Monday, June 29, 2020

Can Art Classes Help Your Kid?


Researchers have been conducting researches for quite some time on the effect of art classes that is seen on the kids. It has been seen that future career growth and success is determined by the way the art education is imparted and it can also work as a ground work for basic lifestyle that the kid would follow. Art classes for kids Thornhill has seen to do wonders when it comes to has seen to do wonders when it comes to make the kid more creative, have a full blown knowledge of the world. These classes are also seen to give the children a means to become expressive and also strengthen their self-esteem.



Art lessons Vaughan has been seen to greatly help the children greatly in getting their creative edge out. It is observed that children have naturally deep curiosity when it comes to art and craft when they are introduced to it at a young age. It is a common misconception that people are born with the skill that is needed to excel in the field of art be it music, dancing, painting or any other form. This is not true that the skill is genetic, this is developed by sheer will power and encouragement. Art education also helps the children in expressing their desires and thoughts in a much nicer way.

Along with their creativity the children are also seen to have an increase in their concentration. When properly encouraged, children are seen to develop an uncanny focus for art and this is when you can be sure that they have developed their concentration to a much better level. Interest in the art forms also encourages the children to ignore the distractions and focus on the task at hand. It has been seen that pottery classes Woodbridge also helps in improving the coordination of the children who have enrolled in the art classes. As the child transfers the images of what he wants to achieve with the clay, his hand and eye coordination improves as they learn to work together. These classes develop this coordination as a fun activity in the beginning but as the time progresses, this eventually comes as a second nature for your kid. Painting classes Vaughan not only provides the children with a way to improve their skill but also gives them a platform where they can get the feel of what success tastes like.

Ask the schoolchildren to paint the murals "Black Life Matters" for downtown Madison

   
 I'm reading "Painting murals gives students empowering role in protest movement" (Wisconsin State Journal):

 As murals were being painted at the end of the school year, SJ Hemmerich, art teacher at Randall Elementary School, created a slide presentation of them. Hemmerich then presented it to students and as a last assignment asked , “If you could design your own mural for (Black Lives Matter), what would it be?” Then Hemmerich got the idea of why not do it for real.

    Hemmerich, like other teachers, reached out to “Black and brown students” to get involved. Hemmerich got permission to work on one large mural and five panels located near each other. ... Hemmerich also sent an email out to art teachers in the Madison School District to recruit more help beyond Randall and wound up with more than 135 students and some staff members.

    “I am really passionate about social justice work,” Hemmerich said. “I thought it would be a really good way to get students involved.”...

    Monique Karlen, art teacher at La Follette High School, said she started by recruiting some of her students and then got other help from students from Middleton and East high schools...

The only mention of parents in the article is about one student who said that her parents worry about her participation in the protests, so the mural-painting is a good, safe alternative. But I don't think teachers should be recruiting children to engage in political activism — even if it's artistic — without first involving the parents and getting their consent. I don't think adults should put any sort of pressure on children to take a political position and to do political work — even if it's artwork. Teachers should not be exploiting their access to children for any political purpose. They are given access to our children for the purpose of education, and it is a solemn trust that should never be violated.

Sunday, June 28, 2020

Tips to Improve Academics of a Child

The learning capability varies from child to child. To enable kids to make conceptual changes in thinking, the teacher should make learning fun, building lectures in story formats. This will help them regain and recall the academic information increasing learning efficiency. Research shows that actively participating in your child's nurturing can boost the learning abilities rather than your own qualification or amount of money the family makes.
Create a positive impact on the child's academic performance by following the ways mentioned below:
Encourage and introduce your child to different learning styles:
Help your child become aware of different fundamental learning styles like Audio, Visual, Verbal, Logical, and Social. Guide him through his preferred learning style, it can be a dominant or a mixture of learning styles.
2. Focus on your child's interest:
If you want your child to ace in academics, help him explore various subjects and topics of his interest. If your child seems to be interested in football, take a personal interest in helping him learn football.
3. Make academics easier through game-based learning:
Games, when used as an educational tool, can turn to create new horizons for kids. It provides opportunities for the development of non-cognitive skills and deeper learnings. It provides motivation to kids for term-based learnings favourable in a classroom setting.
4. Focus on learning not performance:
Focus on learning will give your child the opportunity to solidify his learnings by putting it in his own words. Instead of being concerned about your child's performance and the result, make him understand that actual learning is more important than the test grades. This will boost the confidence and learning capabilities in your child.
5. Create a learning space at home:
Set up an environment more adaptable for concentration that is free from all distractions like loud music, TV noise, toys is important. Also, keeping them away from mobile phones, browsing the internet in this technological era while performing a particular task can help in child's concentration.
6. Celebrate Achievements:
It is important for kids to get proper recognition for strengthening the fundamentals of better learning capabilities. It is very important to recognize small-small achievements and celebrate them. This will act as a motivating factor for your child's learning.
7. Create an environment open for communication:
Encourage an environment where your child is comfortable expressing his likes and dislikes. Validate your child's opinion in a decision even if you disagree, this will create an environment that is open and free learning.
Go about making every day a learning day. This will motivate the child to explore the world around him creating new opportunities and connections. Also, make them understand that being their parents you are always up to learning new things, this will motivate them to find possibilities of learnings from all the new happenings around. Open gates for your child to learn and explore wherever they are may it be home or a classroom.
One of the Pioneers in this field is BRAINY - A division of Brain Child Learning which helps in Brain Training for Children in the age group of 6 to 16-years-old. They have a methodology of Training which Involves Meditation / Digitised Music - to open new neural pathways in the brain and Neurobic Exercises which help the mind stay agile and alert. The Blended training provides all round development of the brain with multiple benefits.
Since this program works on the Cognitive skills of Memory, Focus, Concentration and control of brain waves hence it helps in the academics of the child.

Why Should You Choose Daycare Castle Hill For Your Children

Taking care of the kids is one of the most difficult tasks for the working parents. Your children need your complete attention but at the same time, you cannot ignore the call of duty as well. In order to provide complete attention to the children, you may better plan to send them to the childcare units like daycare Castle Hill.

Why childcare units
The childcare units try to create the home like atmosphere for the kids. Usually, the children cannot get quickly settled at a place outside their home during the earlier stages of their lives. Therefore, the experts need to create the proper area to generate interests among the children. How will they do that? In order to make the children attracted to the daycare system, the experts in the childcare units need to make the place perfect for the kids. From a young age to the age of 12 years, the childcare process continues. It is easier for the childcare officials to take care of the bigger kids but younger ones are difficult to control. Here, most of the parents are cautious regarding taking care of the children between the age group of 6 weeks to 5 years. If you read the childcare toddler care blogs of daycare Granville, you will get the chance to learn how the experts take care of the little kids there in the units.

Can children properly get to sleep in the childcare?
Parents do not ask such a question all the times, but it is an important factor to notice. The kids need proper sleep and the childcare officials need to ensure that. The childcare officials of daycare Liverpool take care of the kids in a proper way and ensure that the younger ones get ample time to sleep. Sleeping, alongside many other tasks is a crucial matter for the perfect growth of the children. In order to grow up in a proper way, the children (aged 6 weeks to 5 years) need sleeping and the experts associated with childcare units, ensure that the kids get the enough sleep alongside timely feeding. At home, when the parents are away, childcare professionals take care of the kids and try to provide the best services to them.
What is better - nanny or childcare?
It is better not to hand over your kids to the nanny or a singular person at your household when you are not around. It is wise to send them into childcare units. In the units, there are more experts, who can control the kids in proper way. In fact, as a parent you can shed your tensions regarding the matters of taking care of your little ones. Therefore, sending children to daycare Liverpool will be wise rather than appointing nannies.
Finally, it is better to mention that as the kids centres in the Liverpool or Granville area can take better care for your children, it will be better for you to send your kids there. The experts of daycare Castle Hill will take care of their basic needs of the kids while they will get the chance to learn the basic lessons to be school ready.

Saturday, June 27, 2020

Zuckerberg says Facebook will crack down on hate speech as ad boycott widens


Zuckerberg — who, citing free-speech concerns, has mostly resisted calls for a clampdown on abuse and misinformation — said in a Friday live stream he was “optimistic that we can make progress on public health and racial justice while maintaining our democratic traditions around free expression and voting.”
“I am committed to making sure Facebook remains a place where people can use their voice to discuss important issues,” Zuckerberg said. “But I also stand against hate or anything that incites violence or suppresses voting, and we’re committed to removing that content too.”
“The complexities of the current cultural landscape have placed a renewed responsibility on brands to learn, respond and act to drive a trusted and safe digital ecosystem,” the company wrote in a blog post.
“Continuing to advertise on these platforms at this time would not add value to people and society,” Unilever said.
Unilever’s announcement is the latest in an advertiser boycott that has added major names like North FacePatagoniaVerizon and Ben & Jerry’s. The big brands have thrown support behind civil rights groups that have hammered Facebook for what they say is its failure to do enough about hate speech and misinformation.
Coca-Cola announced on Friday that it was pausing its global ad spending on all social-media platforms for at least 30 days — but specified that it wasn’t joining the official boycott.
Earlier in the week it emerged that Zuckerberg personally joined a meeting with advertisers to listen to their concerns and explain that Facebook is committed to neutrality. Zuckerberg reportedly tried to explain that what might be viewed as offensive by one person might not offend another, according to Business Insider.
Facebook executives have been adamant that they will not be bullied into making changes they do not want to make, the Wall Street Journal reported.
“We do not make policy changes tied to revenue pressure,” Facebook’s vice president of Global Business Group Carolyn Everson said in an email, according to the report. “We set our policies based on principles rather than business interests.”
Unlike Twitter, which has courted controversy for flagging posts from President Trump that it said could incite violence or spread misinformation, Facebook will still allow any offending posts to be shared “in order to condemn it,” Zuckerberg said.
“This is an important part of how we discuss what is acceptable in our society,” he added.
Zuckerberg’s announcement did little to reverse the direction of Facebook’s stock, which tumbled 8.3 percent to $216.08 on Friday. The drop wiped more than $6 billion off of Zuckerberg’s net worth, which now sits at just over $80 billion.
In a Friday statement, a Facebook spokesperson said the company has banned 250 white supremacist organizations from Facebook and Instagram. Using artificial intelligence, Facebook detects nearly 90 percent of hate speech before users report it.
A Twitter spokesperson said that the site is “committed to amplifying voices from underrepresented communities and marginalized groups.”
“We are respectful of our partners’ decisions and will continue to work and communicate closely with them during this time,” they added.

Meaning of children’s human rights education


Meaning of children's human rights education

Children's rights education is education where the rights of the child, as described in the Convention, is taught and practiced in individual classrooms. But in its most developed form, children’s rights are taught and practiced in a systematic and comprehensive way across grade levels, across the school, and across school districts. With full-blown children’s rights education, children’s rights are not simply an addition to a particular subject or classroom. Rather, the rights of the child are incorporated into the school curricula, teaching practices, and teaching materials across subjects and grade levels and are the centerpiece of school mission statements, behavior codes, and school policies and practices.

Fully developed children’s rights education means that all members of the school community receive education on the rights of the child. The Convention serves as a values framework for the life and functioning of the school or educational institution and for efforts to promote a more positive school climate and school culture for learning.
A core belief in children’s rights education is that when children learn about their own basic human rights, this learning serves as an important foundation for their understanding and support of human rights more broadly.

STRATEGIES FOR HOMESCHOOLING GIFTED CHILDREN

Homeschooling high school can be challenging enough to undertake with normal high school kids, but throw in a student who is significantly advanced or gifted, and some parents might be tempted to call it quits! How can you keep up with a kid who’s studying statistics, anatomy and physiology, and Greek, and asking for more?! Both my sons were gifted, so I know how difficult this can be. Fortunately, there are some practical things you can do to make the process easier and more manageable.


HOMESCHOOLING GIFTED CHILDREN



The first strategy that I find useful is called “acceleration,” which means that you allow your children to work faster. This strategy requires you to let go of the whole parent-teach-the-student model, because your job is not just to teach your children; your job is to help your children learn how to teach themselves. Fortunately, there will be times when you realize your child already knows a subject, perhaps because they have learned it by osmosis, so you can spend less time on that subject.
At high school level, it’s important to remember that when your child finishes a standard curriculum, you can give them high school credit for it. You don’t have to make them sit in front of you as the teacher for 150 hours before you give them credit for a course. As soon as they’re done with a curriculum and know the material, go ahead and give them the high school credit. There’s no rule that requires them to spend 150 hours studying something in order to earn a credit.
You can also skip unnecessary activities in a curriculum. If your child doesn’t need the activities in order to learn the information, it’s okay to skip those, as long as they’re learning. It’s also okay to administer a pretest for a subject, and simply skip the information they already know, or you can work fast through a curriculum and find out what they know first, and then move ahead.
When you don’t use acceleration, and you work at the usual standard pace that children are used to, it can induce boredom. When people tell me they’re struggling with a lack of motivation in their teenagers, or their kids hate school or they’re bored, often it’s because their student is moving at too slow a pace.
Make sure to assess your child’s level first, and begin a curriculum at the point where they will actually learn new information. In this way, you allow them to learn at their own level, and remove those artificial barriers to how much they’re allowed to learn. The result will be a student who’s more interested in what they’re learning, and more motivated to pursue their studies.

Charter schools are the best way to wipe out educational disparity


Such conflicting opinions have led to bitter controversies that have raged for years. But my new book, “Charter Schools and Their Enemies,” features hard facts about educational outcomes in more than a hundred individually identified New York City schools.
These schools are listed by name so that parents, officials and anyone interested in the education of children can make their own comparisons.
What all these particular schools have in common is that charter-school students and traditional public-school students are educated in the same buildings and take the same tests in mathematics and English every year. The results of these tests are listed for each of these schools, along with information on their students’ backgrounds.
Here are some basic facts:
In these buildings, 14 percent of traditional public-school classes had a majority of their students achieve a level defined as “proficient” in English for their grade level by the New York State Education Department.
Meanwhile, 65 percent of charter-school classes in those same buildings had a majority of their students achieve the “proficient“ level on the same test. That’s nearly a five-to-one disparity.
On the mathematics test, just 10 percent of the classes in these traditional public schools had a majority of their students achieve a “proficient” level. But 68 percent of charter-school classes in the same buildings had a majority of their students achieve a “proficient” level. That’s nearly a seven-to-one disparity.
No wonder most critics of charter schools, and defenders of traditional public schools, want to argue on the basis of rhetoric.
They don’t want to argue on the basis of facts about test results.
One common example of misleading rhetoric is an often-repeated statement that — nationwide — charter schools “as a whole“ do not perform any better than traditional public schools “as a whole.“

Wednesday, June 17, 2020

US sanctions Assad, his wife, others in 1st use of law named for military defector

The Trump administration announced new sanctions against the government of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad Wednesday, beginning the implementation of the strongest, most sweeping U.S. sanctions law yet against his regime.


The Caesar Act -- named after a Syrian military war photographer who smuggled out thousands of photos documenting the victims of the Assad government's torture and butchery -- requires sanctions on several top Syrian figures to send a "severe chilling effect on any outside investors who would be contemplating doing business with the Assad regime," a senior administration official said.

The U.S. has led an increased economic pressure to drive the Assad government and its backer Russia to the negotiating table to find a political settlement after over nine years of war. But so far, Assad and Moscow have moved forward with a campaign to conquer the last rebel stronghold and declare a military victory, even as the country's economy has collapsed in recent months.

Many of the Syrian officials and elites targeted Wednesday were already under U.S. sanctions, including Assad himself and businessman Mohammed Hamsho, who has reportedly earned a fortune using his close ties to the regime to win reconstruction contracts.

But prominent among the names of those newly sanctioned is Assad's wife, Asma al-Assad, the British-born first lady of Syria once deemed the "Rose in the Desert" by Vogue magazine. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo called her "one of Syria's most notorious war profiteers" in a statement Wednesday.

In total, there were 39 individuals, businesses and divisions of the Syrian military that were blacklisted by the U.S. Treasury Department on Wednesday. Most are connected to real estate developments in the country, which have brought in foreign investment even as they break ground on land stolen from Syrians displaced by fighting or the government.

"We're not going to reward Assad for destroying his country by pitching in with everybody else and building it back up for him," said U.S. special envoy for Syria James Jeffrey.

Syria's Foreign Ministry accused the U.S. of "bypassing all international laws and norms," according to Syrian state media.

The war in Syria, which began as a democratic uprising against Assad's oppressive rule in 2011, spiraled into a bloody civil war after Assad's forces brutally cracked down on dissenters. Soon, jihadist groups and foreign powers took advantage of the chaos, fomenting even greater violence -- with 11 million people now displaced and at least 500,000 killed.

The country will need hundreds of billions of dollars to recover from the widespread destruction, according to World Bank estimates.

Unwilling to directly intervene in the conflict outside the fight against ISIS, the U.S. has withheld that financial assistance to pressure Russia, who has boosted Assad with forces, weapons and funds, to push its ally in Damascus to political negotiations, with Moscow unwilling to foot the reconstruction bill alone.

"Anyone doing business with the Assad regime, no matter where in the world they are, is potentially exposed to travel restrictions and financial sanctions," Pompeo said in his statement.

The sanctions unveiled Wednesday, however, target only three entities outside the country -- a company based in Austria and two telecommunications firms, based in Canada and Lebanon.

"While more designations are in the works for later this summer, this first round certainly won't shake the Syrian government," according to Tobias Schneider, a research fellow at the Global Public Policy institute in Berlin.

The senior administration official told ABC News that there will be more sanctions targets to come and that those blacklisted on Wednesday will help block any foreign investment into the country.

"We think there were quite a few plans that were in the works for outside investment to come in to some of these vehicles and others that have simply fizzled out because outside investors recognized the extreme risk" created by the Caesar Act, the official said.

"I can guarantee you and anyone listening, and the Assad regime, that of course there are going to be more actions like this. Of course there's going to be intense economic and political pressure that will continue and continue and continue until the Assad regime accedes to a political solution of the conflict and ceases its atrocious behavior towards its own people," the official added during a briefing with reporters.

So far, that policy has not stopped Assad and Moscow as they've moved on the last rebel stronghold in Idlib province, resuming in recent weeks aerial bombardment against targets after a truce because of the coronavirus pandemic. With Russian air power and weaponry, Assad seems intent on retaking Idlib, despite support for the rebels by Syria's northern neighbor Turkey, which has at times clashed with pro-regime forces.

But even as he seems poised to win a battlefield victory in Idlib, Assad faces fresh economic woes that have caused new protests in some government-controlled parts of the country and turmoil within Syria's ruling class.

Assad's position "is worse than at any time, including when the opposition military forces were in the suburbs of Damascus and held Aleppo and much of the rest of the country," said Jeffrey.

In particular, there have been some sporadic protests about the economic crisis, as the country's currency collapses, unemployment rates remain painfully high and even government salaries have become worthless, if they come through at all.

Amid those budget shortfalls, the government has also pressured wealthy Syrian business leaders to cover its costs, but Rami Makhlouf, perhaps the country's most infamous financier and a cousin and close friend of Assad's, pushed back publicly by posting on social media about government penalties on him for paying up.

The U.S. must take advantage of that growing desperation that these fractures belie, according to Mick Mulroy, who served as Trump's top Pentagon official for Middle East policy. To do so, he urged continued U.S. funding for stabilization projects like de-mining and restoration of basic services like water and health care in the areas retaken by the Syrian fighters allied with the U.S. -- a mostly Kurdish fighting force known as the Syrian Democratic Forces.

"We need to do everything we can to help the Syrian people and everything we can to end the Syrian regime. They are one in the same," said Mulroy, now an ABC News contributor. "I hope we keep increasing the pressure on Assad, but also fully funding our stabilization efforts. Both are required."


Tuesday, June 16, 2020

Can digital currencies like Libra ever replace the dollar



banknote (often known as a bill (in the US), paper money, or simply a note) is a type of negotiable promissory note, made by a bank or other licensed authority, payable to the bearer on demand. Banknotes were originally issued by commercial banks, which were legally required to redeem the notes for legal tender (usually gold or silver coin) when presented to the chief cashier of the originating bank. These commercial banknotes only traded at face value in the market served by the issuing bank.[1] Commercial banknotes have primarily been replaced by national banknotes issued by central banks or monetary authorities.

Label = Digital Money

Tips Tarik Tunai Uang di ATM Bersama BRI



ATM Bersama is one of the interbank networks in Indonesia, connecting the ATM networks of twenty-one banks in Indonesia. It was established 1993 and is based on the model adopted by MegaLink, an interbank network in the Philippines.
ATM Bersama has over 70 members with 17,000 ATMs throughout Indonesia. The network is owned by PT Artajasa Pembayaran Elektronis.