Schools chalk out newer ways for teaching…

            Schools are nowadays chalking out newer ways for teaching and are implementing several changes in their academic curriculum, to make it more interactive and interesting for the students. Please find some of the steps taken by St Mary Multipurpose School, Vashi (New Bombay) in this regard.

            “The classroom teaching technique has changed completely. In case of prose, earlier we read them out to students from textbooks, in order to explain them to students. But now with the teaching kit, we need to make students participate. So if there is an English prose to be taught, we will ask students to encircle the complicated words and find their meanings. These words are then written on the blackboard and whenever the word appears, students have to answer its meaning,” explained a teacher from the school.

            Similarly in case of the science lectures, the activity comprises solving questions in group and making the students present the chapter in their own words. “Within a 30 minute lecture students are made to think, share and pair. Since their involvement is a must, they stay more alert. So the lessons taught are better understood,” said Fr Abraham Joseph, the principal.

Courtesy: http://epaper.dnaindia.com/story.aspx?id=36909&boxid=8552&ed_date=2013-01-18&ed_code=820015&ed_page=3

Pampered as kids, men can’t handle rejection: Psychiatrists

Pampered as kids, men can’t handle rejection: Psychiatrists

DNA Correspondent

Whether it was production house owner Jerrit G John, who flung a chemical on physiotherapist Aryanka Hosbetkar, or collegian Nikhil Bankar, who stabbed his former girlfriend eight times and then killing himself on Chetana College premises, in both these cases the attackers could not handle the fact that the girl wanted out.     And psychiatrists feel that the Indian society is to be blamed, to some extent, for men not able to accept rejection.     According to psychiatrists, parents tend to pamper their sons more than their daughters from childhood. “Till date, there are several Indian families where a boy is given priority over daughter. This is one reason behind men not being able to accept rejection,” reasoned Dr Seema Hingorany, a clinical psychologist.     She added that in a city like Mumbai it is also the loneliness and failure to talk about one’s problems that leads to such crimes against women. “Men in our society have inflated ego. In my practice, I have found that a man will never cry or talk about their problems, unlike a woman. Lack of communication and loneliness lead to outburst of aggression in the form of crime,” said Dr Hingorany.    Doctors also feel that even in the 21st century, women empowerment in our society has been very slow. “We have more ‘do nots’ for our daughters, but give many liberties to our sons. This has somewhere led to the men’s inability to accept rejection. Men are still viewed as the protector, the symbol of bravery and martyrdom and it is unconsciously drilled in our mind through movies and mythology,” said Dr Harish Shetty, senior psychiatrist, LH Hiranandani Hospital.    However, a pampered childhood minus responsibility are only contributing factors. “These factors add up to a weak mind-set. I advise parents to be friends with their child’s friends to know what is happening in his or her life,” suggested Dr Fabian alemida, child psychiatrist. Courtesy:

http://epaper.dnaindia.com/story.aspx?id=35019&boxid=15275&ed_date=2012-12-24&ed_code=820009&ed_page=5

the real contexts of some famous nursery rhymes

Know the real context of some famous nursery rhymes.

1. Ring A Ring of Roses

Ring a ring a roses,

A pocket full of posies

A-tish-oo, a-tish-oo

We all fall down

      This is one nursery rhyme origin we think we already know to be sinister. But it has nothing at all to do with the Black Death. The first known reference to the rhyme is in 1881, more than 500 years after the plague swept across Europe. By all accounts, it seems to be a nonsense rhyme – and in its 1881 form, there isn’t even any sneezing. Here’s a version from the mid 20th century:

Ring a ring a roses,


A pocket full of posies


One, two, three, four,


We all fall down down

      The sneezing was added sometime in the last 50 years or so. So this one really is just a nice little rhyme –no ulterior meanings at all!

2. Humpty Dumpty

Humpty Dumpty sat on the wall

Humpty Dumpty had a great fall

All the King’s horses and all the King’s men

Couldn’t put Humpty together again!

    Humpty Dumpty wasn’t a real person; nor was he an odd, fragile egg-shaped thing. It turns out that Humpty Dumpty was a cannon. Owned by the supporters of King Charles I, Humpty Dumpty was used to gain control over the city of Colchester during the English Civil War. Once in Colchester, the cannon sat on church tower until a barrage of cannonballs destroyed the tower and sent Humpty into the marshland below. Although retrieved, the cannon was beyond repair. Humpty the cannon was a feared and effective weapon – as the full rhyme demonstrates:

In sixteen hundred and forty-eight

When England suffered pains of state

The Roundheads laid siege to Colchester town

Where the King’s men still fought for the crown.

There one-eyed Thompson stood on the wall

A gunner with the deadliest aim of all

From St Mary’s tower the cannon he fired

Humpty Dumpty was his name.

Humpty Dumpty sat on the wall

Humpty Dumpty had a great fall

All the King’s horses and all the King’s men

Couldn’t put Humpty Dumpty together again!

       And you thought it was all about an egg? A 19th century illustration in Lewis Carroll’s Through the Looking-Glass created this myth. When Alice talks to Humpty Dumpty on the wall, the illustrator – apparently at a whim – made him egg-shaped. Given the popularity of the book, a generation of kids grew up thinking that Humpty Dumpty was a nonsense rhyme about an egg, rather than a fearsome killing machine.

3. Baa baa black sheep

Baa baa black sheep,

Have you any wool?

Yes sir, yes sir,

Three bags full.

One for the Master, 

One for the Dame,

And one for the little boy

Who lives down the lane.

And with the original ending...

                              And none for the little boy 
who cries down the lane.

      The song is definitely not about black sheep, or even little boys – it’s about taxes! Back in the 13th century, King Edward I realized that he could make some decent cash by taxing the sheep farmers. As a result of the new taxes, one third of the price of a sack of wool went to the king, one third to the church and the last third to the farmer. Nothing was left for the shepherd boy, crying down the lane. As it happens, black sheep are also bad luck: the fleece can’t be dyed, and so it’s worth less to the sheep farmer. Baa Baa Black Sheep is a tale of misery and woe.

3. Lady Bird

Ladybird ladybird fly away home

Your house is on fire and your children are gone,

All except one called Anne

For she has crept under the frying pan

    This poor little ladybird is really a Catholic in 16th century Protestant England. Ladybird is a word that comes from the Catholic term for Our Lady. It was illegal for Catholics to practice their religion, and non-attendance of Protestant services meant hefty fines for absentees. Catholics were forced to say Mass and attend services in secret, often outdoors and in outbuildings. The fire may refer to the Catholic priests who were burned at the stake for their beliefs.  

Courtesy: http://listverse.com/2012/11/28/10-sinister-origins-of-nursery-rhymes/

Playing violent video games makes one aggressive

A new study provides the first experimental evidence that the negative effects of playing violent video games can accumulate over time.

Researchers found that people who played a violent video game for three consecutive days showed increases in aggressive behaviour each day they played. Even a single session of playing a violent video game tends to increase short-term aggression.

Researchers compared playing video games to smoking cigarettes. A single cigarette won’t cause lung cancer, but smoking over weeks or months or years greatly increases the risk. In the same way, repeated exposure to violent video games may have a cumulative effect on aggression.

p. 10, Hindustan Times (Mumbai), 23 Dec 2012, http://paper.hindustantimes.com/epaper/viewer.aspx

Eat with your kids to boost their vegetable intake

    Eating meals together as a family, even once or twice a week, increases children’s daily fruit and vegetable intake, according to the researchers at the University of Leeds.

Children, who always ate a family meal together at a table consumed 125g (1.5 portions) more fruit and vegetables on average than children who never ate with their families. Even those who reported eating together only once or twice a week consumed 95g (1.2 portions) more than those who never ate together.

Even if it’s just one family meal a week, when children eat together with parents or older siblings they learn about eating. Watching the way their parents or siblings eat and the different types of food they eat is pivotal in creating their own food habits and preferences

p. 10, 23 Dec 2012, Hindustan Times (Mumbai), http://paper.hindustantimes.com/epaper/viewer.aspx