Текст на английском про космос

Space is very big. There are millions of stars in space. The Sun is a star too.

We live on the Earth. The Earth is a planet. There are eight planets in the Solar System.

Jupiter is the biggest planet. Mercury is very small and very hot. Mars is red.

The Moon goes round the Earth. At night it is white and bright.

My name is Gleb. I like looking at the stars. I have got a small telescope. I want to be an astronaut!

Last Saturday our class went to the planetarium. I was really excited, because I am crazy about space and I have read a lot of books about it.

First we sat in a big round hall, and the lights went out. Suddenly the ceiling became the night sky. A guide was showing us the constellations, and I found the Great Bear before anyone else!

Then we watched a film about the planets. I learnt that Venus is hotter than Mercury, although Mercury is closer to the Sun. That surprised me a lot. Saturn has the most beautiful rings, but Jupiter is the largest planet.

At the end there was a small museum. We saw a real spacesuit and a model of the first satellite. My friend Dasha took a photo of me next to a rocket.

Next month I am going to join the astronomy club at our school.

For thousands of years people looked at the stars and dreamed of flying among them. However, the space age began only in the twentieth century. On the fourth of October 1957, the Soviet Union launched Sputnik 1, the first artificial satellite of the Earth. It was a small metal ball which sent simple radio signals, but it changed history.

Just four years later, on the twelfth of April 1961, Yuri Gagarin became the first person in space. His spacecraft, Vostok 1, flew once around the Earth, and the whole flight lasted only 108 minutes. Before the launch Gagarin famously said 'Poyekhali!', which means 'Let's go!'. Since then, the twelfth of April has been celebrated in Russia as Cosmonautics Day.

Other achievements quickly followed. In 1963 Valentina Tereshkova became the first woman in space, and in 1965 Alexei Leonov made the first spacewalk. In 1969 the American astronauts Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin landed on the Moon.

Today astronauts from different countries live and work together on the International Space Station, where they carry out experiments that cannot be done on Earth.

I have watched several documentaries about space, but I have never seen a real rocket launch. If I ever travel to Baikonur, I will definitely try to see one.

Every time a rocket lifts off, the same debate seems to begin again. With so many problems still unsolved on our own planet, critics ask, why should we spend enormous sums of money on exploring places where nobody can live? It is a fair question, and it deserves a more thoughtful answer than simple enthusiasm.

The first argument in favour of space exploration is a practical one. Much of the technology we now take for granted was developed, or greatly improved, thanks to space programmes. Satellite navigation, accurate weather forecasts and global communication would hardly be possible without the satellites orbiting above us. Even everyday items such as memory foam and scratch-resistant lenses owe something to research carried out for space missions.

Space science also helps us understand our own world. Observations from orbit have allowed scientists to monitor melting ice, forest fires and changes in the ocean, providing information that could not be gathered from the ground.

Critics, however, point out that the benefits are unevenly shared and that some missions seem driven more by national prestige than by real need. They also warn that the growing amount of space debris may one day make orbit dangerous for everybody.

In my view, the strongest argument is not economic but human. Had Gagarin not flown in 1961, generations of children might never have looked up at the night sky and dreamed of becoming scientists. Curiosity has always pushed humanity forward, and I believe that a civilisation which stops exploring is, in a sense, a civilisation which has stopped growing.