Just think for a minute what it would be like if you couldn’t hear. You couldn’t listen to music, hear a dog bark, hear the phone ring or hear your friends talk to you. The world would be a completely silent place to you.

We must know there are three parts of the ear: the outer ear, the middle ear and the inner ear. How do your ears work? The outer ear is what you can see, including the ear canal (道) which collects the sound waves and sends them to your eardrum. The middle ear is a small space filled with air on the inside of your eardrum. In this part of the ear there are three very small bones (骨头). These bones are used to move the sound waves and vibrations (震动) to the cochlea (耳蜗) which is a piece of the ear.

The inner ear has fluid (液体) in it which moves because of the vibrations and moves of small hairs on the outside of the cochlea. There are about 17,000 tiny hairs in each ear. These hair cells create an electrical signal (信号) which is sent to the brain. The brain then works out what you are hearing.

▲ First, try to stay away from the noise. Hearing the noise for a long time will lead to hearing loss. Second, we should keep the ears dry in our daily life. Last, the ears may be influenced by disease and damage (损伤). Diseases of the ears may lead to hearing loss and other problems. So we must look after them well.

Nowadays, more and more students are becoming short-sighted. Some students become short-sighted when they are very young. It is very common in primary schools or middle schools. That’s too serious. From now on, we should care more about eye health. Let’s follow the tips to keep our eyes healthy and protect our eyes carefully.

Healthy habits mean healthy eyes. Here are some daily tips for eye health.

●Clean your eyes with pure cold water regularly. This is one of the best ways to keep eyes healthy and disease free.

●Avoiding (避免) looking directly at the sun.

●Roll your eyes up and down, then side to side. Then move your eyes in a circular motion. Exercise 5 to 10 times a day to relax your eyes.

●Keep a good distance from the computer screen—sit about 22-28 inches away from it.

●Visit your eye doctor regularly.

There are also some tips from the website: www.cdc’s.goy/contactlenses. Try to follow the advice, we’ll protect our eyes well.

Why do we call the forefingershizhi?

In Chinese,shimeans (意思是) “food” —【小题1】

A long time ago, everyone in China ate with their hands. At that time, people often used their forefingers (食指) to taste food, such as soup. They’d quickly dip (浸入) their forefingers into the soup.【小题2】That’s why the forefinger became known as the “food finger”.

【小题3】Perhaps because it is more flexible (灵活的) and easier to use than other fingers.

There is a Chinese idiom (习语)shizhi dadong(食指大动).【小题4】A story says that during the Spring and Autumn Period (春秋时期), there lived a man named Gongzi Song. He liked eating very much.【小题5】Now we use this idiom to show how excited we get when we see tasty food coming our way.