Text 9 God bless you

It happens everywhere. You sneeze, and people you've never met, mere passersby, say: "God bless you" or simply "Bless you". Believing that it is simply common courtesy rooted in social etiquette, you may have given little thought to why people say this. Yet, the expression is rooted in superstition. "It comes from the idea that you are sneezing out your soul". To say "God bless", is, in effect, asking God to restore it.

As you are probably aware, there are still many who view a black cat crossing their path as a bad omen or who are fearful of walking under a ladder. Many also believe that Friday the 13^th is a day of bad luck and that the 13^th floor of a building is a dangerous place to be. Such superstition persist even though they are irrational.

Think about it. Why do some people knock on wood when expressing some hopeful sentiment? Isn't it because, without sound evidence, they believe that these acts will ensure good luck? The book A Dictionary of Superstitions observes: "A superstitious mind believes that certain objects, places, animals, or deeds are lucky (good omens or charms) and that others are unlucky (bad omens or signs of misfortune)".

A journalist recently made a tongue-in-cheek remark about a chain letter, which is a letter that is sent to several persons with a request that each send copies to many others. Often, one who passes such a letter on is promised good luck, whereas the one who breaks the chain will supposedly experience evil consequences. So the journalist became a new link in the chain and said: "You understand that I'm not doing this because I'm superstitious. I just want to avoid bad luck".

Anthropologists and folklore experts feel that even the term "superstitious" is too subjective; they are hesitant to label certain behavior patterns that way. They prefer more "comprehensive" but euphemistic terms "folk custom and belief", "folklore" or "belief systems".

Text 10

Aside from the schools' task of socializing and equalizing youngsters of different social, cultural and economic backgrounds, schools have the obvious task of providing quality instruction. The public's concern for better schools and more learning is increasing as results of standardized tests show a continual decline in students' academic achievement.

The 1983 report, A Nation at Risk, by the National Commission on Excellence in Education asserted: "The education foundations of our society are presently being eroded by a rising tide of mediocrity." The following statistics of the report bear out this claim:

• 13 percent of all seventeen-year-olds in the United States are functionally illiterate;

• among minority teenagers the figure may be as high as 40 percent;

• average achievement of high school students on most standardized tests is lower that in the mid-1950s;

• reading, writing and math skills are so poor among young people that employers have spent millions of dollars on remedial education and training programs for their employees.

The commission's recommendations for improving student achievement, widely supported by the public, include the following points: 1. stronger academic curricula with a back-to-basics emphasis on reading, writing, math and science; 2. stricter standards for students, including a heavier homework load and higher grading standards; 3. higher salaries to attract and keep talented, well-qualified teachers.

By its democratic standard America has succeeded in educating the many and has made gains in evening out inequalities. The challenge for American education today is to improve the quality of learning without sacrificing these gains.