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Hero boy swims for four hours to save his family (9th February 2026)

A 13-year-old Australian boy has been hailed a hero after an epic swim that saved his family. The boy, Austin Appelbee, and his family were on a beach holiday in Western Australia. They were kayaking and paddleboarding in shallow water when strong winds pushed them farther offshore. They ended up over four kilometres away from land, and the daylight was fading. Austin decided to kayak to shore to get help. However, the waves had damaged his kayak, which had taken in water and flipped over. He said he then lost an oar and knew he was in trouble. He decided he had no alternative but to swim back to land. He swam through shark-frequented waters to raise the alarm.

Austin made it to the beach and phoned for help. This sparked a huge rescue operation, which resulted in coastguards finding the teenager's mother and two younger sisters. The boy said: "I hit the bottom of the beach and I just collapsed, and then, after that, I had to “ sprint two kilometres to get to the phone." Rescuers called his efforts "superhuman". One rescuer said Austin's actions could not "be praised highly enough." He added that the teenager's "determination and courage ultimately saved the lives of his mother and siblings." Austin's mother Joanne,47, told reporters: "The wind picked up. We lost oars, and we drifted out further. It was an absolute nightmare."

Because she was correcting homework and planning lessons, Britany went to bed late – and then she overslept!

She had a quick shower but she didn’t have ________ 1 time to put on her makeup. Luckily, she doesn’t wear much anyway, but she had wanted to put on some lipstick at least. Too bad! She made herself a coffee and checked the mail. But ________ 2, it seemed, had remembered her birthday – except for John and Clare whom she had invited for dinner later in the day.

At school, ________ 3 of her colleagues seemed to have remembered that it was her birthday either and that made her miserable, but at least the children in her second grade class were in a happy mood. It cheered her up, and so every time one of them did ________ 4 good or gave her a correct answer, she gave them a gold star. They loved that. Luckily, she had enough stars so ________ 5 went home with at least one!

When she got home, Britany was still tired, so she lay down to have a bit of rest but she didn’t get much sleep because her parents rang from the UK to wish her a happy birthday. At least _________ 6 had remembered! When she finished the call there was ________ 7 time left for sleeping. She had to get dinner ready.

A few minutes later the doorbell rang. She opened the door. There were a lot of people outside. All of them were wearing party hats! A few of them were carrying plates of food. Most of them were colleagues from her school, but there were many others, too. And then they started to sing ‘Happy Birthday …’.

In: HARMER, Jeremy. Teacher Knowledge: core concepts in English language teaching. Pearson Education limited. Essex, UK: 2012

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In the Star Trek universe, the audience occasionally gets a glimpse inside schools on the planet Vulcan. Young children stand alone in “capsules” surrounded by 360-degree digital screens. Adults walk around but do not talk to the students. Instead, each child interacts only with a sophisticated artificial intelligence (AI). Although this is not the reality in today’s classrooms on Earth, there are people for whom a vision of personalized learning conducted by artificial intelligence has considerable appeal.

Individualized learning has its place. But decades of educational research also demonstrate that learning is essentially a social endeavor. Classrooms that privilege personalized AI chatbots overlook that fact.

Generative AI is quickly coming to classrooms. If decades ago educators worldwide promoted the benefits of “One Laptop per Child”, today we may be approaching the model “one chatbot per child.” What does educational research tell us about what this model could mean for children’s learning and well-being?

During much of the 20th century, learning was understood as mainly as a matter of individual cognition. A misconception, if compared to today’s comprehension of what learning involves. Scientists now understand that apparently individual processes – such as building new knowledge – are actually social interactions with the world around us. In classrooms, this suggests that opportunities for daily personal interaction can strongly support brain health and academic learning.

Therefore, it is important to understand generative AI’s real-life impact on students.

For example: How does it feel to learn from a chatbot, day after day? How will long-term use of AI affect children’s mental health? How does AI use affect children’s relationships with each other and with their teachers? What kinds of relationships might children form with the chatbots themselves? More broadly, we could also ask: What do we, as a society, actually want children to learn?

Good teaching and learning blends social and individual processes. I see the beneficial application of any new technology in the classroom – AI or otherwise – as a way to build upon the social fabric of human learning. My concern about personalized AI tutors is how they might displace already infrequent opportunities for social interaction, further isolating children in classrooms.

(Niral Shah. www.converstion.com, 15.12.2025. Adaptado)