Are you the only child in the family? If so, you are the most important in your family.

Parents are the closest people to you in the world. But a lot of middle school students have a problem. They feel they are not as close to their parents as before. They even don’t think their parents are fair to them.

   Some students complain that their parents often say a lot to them, but never listen to them. Some say their parents don’t allow them to play computer games when other people are doing it. Others say when they are making phone calls to friends, their parents like to ask if they’re speaking to a boy or a girl. These make them very unhappy. Some students even decide to leave home because they’re afraid to tell their parents when they have done something wrong, particularly(尤其) when they do badly in exams. Then they usually think running away is the only choice. But they don’t know running away may bring them some more problems. Problems are parts of life. Here are some advice for you to solve your problems.

◆Find a good chance to talk with your parents. Don’t be afraid to tell them your feelings.

◆Keep a diary to help you understand more about yourself and your feelings.

◆Get help from others like good friends or teachers.

◆Show your parents you are growing up. Then they will feel you are no longer a small child.

If you follow the advice, you will have a happy life and never think of running away.

Recently, we’ve interviewed a few parents. 【小题1】 Here are the replies from two of them.

Janet: I think the biggest difference between my childhood and the present is today’s lack(缺乏) of time. 【小题2】 When I was a child, we were outside, climbing trees, building houses with sand and playing from day to night. We would leave our houses and go for explorations(探索) in the woods independently. 【小题3】 They spend a lot of time in front of a TV, or a computer or a mobile phone. I worry about how modern children can have a love for nature and animals.

They spend so little time getting close to them. And they have no place to go for explorations. That seems terrible for the kids these days.

Esther: 【小题4】 In my time, we could only read about different countries and their cultures through books. And we even didn’t have enough books to read. Now, there are not only a large number of traditional paper books but also all kinds of digital media(数字媒体).

【小题5】 Kids also have the chance to travel around to experience the world in person and open their eyes to other cultures.

For the first time, Zhang Shengyu, a student from Laiyang Middle School in Shandong, didn't ask her mother to buy her a new schoolbag or any new pens for the beginning of the school term. "My old schoolbag can still be used, so there is no need to buy a new one," Zhang said, "I've decided to be thrifty from now on."