By ZHOU Xingzi

The library hall is always an ideal platform to for English Corner as it has more space. The English Corner was moved back to the library this week, which is approved by all the students and teachers. Many students could’t wait to join in the activity, so they arrived before 6:00 p.m. The number of overseas teachers attending this week’s English Corner also increased, with Mr. Gerard Brent, Mr. Michael Beauchot, Mr. Sean McHugh, Mr. Andrew Chun, Dr. Phillip Stevenson, Dr. Maria Sofia Pimentel Biscaia and Dr. Matthew Conduct.

The eternal topic in the English Corner is about traveling and American TV series. As a British, Dr. Matthew Conduct asked the students about many famous tourist spots and traffic condition in China. He preferred to go travel by train rather than by air. So it always takes him a lot of time to reach the destination. For American TV series, he recommended Doctor House and Walking Dead to students. And he also said he was a big fan of the Sherlock Holmes produced by BBC. When talking about novels the students have read, he was very interested in the book named Who moved my cheese, for it was a book about philosophy.

Dr. Matthew Conduct got a PhD in psychology and philosophy. As the students were curious about both fields, he took a simple example to explain the difference between psychology and philosophy. He said one idea of psychology is that when human beings are thinking, their mind and brain are connected. As for visual sense, if the study focus is put on those questions like how images are reflected to the brain, how it becomes an impression in the brain, and what is the relation between them, it belongs to philosophy. He also emphasized that philosophy mainly studies the process to memorize. When a person is taking a note, all the tools he uses to take notes should be part of the memory process, such as the content and the pen, and they might have some relationship. What philosophy studies is to find out the relationship.

Although psychology and philosophy are difficult subjects, the students got a general idea about them in the English Corner. Indeed, The English Corner is a place for students and teachers to communicate with and learn from each other. More topics will be discussed in the following weeks.