It would be highly unfortunate if women started thinking twice before having children due to the risk of minor weight gain as a result:
MUMS who blame their children for their weight gain now have evidence to back their claims.
UK researchers have found that the more children a woman has, the greater her body mass index (BMI) is likely to be later in life.
I hope mothers are not blaming their children for weight gain, or anything else for that matter.
Never, ever take a kids survey on face value!
According to a recent survey millions of children are complaining that school is too easy.
My students often boast about the lesson content being very easy. Then I assess them. It often turns out it wasn’t as easy as they first thought.
Why on earth would we believe a kids survey that claims school is too easy when it isn’t backed up by assessment results?
Millions of kids simply don’t find school very challenging, a new analysis of federal survey data suggests. The report could spark a debate about whether new academic standards being piloted nationwide might make a difference.
The findings, out today from the Center for American Progress, a Washington think tank that champions “progressive ideas,” analyze three years of questionnaires from the Department of Education’s National Assessment of Educational Progress, a national test given each year.
Among the findings:
•37% of fourth-graders say their math work is “often” or “always” too easy;
•57% of eighth-graders say their history work is “often” or “always” too easy;
•39% of 12th-graders say they rarely write about what they read in class.
If I was from the Center of American Progress I would be embarrassed to admit to spending so long on a survey that is clearly misleading. Talk about a waste of three years!
Rule 1: Never ask students whether class work is easy when you can get a better picture by gauging their assessment results (I’m not referring to standardised tests).
Rule 2: Never ask students whether their homework was easy. Instead, ask their parents as they are the ones that do it.
Rule 3: If you are trying to make education more “progressive”, don’t waste three years on a survey.
Click here for a more in-depth analysis of this survey.
I wonder if the firing of a yoga teacher for setting sensible standards of behaviour will soon apply to us school teachers:
For years, yoga instructor Alice Van Ness has started her classes with a simple request – that students turn their cell phones off.
She brought that policy with her to Facebook, where she began teaching a weekly class at the company’s Menlo Park campus in March. But it proved to be a hard policy to follow for at least one employee, who began tapping away on her phone in the middle of class. And after Van Ness shot her a disapproving look, the instructor found herself out of a job.
The 35-year-old San Carlos resident was fired last month after managers at the fitness contractor she worked for explained that saying “no” to Facebook employees is a no-no.
Bill Henson, a so-called artist, who makes his living by photographing (among other subjects) minors in the nude, is no expert on child welfare. I find it quite upsetting that a person who has grown to prominence by insisting that photographs of naked minors are somehow artistic, gets the platform to point the finger at the church and sport.
The church is an easy target. Mr. Henson has made a diversionary “cheap shot” which is offensive and in very bad taste:
CONTROVERSIAL photographer Bill Henson has pointed to sport and the church as far more likely to harm children than anything involving the arts.
Mr Henson, who sparked outrage by including images of naked minors in a 2008 exhibition, told The Australian that the arts were the last thing likely to actually harm kids.
“We’re talking about the potential for harm,” he said. “If you want to talk about that in relation to real children and real harm, you’d have to start with priests in the church, or sport.
“If you want to talk about actual harm to actual kids, the last place you would start would be the arts.”
Henson has an exhibition opening in Sydney in September but said he had not decided whether it would include nude figures.
“There’s a lot of grassroots common sense out there in Australian society and I think a lot of people began to get a bit sick of it,” he said in reference to the furore over his 2008 exhibition.
I am not in favour of banning Mr. Henson’s work, but I am certainly not a devotee. In my opinion, there is no way to photograph a naked pre-pubecent child without being exploitative and without sexualising the “model”. Sure he might be talented, but talent isn’t an excuse for poor taste.
Mr. Henson should stop looking for easy diversions and grow up!
Food companies wouldn’t be “conning” well-meaning parents, would they?
CHILDREN are being conned by food companies who are making fatty and sugary foods appear to be healthy, a study suggests.
Some of Australia’s most popular brands, including Kellogg’s and Nestle, have been accused of making food that appeals to children look healthier than it actually is, the Flinders University study shows.
Researchers, led by lecturer Kaye Mehte, found 157 products on a major supermarket chain’s shelves with packaging designed to appeal to children through cartoons, competitions and give-aways.
More than three-quarters of these products were deemed to be unhealthy, primarily because they are high in fat and sugar.
But more than half of them had prominent nutrition claims on the packaging, boasting that the product is, for example, “99 per cent fat free”, “high in calcium” or has “no artificial colours”, they found.
“This has the potential to mislead and confuse children as well as parents who would be more inclined to purchase products carrying claims about health and nutrition,” Dr Mehte said.
Jane Martin, executive manager of the Obesity Policy Coalition said using the techniques to attract children to unhealthy food was “simply unethical”.
What a brave decision! After weeks of writing an endless array of negative posts, I have found a truly remarkable person to write about. Fed up with a school that included teachers who sexually abused students (even in one case forcing them to eat semen), Los Angeles schools Superintendent John Deasy fired the entire staff:
Faced with a shocking case of a teacher accused of playing classroom sex games with children for years, Los Angeles schools Superintendent John Deasy delivered another jolt: He removed the school’s entire staff — from custodians to the principal — to smash what he called a ‘culture of silence.’
‘It was a quick, responsible, responsive action to a heinous situation,’ he said. ‘We’re not going to spend a long time debating student safety.’
The controversial decision underscores the 51-year-old superintendent’s shake-up of the lethargic bureaucracy at the nation’s second-largest school district. His swift, bold moves have rankled some and won praise from others during his first year of leadership.
Hired with a mandate to boost achievement in the 660,000-pupil Los Angeles Unified School District, Deasy has become known for 18-hour days that involve everything from surprise classroom visits and picking up playground litter to lobbying city elite for donations and blasting Sacramento politicians over funding cuts.
He’s also gained a reputation for outspokenness and a brisk decision-making style some have criticized as heavy-handed. Earlier this year, for instance, Deasy ordered a substitute teacher fired after finding students doing busy work.
It’s very hard for parents to find time with their iPhones and iPads because children have a habit of getting to them first.
It was only a matter of time before manufacturers invented a toy that will give your children yet another reason to run off with your phone:
Any parent knows that irrespective of what engaging and exciting toys you buy for your children, they will always be more interested in your mobile phone or tablet computer. It’s an inescapable fact of modern day parenting. With this in mind, toy firm Little Tikes has revealed a range of iPhone-friendly toys which can connect with your iOS devices.
The iTikes toys iOS devices toys include a keyboard, map, microscope and an art canvas, all of which can be used as stand-alone toys. But it’s when you add an iPhone, iPad or iPod Touch running a free iTikes app, that the fun really begins and the toys gain additional (and considerably more high-tech) functionality.
I’m still waiting for the iCanMakeMyBed, iWillShareMyToys and the future bestseller iWillDoMyHomeworkWithoutComplaint.
It’s a disgrace that so many predators are registered teachers. Every day at least one pedophile teacher is uncovered.
Take this latest allegation for example:
A HIGH school teacher allegedly obtained naked and semi-naked pictures of two 14-year-old girl students at his school after posing as a teenage boy on a fake Facebook profile.
It is understood police will allege the country teacher pretended to be a schoolboy of a similar age from another regional town in a ploy to prey on the girls.
The students are believed to have sent him naked and semi-naked photos of themselves via the social networking site.
The teacher, who has been sacked and cannot be named for legal reasons, faced court this week on two counts of involving a child in child exploitation.
Until now, The Sunday Times has been prevented from publishing any details of the case.
After successfully challenging the terms of the original suppression order on the case, The Sunday Times is now permitted to reveal certain aspects of the allegations, which have prompted a warning from cyber safety experts for parents to educate their children about the importance of safety settings on Facebook for the coming school holidays, which started yesterday.
This is why I am a strong proponent of the no contact rule in schools. Whilst the vast majority of teachers are good citizens, there are still too many sick, evil predators still to be exposed.
Click here to read my post, “Why Can’t Teachers Touch Kids any More? :O’Brien”.
I’m sorry but ‘soul searching’ isn’t going to be sufficient in this case:
The suicide of a 13-year-old boy in southern Japan after classmates systematically bullied him — even making him “practice” suicide — while teachers ignored the abuse or laughed has prompted soul-searching among educators across the country.
One of the boy’s last acts was to text his tormentors and leave voice mails for them to say, “I’m going to die.” They texted him back to say, “You should die.”
The middle school student, whose name has not been released, jumped from his 14th floor apartment in the city of Otsu last October after enduring heartrending tales of abuse at the hands of his classmates.
His father filed several reports with the police, but officers never accepted them, saying that they could not prove that bullying led to his suicide, according to Japanese media reports.
Details of the harassment are coming to light eight months later, following a student survey conducted by the city’s board of education. In that anonymous survey, students write the bullying escalated to “punching and kicking” in September last year, about a month before the teen jumped to his death. The victim was pressured into shoplifting, had his legs and arms tied while bullies duck-taped his mouth. Students watched as their peers pressured the teen into eating dead bees, “pantsed” him, and made him “practice” committing suicide.
In the survey, some classmates report alerting teachers to those “practices,” but say nothing was done.
Instead, teachers reportedly laughed as bullies tried to choke the victim.
Any teacher found to be laughing needs to be sacked immediately. Those who texted back to the boy on the night of his suicide should be expelled.
There is a place for “soul-searching”. This however, is a time for action.
Click here to find out what happened next in this tragic saga.
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