About values:

Recently some of my students had the homework of having a conversation about values with someone, and then writing a short summary.

Favorite pieces from their summaries... with some edits...:

"We talked about love and marriage. In my opinion, college students can find a girlfriend or a boyfriend. But we can't spend too much time and energy on it, because the most important thing in college is study. Dave agreed with me. What amazed me was that Dave said he should find a girlfriend who is good in his mother's eyes. I told to him we aren't children now and we should do choice by ourselves."

"As a college students, should study hard, filial piety parents. Make a contribution to society. Love the motherland."

"Beliefs are important that it can change one's fate. Two little mice fell in a bucket of cream. I think it's right that we should have belief in our life. Obviously, the latter mouse is the one who has his own beliefs. There are always hope in his eyes that encourage him to fight and fight and fight. He never gives up when he is in some difficulty situations. Because the optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty, while the pessimist sees difficulty in every opportunity."

...the entire essay of the student who discussed with her Italian "friend" about the meaning of marriage. Apparently they hotly disagreed. I'm curious to see how that works out for the two of them...

"if I can do good on my job, my life's value is realization I think."

"My parents gave me live, friends give I care about. If one day, someone asked me to sell them, I can't do absolutely. Maybe in the future, I don't have any achievement, not a lot of money, but I have them is enough."

"As to me, I thanks for my parents gave me a birth and I treasure my life as a priceless jewelry."

"we have many dreams that we work hard for it just wanna see our dreams come true. It's a gift that the god give us, so we should keep beautiful eyes to see anything we can see, to feel them, to appreciate them."

"We shouldn't be mammonish."

[in response to why did you enter this college?] "I want to play computer games." (sometimes... I really hope that they DID cheat and not have this conversation.)

"So, I think different people have different values. And I want to know your values."

"I said I agreed Rusue's [Rousseau?] word – why we live – the mercy for difficulty, the wants for knowledge, the wants for loves."