Sunday, April 27, 2008
Earth Day
A new look at junk, or change the world, one bit a a time...
Things to discuss when it comes to saving resources...
Recycling is when an object can be shredded, melted or otherwise processed and then turned into new raw material -- for instance, aluminum cans can be melted down to make more cans, glass can make more glass, cardboard and paper make more cardboard and paper, plastic bags and containers can be turned into other plastic products. This takes some energy (very little for aluminum), but it is a good choice.
Reusing is when you find a use for an existing item - like decorating a bag and using it as a gift bag instead of buying wrapping paper; putting leftovers into a clean container from some other food; turning a used box into storage; decorating a can to hold pencils; saving packing peanuts and boxes and using them the next time you need to ship something or give a gift.
It is important to 'reuse' items wisely -- reusing packing peanuts to pack an item is by far the best way to use them. Recycling them, if it is available, would be the next best thing. Turning them into an art project would be the least effective, and eventually they will end up in the landfill. Now many of us love art projects, and would be using materials to make crafts anyway, and so using an item that would otherwise be discarded may still be a sensible choice, it depends on the project. Our Earth Day Messenger Card and Laundry Bottle Pet Food Scoop crafts are great ways of making art out of would-be "junk." For more great ideas on recycled crafts, check out our Earth Day Crafts section.
Giving things in good condition that you no longer need to charity is another good way to reuse things like outgrown clothing or toys. Reusing is often the best way to save resources. This is something to consider year-round, not just around the winter holidays.
Shop Wisely to save resources. Can the container be easily recycled or reused? Will a larger container reduce the amount of packaging and perhaps cost less per serving? Is everything that can be recycled being recycled?
Save resources (and money) by asking yourself if the item is something you really need, and if it is well suited for the task, and if it will last. Not only can this save you money, it can save you space and work, too. Five toys that are loved an played with are more fun than 10 toys that are broken or are boring to play with. And it's quicker to pick up 5 toys and put them away than to pick up 10. Sometimes my kids and I imagine what it would be like if we bought everything we 'liked'..... and we realize that there wouldn't be any room left for us in the house.... and that really doesn't sound like that much fun, even to my kids.
And, when you're out shopping in the stores, bring your own reusable bag instead of taking a plastic bag you'll eventually just throw away.
Plant a Tree
Sally Sullivan writes:
I teach a 4 year old preschool class and one of the ways we celebrated Earth Day last year was to purchase trees through the National Arbor Day Foundation to be planted in honor of each child in our class. The trees last year were to be planted in the John Denver Memorial Grove in Aspen. It was only a $1 donation per tree.
We printed up a letter/document for each child telling them about the tree that was purchased on their behalf and how it would help our earth.
Plant-It 2020 is also a nonprofit tree-planting foundation. For every dollar contributed to this foundation a tree will be planted, and the contributor selects where the tree(s) will be planted from an international site list. (click here to visit the Plant-It 2020 site)
Clean Up and Beautify
Organize a project to clean up or beautify some area in your town. It could be at your school, or some other spot. Make sure to have a plan for how to take care of the spot after you've made it nice.
You can read about what some kids did in this International Center for Tropical Ecology Newsletter - scroll down and look for 'Windstar Kids at Broadview Elementary'
Other Ideas
Earth Hour - A world-wide initiative to have households, businesses, and schools turn off their electricity for at least one hour to reduce the impact on global climate changes on Earth.
Pennies for the Planet - Get a free teacher's guide for this fundraising and awareness event from the World Wildlife Fund.
Earth's Birthday Project - Butterfly and Moth Activity teaching kit, adopt and acre of rainforest, and read about Earth's Birthday with the Zwibble Dibbles.
Earth Day Groceries Project - Increase awareness of Earth Day by making special Earth Day grocery bags for your supermarket. Good school project.
Teachers.net has an Earth Day discussion board where folks are posting ideas.
Things to discuss when it comes to saving resources...
Recycling is when an object can be shredded, melted or otherwise processed and then turned into new raw material -- for instance, aluminum cans can be melted down to make more cans, glass can make more glass, cardboard and paper make more cardboard and paper, plastic bags and containers can be turned into other plastic products. This takes some energy (very little for aluminum), but it is a good choice.
Reusing is when you find a use for an existing item - like decorating a bag and using it as a gift bag instead of buying wrapping paper; putting leftovers into a clean container from some other food; turning a used box into storage; decorating a can to hold pencils; saving packing peanuts and boxes and using them the next time you need to ship something or give a gift.
It is important to 'reuse' items wisely -- reusing packing peanuts to pack an item is by far the best way to use them. Recycling them, if it is available, would be the next best thing. Turning them into an art project would be the least effective, and eventually they will end up in the landfill. Now many of us love art projects, and would be using materials to make crafts anyway, and so using an item that would otherwise be discarded may still be a sensible choice, it depends on the project. Our Earth Day Messenger Card and Laundry Bottle Pet Food Scoop crafts are great ways of making art out of would-be "junk." For more great ideas on recycled crafts, check out our Earth Day Crafts section.
Giving things in good condition that you no longer need to charity is another good way to reuse things like outgrown clothing or toys. Reusing is often the best way to save resources. This is something to consider year-round, not just around the winter holidays.
Shop Wisely to save resources. Can the container be easily recycled or reused? Will a larger container reduce the amount of packaging and perhaps cost less per serving? Is everything that can be recycled being recycled?
Save resources (and money) by asking yourself if the item is something you really need, and if it is well suited for the task, and if it will last. Not only can this save you money, it can save you space and work, too. Five toys that are loved an played with are more fun than 10 toys that are broken or are boring to play with. And it's quicker to pick up 5 toys and put them away than to pick up 10. Sometimes my kids and I imagine what it would be like if we bought everything we 'liked'..... and we realize that there wouldn't be any room left for us in the house.... and that really doesn't sound like that much fun, even to my kids.
And, when you're out shopping in the stores, bring your own reusable bag instead of taking a plastic bag you'll eventually just throw away.
Plant a Tree
Sally Sullivan writes:
I teach a 4 year old preschool class and one of the ways we celebrated Earth Day last year was to purchase trees through the National Arbor Day Foundation to be planted in honor of each child in our class. The trees last year were to be planted in the John Denver Memorial Grove in Aspen. It was only a $1 donation per tree.
We printed up a letter/document for each child telling them about the tree that was purchased on their behalf and how it would help our earth.
Plant-It 2020 is also a nonprofit tree-planting foundation. For every dollar contributed to this foundation a tree will be planted, and the contributor selects where the tree(s) will be planted from an international site list. (click here to visit the Plant-It 2020 site)
Clean Up and Beautify
Organize a project to clean up or beautify some area in your town. It could be at your school, or some other spot. Make sure to have a plan for how to take care of the spot after you've made it nice.
You can read about what some kids did in this International Center for Tropical Ecology Newsletter - scroll down and look for 'Windstar Kids at Broadview Elementary'
Other Ideas
Earth Hour - A world-wide initiative to have households, businesses, and schools turn off their electricity for at least one hour to reduce the impact on global climate changes on Earth.
Pennies for the Planet - Get a free teacher's guide for this fundraising and awareness event from the World Wildlife Fund.
Earth's Birthday Project - Butterfly and Moth Activity teaching kit, adopt and acre of rainforest, and read about Earth's Birthday with the Zwibble Dibbles.
Earth Day Groceries Project - Increase awareness of Earth Day by making special Earth Day grocery bags for your supermarket. Good school project.
Teachers.net has an Earth Day discussion board where folks are posting ideas.
Friday, April 18, 2008
Men, women and directions
If men are so good at directions then why can they never find anything around the house? I was pulled over to the computer the other night by the man I seem to have married. He was gloating quietly over something he found on the Internet. It was about men, and how good they are with maps.
‘Funny that,’ he said.
It was one of those brain-scan studies where they take nice coloured-y pictures of the brain during various Activities. Now it is well known that a man’s brain remains completely dead and grey when he’s asked to clean the toilet, but it lights up like a Christmas tree, apparently, when he is asked to read a map. They took the pictures as people made their way around a 3-D computer maze, and the results show that men navigate with some deep, limbic bit of their brain while women use a shallower, more cortical approach. We just look around us apparently and try to figure things out.
So what does this mean? It means men know the way, while women have to think about it. Does this explain why they never, ever ask for directions? Is this why they refuse - just refuse - I mean stall, balk at, dig their heels in, find themselves incapable of moving in any other direction than the one the have decided, nay intuit, in their deepest, truest self to be the Only Right Way?
They Know, that’s all. Deep down. They can not unknown. They can’t help it.
I have no particular man in mind here, you understand, I married a paragon of mildness and good sense, who just has to lift his nose and sniff to know where north is. You can’t argue with that. No, I’m talking about the more mediocre style of man, the kind other girls marry, who are always stubborn but not always right.
Because, even in this computer test, the men were wrong a good percent of the time. They were wrong in a very deep, very lit-up part of their brains. And who’s to say they’re not just better at computer simulations, having wasted more time with stupid games, lets face it, than their female counterparts. Though I am quite partial myself, to the occasional lost weekend of Tomb Raider 3.
Hang on. Does this mean I’m a boy really, deep down? Oh, never mind. I’ve always thought that the differences between men and women are much exaggerated – the only thing that I have found to be true, and absolutely true, is that men always, but ALWAYS, have more keys on their key rings. The other is that the person who makes the security gate bleep at the airport is ALWAYS a man. If it’s a woman holding the line up when you’re running for a flight, believe me, he’s in drag. It’s their bits that set it off. I’m convinced of it.
But otherwise I am wary of studies and statistics. The scientists have found that women’s brain have a bigger bit for sadness. Is this why we cry at the pictures? They have found the place where we believe in god – it’s in our frontal lobes apparently. And a place for laughter, in the motor cortex.
Scientists.
My favourite scientific statistic is that men who help around the house get more sex. Now that’s what I call a good statistic – it’s true, it makes sense, and it was researched by a woman.
Meanwhile they keep banging on about boy toddlers spatial awareness, how boys learn by running around a lot, how girls learn by doing bloody embroidery. But if men are so spatially aware, if they are so wonderfully 3-D, how come they never know where anything is around the house? Where’s that book? It’s on the third shelf down. Where’s my bag? It’s where you left it. Where’s the saucepan? It’s in my back pocket.
Well yes, says my man, but what about all the time you spend looking for your goddamn keys!! Yeah but that’s just psychological, isn’t it? I don’t want to find my keys. I know where every book in the house is. I know where the plastic cutlery is for going camping! I know where the hair-dryer is, if either of us decided to grow our hair, or sweat the fat off a duck. I know where I put my feather boa. I know where the cleaner is, for suede shoes. Do you know where the cleaner is for suede shoes?
Up a bit…left a bit…right a bit…down a bit. Oh, if it was a dog, it would bite you.
‘Funny that,’ he said.
It was one of those brain-scan studies where they take nice coloured-y pictures of the brain during various Activities. Now it is well known that a man’s brain remains completely dead and grey when he’s asked to clean the toilet, but it lights up like a Christmas tree, apparently, when he is asked to read a map. They took the pictures as people made their way around a 3-D computer maze, and the results show that men navigate with some deep, limbic bit of their brain while women use a shallower, more cortical approach. We just look around us apparently and try to figure things out.
So what does this mean? It means men know the way, while women have to think about it. Does this explain why they never, ever ask for directions? Is this why they refuse - just refuse - I mean stall, balk at, dig their heels in, find themselves incapable of moving in any other direction than the one the have decided, nay intuit, in their deepest, truest self to be the Only Right Way?
They Know, that’s all. Deep down. They can not unknown. They can’t help it.
I have no particular man in mind here, you understand, I married a paragon of mildness and good sense, who just has to lift his nose and sniff to know where north is. You can’t argue with that. No, I’m talking about the more mediocre style of man, the kind other girls marry, who are always stubborn but not always right.
Because, even in this computer test, the men were wrong a good percent of the time. They were wrong in a very deep, very lit-up part of their brains. And who’s to say they’re not just better at computer simulations, having wasted more time with stupid games, lets face it, than their female counterparts. Though I am quite partial myself, to the occasional lost weekend of Tomb Raider 3.
Hang on. Does this mean I’m a boy really, deep down? Oh, never mind. I’ve always thought that the differences between men and women are much exaggerated – the only thing that I have found to be true, and absolutely true, is that men always, but ALWAYS, have more keys on their key rings. The other is that the person who makes the security gate bleep at the airport is ALWAYS a man. If it’s a woman holding the line up when you’re running for a flight, believe me, he’s in drag. It’s their bits that set it off. I’m convinced of it.
But otherwise I am wary of studies and statistics. The scientists have found that women’s brain have a bigger bit for sadness. Is this why we cry at the pictures? They have found the place where we believe in god – it’s in our frontal lobes apparently. And a place for laughter, in the motor cortex.
Scientists.
My favourite scientific statistic is that men who help around the house get more sex. Now that’s what I call a good statistic – it’s true, it makes sense, and it was researched by a woman.
Meanwhile they keep banging on about boy toddlers spatial awareness, how boys learn by running around a lot, how girls learn by doing bloody embroidery. But if men are so spatially aware, if they are so wonderfully 3-D, how come they never know where anything is around the house? Where’s that book? It’s on the third shelf down. Where’s my bag? It’s where you left it. Where’s the saucepan? It’s in my back pocket.
Well yes, says my man, but what about all the time you spend looking for your goddamn keys!! Yeah but that’s just psychological, isn’t it? I don’t want to find my keys. I know where every book in the house is. I know where the plastic cutlery is for going camping! I know where the hair-dryer is, if either of us decided to grow our hair, or sweat the fat off a duck. I know where I put my feather boa. I know where the cleaner is, for suede shoes. Do you know where the cleaner is for suede shoes?
Up a bit…left a bit…right a bit…down a bit. Oh, if it was a dog, it would bite you.
Wednesday, April 09, 2008
Eating disorders
Living with an eating disorder is a miserable, lonely experience. For most people, food is one of life's pleasures and an important social event. So if your feelings about food aren't relaxed, an important part of life becomes extremely stressed. This stress may add to other enormous stresses that may have led to the eating disorder in the first place.
When someone you know and love develops an eating disorder, it's easy to feel confused about what to do, and even threatened or angry.
Unfortunately, many health professionals are just as much at sea. Although eating disorders are increasing, we still know very little about their causes. Worse still, there aren't any quick or easy treatments.
A few things are clear. People with eating disorders aren't:
* Bad or being defiant
* Going through a 'teenage phase'
* The result of poor or inadequate parenting
* The product of modern stresses and obsession with weight
* Able to snap out of it
What is known about eating disorders?
Many things about eating disorders aren't fully understood, but we do know the following:
* Eating disorders have been around for centuries
* Diets don't cause eating disorders, but research has shown young women who diet at a severe level are 18 times more likely to develop an eating disorder than those who don't and those who diet at a moderate level are five times more likely
* Severe psychological problems, such as obsessive compulsive behaviour and depression, increase the risk of developing eating disorders
How common are they?
The most common form of disordered eating is obesity
Eating disorders include a range of different conditions where people have an abnormal attitude towards food, altered appetite control and unhealthy eating habits that affect their health and ability to function normally. The most common form of disordered eating is obesity, which affects more than one in ten people.
Bulimia nervosa, or binge eating and purging, is twice as common as anorexia.
Men and boys also have eating disorders, but less often than girls or women.
What are the causes?
Families often blame themselves, but they shouldn't. None of the research shows much difference between the ways that families of anorexics work compared with other families.
The causes of eating disorders are complex. They're probably the result of several factors, including:
* A genetic tendency
* Learned responses and habits, especially to stress
* Cultural and social pressures, for example to be slim
* Psychological factors, such as perfectionism and lack self-esteem, although it's not known whether this is a cause or effect of disorders
What can families do?
Treating eating disorders usually involves years of hard work
The first thing is to accept that there's no quick fix - treating eating disorders usually involves years of hard work. During this time, there can be huge tension and communication can be terrible, but families can play a critical role in helping their relative through the worst.
Families need expert help for this, so talk to your doctor or contact one of the organisations given in our links.
How to help:
1. Help the person affected recognise they have a problem. Try to avoid head-to-head confrontation because it will only end in rebellion, tears and failure.
2. Be prepared to raid all your reserves of optimism and enthusiasm.
3. Try to remain sympathetic, no matter how bad the person's outer expression of their inner turmoil becomes.
4. Don't forget other members of the family and their needs, and don't let your own life, career and enjoyments become swamped or you'll become unable to give support.
5. Keep communication going with the patient and health professionals. What your loved one needs is a cohesive team supporting them.
It's a long road to recovery. After five years, about half of people with eating disorders have recovered, although many remain preoccupied with food, eating and their weight for many more years.
When someone you know and love develops an eating disorder, it's easy to feel confused about what to do, and even threatened or angry.
Unfortunately, many health professionals are just as much at sea. Although eating disorders are increasing, we still know very little about their causes. Worse still, there aren't any quick or easy treatments.
A few things are clear. People with eating disorders aren't:
* Bad or being defiant
* Going through a 'teenage phase'
* The result of poor or inadequate parenting
* The product of modern stresses and obsession with weight
* Able to snap out of it
What is known about eating disorders?
Many things about eating disorders aren't fully understood, but we do know the following:
* Eating disorders have been around for centuries
* Diets don't cause eating disorders, but research has shown young women who diet at a severe level are 18 times more likely to develop an eating disorder than those who don't and those who diet at a moderate level are five times more likely
* Severe psychological problems, such as obsessive compulsive behaviour and depression, increase the risk of developing eating disorders
How common are they?
The most common form of disordered eating is obesity
Eating disorders include a range of different conditions where people have an abnormal attitude towards food, altered appetite control and unhealthy eating habits that affect their health and ability to function normally. The most common form of disordered eating is obesity, which affects more than one in ten people.
Bulimia nervosa, or binge eating and purging, is twice as common as anorexia.
Men and boys also have eating disorders, but less often than girls or women.
What are the causes?
Families often blame themselves, but they shouldn't. None of the research shows much difference between the ways that families of anorexics work compared with other families.
The causes of eating disorders are complex. They're probably the result of several factors, including:
* A genetic tendency
* Learned responses and habits, especially to stress
* Cultural and social pressures, for example to be slim
* Psychological factors, such as perfectionism and lack self-esteem, although it's not known whether this is a cause or effect of disorders
What can families do?
Treating eating disorders usually involves years of hard work
The first thing is to accept that there's no quick fix - treating eating disorders usually involves years of hard work. During this time, there can be huge tension and communication can be terrible, but families can play a critical role in helping their relative through the worst.
Families need expert help for this, so talk to your doctor or contact one of the organisations given in our links.
How to help:
1. Help the person affected recognise they have a problem. Try to avoid head-to-head confrontation because it will only end in rebellion, tears and failure.
2. Be prepared to raid all your reserves of optimism and enthusiasm.
3. Try to remain sympathetic, no matter how bad the person's outer expression of their inner turmoil becomes.
4. Don't forget other members of the family and their needs, and don't let your own life, career and enjoyments become swamped or you'll become unable to give support.
5. Keep communication going with the patient and health professionals. What your loved one needs is a cohesive team supporting them.
It's a long road to recovery. After five years, about half of people with eating disorders have recovered, although many remain preoccupied with food, eating and their weight for many more years.
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