A Doll Comes To Visit

You are a fifth-grade girl who comes home from school to find a doll on your front porch. The doll looks like you, is dressed like you, and there is something about the eyes. Who left it? Why is it here? And what makes this doll so special?

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With a Little Help From My Friend

Jim Jenkins is an ace detective who solves the most difficult crimes. Yet he always works alone. Or does he?

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The Boy Who Could Wiggle His Ears

Learning how to wiggle your ears is really hard. But you can do it if you keep trying. And if you learn to keep trying, no problem is too big. So if you can wiggle your ears, you can do anything!

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How Does Seaweed Reproduce?

Seaweed is a plant, right? And many plants depend on pollination for reproduction. So how is seaweed able to reproduce? The trail does lead to the process familiar to many land plants. First, scientists discovered in 2016 that zooplankton can pollinate seagrass in the Caribbean. Now scientists have found a small, bug-like crustacean called Idotea balthica that can pollinate

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Why Hot Weather Is So Hard On Us

Are you getting tired of the hot weather? It’s been pretty relentless;  On July 6 The New York Times reported about 70 million people in the U.S. were under heat advisories or warnings. I’m sure you’ve seen the cautions about dehydration, heat exhaustion, and so forth. But you can be sitting in the shade with your glass of

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What Can We See From Space?

Some of you reading this are young enough to get a realistic chance to travel into space sometime in the future. When you look down on Earth, what do you expect to see? Yes, there will be oceans and continents, and even large lakes, but will there be any signs of human handiwork? This question

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The Cost of Change

People simply don’t like change. When I was in the publishing business, the company I had just joined had the opportunity to expand. There was a casket-supply company close by whose business was (if you’ll pardon the expression) dying, so we had a chance to move into their location. Yet some neighbors were very vocally

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Addition by Subtraction

When you are asked to improve something, how often do you think about additions? For home renovation, isn’t it always what you can add? Or for business brainstorming sessions, which new projects to take on? But there is a case to be made for taking away. Sometimes we can do better by removing, streamlining and

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