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This is the VOA Special English Education Report , from voaspecialenglish.com | http About eighteen thousand refugees from Burma have come to the United States each year since two thousand seven. Some have settled in Howard County, Maryland, between Baltimore and Washington. A local school began teaching English to the children of the refugees. But while the children learned the language, their parents did not. Currently almost fifty Burmese youngsters attend Bollman Bridge Elementary School. Laurel Conran teaches English to speakers of other languages. One of her students is Tha Neih Ciang. Another student is Tha Neih’s mother, Tin Iang. The teacher practices English with the mother at the mother’s workplace. Many Burmese refugees work at Coastal Sunbelt Produce. The company supplies fruits and vegetables to restaurants and other businesses. Laurel Conran started English classes there to help refugees from the country also known as Myanmar. The program is a six-week session held every Wednesday from twelve to one o’clock. Each week Ms. Conran goes to Coastal Sunbelt. As the Burmese workers eat lunch, they also practice their new language skills. They sit with an English-speaking volunteer in small groups.Lisa Chertok is a manager at the company and also has a child at Bollman Bridge. She helped Ms. Conran develop the lessons: “When the Burmese employees got here, they were very, very shy. Now I find that they are more responsive as employees. They’re more communicative …

This is the VOA Special English Agriculture Report from voaspecialenglish.com | http Many people have lettuce in a salad at the beginning of a meal. The ancient Egyptians and Romans had it at the end. Either way, gardening experts say lettuce is one of the easiest vegetables to grow in a garden.There are hundreds of kinds of head and leaf lettuces besides the most popular choices, like iceberg, Boston, bibb and romaine. The best time to plant the seeds is during cool weather. Gardening advisers at the University of Illinois Extension say the best planting temperature is fifteen degrees Celsius. You can use a seed tray to start the seeds indoors. The container should be deep enough to hold at least three centimeters of soil. Leave about one centimeter of space between the soil and the top of the container. The container should have holes in the bottom so extra water can flow out. Cover the seeds lightly with soil. If the soil is not already a little wet, give it some water, but not too much. Too much water could drown the seeds. Next, cover the seed tray with paper. Remove the paper when the seedlings are tall enough to touch it. You can transplant the seedlings into the garden when they are about two to three centimeters tall. Do this when the weather is not too hot and not too cold. Take out as much of the soil as you can with the seedlings. Plant them in the ground in a hole that is bigger than the lettuce roots. Keep the plants watered, but not too heavily. Planting …

This is the VOA Special English Health Report, from voaspecialenglish.com | http The journal Science chose an AIDS study as the twenty-eleven “Breakthrough of the Year.” The study found that antiretroviral drugs can greatly lower the risk of spreading HIV, the virus that causes AIDS. It showed that infected people with early treatment were ninety-six percent less likely to infect their partners.The study was a clinical trial known as HPTN 052. Myron Cohen led an international team that began the study in two thousand seven. But Dr. Cohen says the work really began twenty years ago: “We had a strong suspicion based on all the biological studies we had done that when we treat people and lower the concentration of HIV in the blood and secretions, we were rendering them less contagious. But we didn’t understand the magnitude of the benefit.”Dr. Cohen heads the Institute for Global Health and Infectious Diseases at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases paid for the study.It involved heterosexual couples in nine countries in Africa, Asia and the Americas. The results have already had an effect on government policies. Those changes include treating HIV-infected people when their immune systems are still relatively healthy. Dr. Cohen says the study “has generated policy changes at the level of the United States and the World Health Organization and UNAIDS. And it’s inspired new community-based clinical trials …

This is the VOA Special English Economics Report from voaspecialenglish.com | http In early January, President Obama appointed Richard Cordray as director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. This new government agency says it has already made home loans and credit card agreements easier for Americans to understand. But the Obama administration said the bureau cannot supervise financial products like home loans without a director. The president used a measure known as a recess appointment to fill the position. He nominated Mr. Cordray last July. But the opposition Republican Party blocked a vote in the full Senate.Mr. Obama announced the appointment during a visit to Ohio. It was his first political campaign trip of the year. He told the crowd that the severe economic crisis three years ago did not happen because of too many financial rules. Mr. Obama said: “Does anyone think the reason why we got into such a financial mess, the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression, the worst economic crisis in a generation, that the reason was because of too much oversight of the financial industry? Of course not. We shouldn’t be weakening oversight, we shouldn’t be weakening accountability, we should be strengthening it!”Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell criticized the president’s appointment. Many Republicans oppose the new agency, saying its goals are not clear. They also want a group of people to lead the agency instead of a single director. The Consumer …

This is the VOA Special English Education Report from voaspecialenglish.com | http Did you make a New Year’s resolution? Some of you shared your goals at the VOA Learning English page on Facebook. And, no surprise, many of you said at least one of your goals for twenty-twelve is to speak English better. Daniel Kwon even went so far as to declare: I’m definitely going to try to study English at least an hour a day. Jose Antonio Velarde says: My first resolution is to speak English as fluently as my Spanish. And Tuti Riel says: My New Year’s resolution is to be able to speak English and Mandarin fluently, and be a better person. Juwita Zulmi says she wants to improve her English and get a scholarship to study overseas. Another goal for twenty-twelve: a new boyfriend. Derly Johanna Barreto has these two resolutions: to speak English fluently and to get a job. Jiseon Kim also has two goals: to lose weight and improve speaking English. And Katie Chekalina has these resolutions: Don’t eat meat. I’ll take it easy. Then, to learn Spanish or Italian, and find my real love. The last ones will be the most difficult, she thinks. Rafa Mtz’s main goal is finishing high school and getting into a university. Lola Wazqito Oktobrata says: I am going to get married and finish my undergraduate study with good results. And Uma Cherif is ready for the next step this year: a master’s degree. Handri Permana has this resolution: Be more meaningful before my time’s up on earth. And Handri has this …

This is the VOA Special English Technology Report, from voaspecialenglish.com | http Electronics were among the most requested gifts of the twenty-eleven Christmas holiday season in the United States. Jim Barry from the Consumer Electronics Association says tablet computers were the most popular electronic gift. Laptop computers were second. Jim Barry says the iPad continued to lead the way in the tablet market. Apple released its iPad 2 in March. The company is expected to release the iPad 3 in twenty-twelve. “Tablet computers are the top of the list of what folks said they were going to buy this year. And probably north of eighty percent of the tablets being sold up until now have been Apple iPads.” But he says the tablet market is starting to change. There are now more choices and less costly tablets available. These include the new Kindle Fire from Amazon.com. Jim Barry says e-readers were number three on his group’s survey of holiday gift wishes, and that came as a surprise to more than a few people. “Some folks thought that the popularity and success of the tablet computer would mean sales of e-book readers would go down. Well, that hasn’t happened. Sales of e-book readers have more than doubled this year. We’re buying lots more. The leaders there continue to be the Kindle from Amazon and the Nook from Barnes and Noble, along with the e-reader from Sony.” Amazon released its Kindle Fire just in time for Christmas. The new Kindle is a touchscreen tablet. Unlike the …