NEWSBITES FOR KIDZ™ OCT 31 2004
Where you’re the first to
know!
From the News for Kidz™
e-magazine
HEADLINES - This
is what kids all over the world did last fortnight!
Turkish girls in literacy battle -Turkey
Headmasters Vow to Divide and Conker - UK
CHILDREN OF THE LAMP: The Akhenaten Adventure
RED RIBBON DAY- MISSISSIPPI, USA
Cypress trees harvest helps children grow – EVERGLADES, FLORIDA,
USA
Creating Good Citizens: Ohr Avner School Holds 'Knesset'
Elections- UKRAINE
Kids participate in make-believe hurricane – FLORIDA, USA
Kids trick or treat for a different reason – SARATOGA
SPRINGS, NEW YORK, USA
Ghostly jamboree – SHANGHAI, CHINA
Paintings of children – BROOKLYN, NEW YORK, USA
Adopting children from S. Korea a sure thing for Brighton
family – BRIGHTON, MICHIGAN, USA
Kids Vote offered in Santa Cruz County by elections office
– PAJARO VALLEY, CALIFORNIA, USA
Colours, tunes, quiz & dhaak- CALCUTTA, WEST BENGAL,
INDIA
What’s Dalapuligadaritt? These kids don’t have to think
twice to answer – MUMBAI, MAHARASHTRA, INDIA
HEADLINES................................................ Past issues of NewsBites for Kidz™
BBC NEWS |
Turkish girls
in literacy battle -
Rural schools in
literacy standards among young girls, the
BBC's
Dymond reports.
In
the pupils of "My Teacher's"
school queue up in the crisp early morning
sunlight, two neat columns of children
under a Turkish flag.
Just inside the school, a bust of Kemal Ataturk, founder of the
Turkish
Republic, glowers down over the hall.
The school is new, the money to
build it donated by local teachers. When more
money arrives from
far-flung villages will stay for the week.
The class faithfully recites the
pledge heard every morning in every school
across the country, dedicating themselves
both to hard work and to the Republic.
And then they rush into the
building.
Power of persuasion
In amongst the small crowd is an
even smaller girl. It sounds melodramatic, but
10-year-old Ida Goyhan
has been saved - saved from a life of illiteracy and
ignorance. In her English class she stares
hard at her text book and does her
best to repeat the phrases the young
schoolteacher calls out.
We tell them it helps women get
over their daily problems and daily practices
Bunyamin Durak, Headmaster
She only started school last year.
She came only once her parents had been
persuaded to send her. Now, unlike her
mother, she can read and write.
"I want to go to high school
and then university," Ida says. "My parents want me
to go as well. When they have the
money they will send me. But when they don't,
they can't."
As the bell goes for a short break,
the pupils all rush out to play in the bare
schoolyard. There the headmaster, Bunyamin Durak keeps order.
A big friendly man, he spends his
spare time in the holidays visiting the
villages around
It is not, he says, poverty that
stops them sending girls to school; government
grants help pay for textbooks and
clothing. Instead it is tradition.
Pragmatism
For many of the local Arab and
Kurdish population, a school is simply not a
place that girls go to. The headmaster
stresses the practical benefits of
schooling, over any more lofty ideas of
sexual equality.
"We try to tell parents that
schooling is very important," he says. "We also
tell them that without it women cannot
solve their daily problems.
"When they go to the doctors
they cannot explain their pain, or when they go to
a state building they cannot give a
petition or explain what they want.
"We tell them it helps women
get over their daily problems and daily practices."
Traditions
In
headmaster, there were just three girls in
the schools; now there are over 700.
It is partly a result of the work
of men like Bunyamin Durak;
and partly because
of the national campaign run in
conjunction with the United Nations agency
Unicef.
Near
and persuade parents to send their
girls to school. It is gruelling work - at
points, hard labour,
as Unicef's Lila Pieters
plunges into a cotton field to
talk to a family working there.
She too stoops under the midday
sun, helping pick cotton and stuffing the buds
into a sack.
She finds out that, of the family
working in the field, the boy goes to school
in the morning, whilst the girl does
not. She tries to persuade the children's
uncle to send the girl to school as
well.
Like the headmaster, she too
stresses the practical aspects - maybe the girl
could learn new agricultural techniques
at school? The uncle is doubtful.
Tradition dictates otherwise.
There has been television and radio
advertising across
and support from the prime minister
and his wife. But real results seem to come
this way, through face to face meetings
and persuasion.
It will be a long haul before all
girls go to school in this deeply conservative
region. But there has been some
astonishing success. And tens, maybe hundreds of
thousands of girls are now going to school
for the very first time.
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/europe/3753582.stm
Published: 2004/10/18 16:40:41 GMT
Headmasters
Vow to Divide and Conker -
By Simon Evans. PA News
Tue 12 Oct 2004
http://news.scotsman.com
A band of headteachers
is refusing to bow to the “health and safety” protocols responsible for
the national upsurge in school conker bans.
This Friday, Creighton Muirhead, head of
cancelling afternoon lessons to stage his
school’s seventh annual conker championships – an
event
which every pupil is urged to take part
in.
Meanwhile at Little Garth School in
Nayland, near
encouraging his pupils to compete in their own
conker competition.
This as other schools around the
country impose conker bans because they are deemed
too
dangerous, or, as in one school’s case in
their opponents.
Since mid-September Mr Muirhead has been advising his
400 pupils, aged seven to 11, to gather
their conkers
and harden them for battle by soaking them in vinegar before baking them in the
oven.
“Every year we have a school conker championship, the whole school gets involved and the
children
love it,” he said.
He told how banning conkers is simply a way of lessening children’s enjoyment
of life.
In the light of various schools’
decision to outlaw the conker on health and safety
grounds, he
said: “Eventually children are going to
end up doing nothing apart from sitting in their chairs.
“And that will present health and
safety issues of its own. The children need to enjoy
themselves.
“It will end up with our children
never doing anything if we not careful children never using the
bus or going into town by themselves.
There is a risk in living and its about striking a
balance.”
Notices with the message ’Get Your
Championship Conkers’ are up around the school.
“Everyone is encouraged to have a conker, the children need to be involved in what is a
celebration of the time of year,” said Mr Muirhead.
“We’ve never had a parent say they
do not want their child to take part.”
The conker
championships, which will be fully supervised and will involve the school’s
autistic
and special needs pupils, will run
from 1pm to 3pm this Friday.
Meanwhile Mr
Muirhead’s kindred spirit in
for his 250 pupils to compete for the
coveted “golden conker.”
“I feel it’s about time some
schools made a stand on things like this,” Mr Jones
said as his
school’s second annual conker
championships taking place this week in break times – gets under
way.
“Obviously you have got to take
into account health and safety considerations but if you
considered everything to be too much of a
risk you would exclude anything exciting.”
Last week at Ivy Lane Primary in Chippenham, Wiltshire, near to Mr
Muirhead’s school, a conker
ban was imposed by headmistress Chris
Marshall.
It was not to protect children’s
eyes from flying conkers, but for fear the horse
chestnuts could
trigger potentially hazardous anaphylactic
nut-related reactions.
But Hazel Gowland,
food adviser at the Anaphylaxis Campaign, and a sufferer herself, said a
“common
sense approach” would have been better than a ban.
“I do not like bans but I
understand schools coming to this decision because they are
frightened,” she commented.
October 31, 2004
Children's book of the week
REVIEWED BY NICOLETTE JONES
CHILDREN OF
THE LAMP: The Akhenaten Adventure
by P B Kerr
Age 11+
The novelist Philip Kerr, astutely
adopting double initials à la J K, has written a clever
book
for children not least clever in its
timing, when advances for fantasy trilogies (this is Volume
1) are
big, and in its choice of publisher (Scholastic in the
strong marketing campaign). Children of
the Lamp is cunningly filmic, and was sold long before
publication to DreamWorks. It demonstrates a
sassy knowledge of both youth culture (name checks
to Pink, Dido and Fox Kids), and high
culture (nods to Coleridge, Shakespeare, Latin and
Shelley). Its sophisticated frame
of reference, from Houdini to Jimmy Choos, suggests
either a
pedagogical intent or an eye to the crossover
market. And the story? Rich New York twins come to
and the North Pole they tackle Ifrits, the bad djinns, in a somewhat episodic plot rather
dependent on elaborate explanations. Kerr
writes with ease and cynical humour but foreigners
come
off badly, while the Egyptians have
punning pseudo-Arabic names: Toeragh, for instance.
The book
is ingenious, but with perhaps more
smart than heart.
Rally carries on Early's positive message to kids
RED RIBBON DAY-
By David Lush / Delta Democrat
Times
The stands at Legion Field were
full Saturday night, as hundreds of people cheered, yelled and
clapped.
It was a far cry from the hoards of
empty seats that were common when the stadium was home to the
Greenville
Bluesmen professional baseball team.
Instead, Legion Field was where
scores of Greenville-area residents came to show support for the
Chuck Early Red Ribbon Rally,
sponsored by the Washington County Anti-Drug Community Partnership.
Early, a longtime
died in 2002.
Early was also an outspoken
supporter of previous Red Ribbon Rallies and other efforts of the
partnership, leading to the organization's
naming the annual event in his honor.
The sunny day provided a backdrop,
which encouraged people to turn out and turn out they did.
"This is a great crowd,"
said Audine Haynes, executive director of the
partnership. Haynes was
busy during the program keeping things
on schedule.
"This is the most fun time of
the year for me," she said. "The weather is great, and it's a big
crowd, and there are so many kids here,
which is great."
The program, hosted by Kae Cooper of the Delta Democrat Times and Tom Henkenius of WABG TV
Channel 6, included a decorated box
competition, a cheerleading competition and words of
inspiration promoting an anti-drug message. Amstat of Arkansas, led by Tim Norris, was also on
hand with its remote-controlled
"Andy Ambulance" previously seen at area events.
Many in attendance sported red
T-shirts and red ribbons donated by the Elks USA organization.
Early was a long-time radio
announcer for WNIX-WIQQ in
the public address system at previous
rallies, where he would announce events, names and add
other words of encouragement.
"The Red Ribbon rally was
named after Chuck Early because he always used to help with the event,"
said Haynes. "He loved kids, and
he loved to point them in the right direction to do good."
Many of the students came in
colorful school uniforms. Those from South Delta Elementary in
Rolling Fork wore special-made
tie-dyed shirts.
"This is very exciting,"
said Yolanda Thomas, a fifth-grade language arts teacher at South Delta.
"We teach the kids to just say
no to drugs, but we do have problems in our area. But most kids
listen to the message."
David Adams, a fifth-grader at
South Delta said, the "Red Ribbon Rally and the things we do at
school are to protect children from using
drugs."
"We've got a great
crowd," said Barbara Felton, Safe and Drug Free coordinator for the
it's been very successful."
Felton said that based on
statistics, "Drug use among kids is down. Smart Track results, which is
scientific-based research, shows that use is down
with drugs and alcohol. They (students) need to
be drug free, and most of the kids
are getting message."
The Pilot Club of Greenville, which
has been handling concessions at the Red Ribbon Rally for the
past four years, was back at it again
Saturday.
Part of the proceeds from the sale
of concessions will go to support the Lighthouse Lodge, which
provides temporary lodging for families of
patients of the Mississippi Firefighters Memorial Burn
Center at
By Patty Pensa
Staff Writer
October 31, 2004
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/palmbeach/sfl-pcypress31oct31,0,7543948.story?coll=sfla-news-palm
Now, because of the work of
hundreds of volunteers, this tiny piece of the
Some of the volunteers returned to
the Arthur R. Marshall Loxahatchee Wildlife Refuge on Saturday
to harvest seeds from the trees they
had planted. Thousands of seeds will be sent to nurseries to
germinate. In two years, they'll be ready to
go in the ground.
Call it the cycle of life, with a
little human intervention.
"We're doing something. We're
actually making a difference," said Gail Mazzaferro,
leader of Girl
Scout Troop 2155.
The troop of cadets has made
planting and seeding an annual project. Despite one obstacle
Saturday -- some of the girls were
bitten by a swarm of ants -- the group collected several
thousand seeds in just an hour.
"It's fun to come back and see
the trees all big," said Tyler Mazzaferro, 12,
of
Nancy Marshall, vice president of
the nonprofit Marshall Foundation, said the event serves to
educate children about the environment and
the
About 400 volunteers, of all ages,
helped on Saturday. The annual harvest began five years ago
with just 22 volunteers.
"It helps children become
stewards of the environment,"
become associated with a tree, or in this
case seeds, the more people that will be lifelong
stewards."
While the kids plucked the Ping
Pong ball-sized seeds from the trees' low branches, the adults
cleared the higher branches.
At 6-foot-2, Craig Winkelman was perfect for the task. Winkelman,
one of 10 volunteers from the
Sierra Club,
said the work is all about preservation and education.
native to
he said.
"It just perpetuates things
for future generations," said Winkelman of Boca
Raton.
Volunteer events sponsored by the
Marshall Foundation have added more than 66,000 native trees to
the greater
Planting the trees usually is
dirtier work, said Nada McKinney, Sierra Club treasurer. But both
are equally important, she said. The
more people who come, the more who will understand the
benefits of cypress trees,
don't know," she said. "People
don't understand the connectedness of everything."
Patty Pensa
can be reached at [email protected] or 561-243-6609.
Copyright © 2004,
Creating Good
Citizens:
Saturday, October 30, 2004
http://www.fjc.ru/news/newsArticle.asp?AID=217117
DNEPROPEROVSK,
opportunity to define the future of their
school by participating in elections to the school’s
'Knesset'. This is a traditional event that
usually takes place at the beginning of the school
year. The children have to chose nine pupils as their Knesset (Board of Leaders) and
make
decisions concerning the development of the
school, together with the teaching staff.
An extensive election campaign
preceded the elections, with candidates presenting their programs
on the school radio. Ninth-grader
Anna Baranovskaya, one of the election candidates,
proposed
forming a committee on international
relations, an idea prompted by the school’s close
cooperation with their friends abroad - in the
Kozachkova, suggested the establishment of a
movie room, as well as increased activity for the
school’s video studio. With 1500 children,
from the fifth grade and up, these elections
represented an important event for the largest
Jewish school in
During the election frenzy,
schoolchildren also took the opportunity to elect three persons to
represent the
the initiative of the Mayor of Dnepropetrovsk, Ivan Kulichenko.
Designed as a forum where young
citizens may voice their opinion about
youth issues in the city, Ohr Avner
students have advanced
from the observer status they held last
year to full-fledged elected deputies to represent the
Jewish School.
18 Jewish pupils contended for the
three vacancies in the municipal youth parliament. One of the
candidates, eighth-grader Vyacheslav
Zagalsky, presented his campaign platform. "I
would like to
work in the Parliament's Committee on
Economics and Sports. My goal is to establish warm
relations between the city’s schools and to
arrange more joint sports activities. I would also
like to inform everyone about our
Jewish Boys’ Choir, and I am hoping to arrange concerts for
them, in the city's other schools and
in those of nearby towns," he explained.
"Children are only as great as
the tasks that they set before themselves," said Laris
Kurilenko,
the Head of the school’s staff.
"The children are getting accustomed to democratic procedures,
which make them realize that one must
fulfill his or her promises.
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/broward/sfl-cb31hurricaneoct31,0,820208.story?coll=sfla-news-broward
Kids
participate in make-believe hurricane –
By Sarah Halasz
Staff Writer
October 31, 2004
A simulated Hurricane Jason was
approaching rapidly. A fire broke out at a storm shelter. A truck
overturned on a main evacuation route,
leaving thousands of make-believe people stranded as the
pretend tempest approached.
And all this during the group's
first day on the job.
Luckily, Hurricane Jason's impact
was only seen within the confines of the
School.
As part of a nationwide Weather
Channel initiative called Project SafeSide, 53 middle
school
students adopted the roles of
bring the county through what would have
been one of the worst storms of the season.
Make-believe Hurricane Jason --
represented on huge television screens by an alternate path of
Hurricane Jeanne -- made landfall
on the shores of
"The decisions they made today
are on a par with the decisions we would make in a real setting,"
said Carl Fowler, a spokesman for
the event.
The simulation was the culmination
of a monthlong weather curriculum prepared by the
Weather
Channel, which has operated similar
events with middle- or high-school students in
for the past five years.
Students learned about hurricane
formation, storm fronts and the functions of city response
units.
They then dispersed into 10 groups
and researched one "emergency support function" each, such as
law enforcement, mass care,
communications, fire response, transportation, and food and water.
And all this as four hurricanes hit
"We haven't just been studying
it, we've been living it," said Suzy Pinnell,
the science teacher
whose three classes participated in the
simulation. "I think this is a great program for these
kids because it teaches them what to do
in a storm situation."
Several students had lost power
after Hurricanes Frances and Jeanne, so learning about the
different support functions helped them
understand why it may have taken Florida Power & Light
Tammy Noel, a vice mayor for the
imaginary city, said her family lost power for five days during
Hurricane
But Noel, who simultaneously was
studying hurricane preparedness in science class, said she
better understood now how hard it is to
respond to a disaster such as Hurricane Jason.
"At first I thought the news
people ... just read things off sheets of paper," Noel said. "But I
didn't realize the storms affected
everything so much."
For other students, the simulation
offered a chance to check out career fields.
"I always wanted to be a
doctor," said Natasha Augustin, who worked with
the health and medicine
team. "It's a good feeling to know
you can help people like this."
Sarah Halasz
can be reached at 954-572-2029 or [email protected]
Copyright © 2004,
Trick or
treat -
Kids take to streets for
door-to-door candy quest
By Jim Gaines,Daily News
Sunday, October 31, 2004
Trevor Frey/Daily News
Donald Alvey
(left), 12, and Julio Medina, 9, go trick-or-treating on
sets on Saturday night.
What’s Halloween about for
Wednesday Addams and her pirate friend?
“The candy!” chorused Alex Kary and her friend Summer Shepherd, both 7, as they filled
their bags
with treats Saturday evening on
Alex and her parents, Dean and
Debbie Kary of Woodburn, formed a trio of “Addams
Family” members
as they trick-or-treated up the
street from Dean Kary’s sister’s house.
“She wanted to be Wednesday, and it kind of
formed around that,” Dean Kary – Gomez – said of
Alex, who sported long real braids
to match her dark outfit and headless doll.
“She grew her hair out for a solid
year, just for that,” said Debbie Kary, a
black-wigged
Morticia.
They trooped from house to house on
Magnolia with Summer and her mother, Jan Shepherd, who
wore
hippie garb.
“My best friend. We’ve known each other since
preschool,” Alex said, hugging Summer and giggling.
The Karys
and Shepherds started early, just after 5 p.m., but the crowd thickened as the
sun
fell. Knots of children and parents
moved through the neighborhood, begging for candy from houses
festooned with jack-o-lanterns, flashing
lights and cobwebs.
Two blocks down, Tamela Smith, dressed as a witch with pointy black hat, sat
on her front steps
with her neighbor Holli
Drummond. They waited to hand out M&Ms, Dum-Dums
and other candy while
Smith’s husband Doug sat on the
porch swing.
Doug Smith said he’s slowed Tamela Smith’s Halloween enthusiasm since their recent
marriage,
cutting back on the house decorations.
“She usually goes all-out for
Halloween,” he said.
Not as many trick-or-treaters as
usual were out early this year, said Tamela Smith, a
10-year
resident of the street.
“We usually have a lot of
trick-or-treaters around here,” she said. “A lot of people in the
neighborhood dress up, they decorate their
houses. I think the neighborhood really enjoys
Halloween.”
“They’re coming. They’re working
their way up,” said her niece, Erika Williams.
The crowd grew near
with many princesses, vampires and
Spider-Men, she said.
Sure enough, in a few minutes Shellene White, in a black cloak and vampire teeth, led her
son
James White, 5, in his Spider-Man
outfit toward the Smiths’ house.
She held his hand as they walked
door to door. James peered into his pumpkin bucket to inventory
the suckers, candy bars and other
treats he’d received so far.
His chosen identity of Spider-Man
was easily explained.
“Because I like
him. Because he
webs houses ...” James said, clutching the mask close to his
face.
Over on
Jacob Walker pushed the two-masted wooden cart, which was decked out like the prow of a
pirate
ship. He and his wife, Charlene, their
two children and two friends all dressed as pirates.
Knowing they’d have a crowd, but
not how many, they needed costumes for a flexible group – and
you can always add more pirates,
Charlene Walker said.
Dressed all in black, their friend
Scott Lyles brought up the rear, sporting a Communist red star
with his obligatory pirate dagger.
Charlene and Jacob Walker’s
daughter Julea, 2, rode in the “ship” while Dontarius Martin, 10, a
pirate in sneakers, ran around clashing
plastic swords with his friend Joshua Goodpastor, 8.
Goodpastor is Charlene Walker’s son.
Dontarius loudly claimed Charlene Walker’s
friend Rachel Paquette as his “pirate princess
daughter.”
Paquette, also in a ruffled pirate
outfit, came along because “we needed a wench,” Charlene
the kids.”
Daily News ·
http://www.capitalnews9.com/content/headlines/?ArID=101707&SecID=33
Kids trick or
treat for a different reason –
10/29/2004 3:01 PM
By: Capital News 9 web staff
It's Friday morning, just a few
days before Halloween and some kids are on a mission to get the
goods -- but not the sweet treats you
might be thinking of.
Seventh grader Cate
Mensler said, "We're collecting bags full of
food that we laid out on Monday
and we're giving it to the pantries
for people who are not going to have a good Thanksgiving."
"Trick or Treat for
Hunger" is a joint project between St. Mary's School and Spa Catholic High
School that goes
back 12 years.
The kids dropped off 500 empty bags and have now come to collect.
Up and the down the street, the
girls raced the boys to gather the most bags and the most goods.
The drive is part of a larger
community service requirement in both schools.
Kathleen Cornell of
and we're getting close to the
holidays, Thanksgiving and Christmas, and there's a great need for
food and nonperishable items."
All the bags were dropped off at
Spa Catholic where the seniors will sort the items. So how was
this year's haul?
Sixth grader Packie
Guy said, "We got lots of bags and lots of food for the hungry."
All the food will be going to the
food pantry at the Economic Opportunity Council in
Springs, making
for not only a haunting Halloween but a helpful one as well.
Ghostly jamboree –
29/10/2004 7:51
http://english.eastday.com/eastday/englishedition/features/userobject1ai613732.html
Shanghai Daily News
This Sunday, October 31, is `All Hallow's Eve' -- the day that has come to be known as
Halloween.
Tina Kanagaratnam
traces the origins of the holiday, and offers some tips on how to have a Happy
Halloween in
``Trick or treat, smell my feet,
give me something good to eat.'' If that traditional American
children's rhyme hasn't quite made it to
be more Halloween festivities at the
city's bars, more costume parties, even more Halloween
paraphernalia.
Halloween, or ``All Hallow's Eve,'' is the Celtic celebration of the end of
summer. It was also
Samhain, the day that commemorated the
dead, who, as it was believed, visited their kinsmen on
this day. It is the Western equivalent
of Chinese ``ghost month,'' albeit telescoped into a
single day: the day when spirits, good
and evil, roam the earth. The traditions of Halloween,
many of which seem downright strange,
come from these roots. Jack-o-lanterns, hollowed-out
pumpkins lit with candles from the inside
and with grinning faces carved upon them, come from the
tradition of skull-like faces placed around
a fire to keep demons at bay. People dress up like
the ghosts and spirits said to be wandering
the earth that night. It was the Irish immigrants in
the late 19th century who brought
Halloween to
a cornerstone of American life.
Enthusiastically embraced by children, ``trick-or-treating,''
going door-to-door asking the neighbors
for candy (or risking a ``trick'') began in the 1930s.
Most compounds in
Halloween, and many of the international
schools hold some type of Halloween activity. For
grownups, virtually every bar and club in
the city holds some type of Halloween celebration,
often with fabulously spooky decor and
an opportunity for costumes. Halloween how-to * Pumpkins
Pumpkins, or ``nangua''
in Chinese, are available at City Shopping and major supermarkets. And
while they don't quite have the same
vibrant orange color as the pumpkins back home, they work
just fine. Get your pumpkin late,
though: Because of
here very quickly, so carve your
jack-o-lantern at the last possible minute. * Costumes In
keeping with the tradition of ghosts and
spirits, Halloween costumes are supposed to be scary --
but they don't have to be. Every year,
there are countless superheroes, fairies and characters
from the latest
your ultimate costume fantasy, there's
still time. Head to
Holiday House, where they have an
enormous selection of costumes (on the second floor).
The Shanghai Zhongbao
Dress Ornament Co, a costume warehouse, also has a wide selection, but be
warned -- neither offers high-quality
costumes; the fabric is thin and very synthetic. For
high-quality kids' costumes, try Confetti, who
have the range of Disney heroes and heroines. For
accessories,
the latter, along with yards of
sequined fabric (good for a last-minute cape). * Candy An
all-important Halloween accessory.
Unfortunately, there are as yet no bags of Halloween candy
available here as there are in the
lollipops, as well as wrapped Halloween-themed
chocolates.
The souls of children -
Sunday, October 31, 2004
By ELAINE D'AURIZIO
STAFF WRITER
Dave DeVries
has become something of an expert on children and monsters. He's been working
with
both for six years.
It began when his niece Jessica,
then 7, snatched his sketchbook at the beach and drew a flat,
stick-like demon. DeVries,
an artist, was so intrigued, he traced her drawing onto canvas and
painted it in realistic, three-dimensional
detail and color. Then he talked to Jessica about it.
It was the beginning of a project
called "The Monster Engine," which involved young children and
monsters of all varieties. That resulted in
a book by the same name and now an exhibit at the
Society of
Illustrators in
with DeVries'
painted transformation of it.
DeVries, who was raised in
because "there is magic and healing
in it."
"I love their drawings because
they are so simple, uncensored and powerful," he said. "They're
revealing a part of themselves, their
souls."
He said drawing monsters is a way
for kids to illustrate real fears, using a fantasy character,
and to talk about it. "If a kid
is going through a divorce, he's not going to draw pictures about
divorce," DeVries
said. "It's going to be something that might be a monster separating him
from
something he loves, a tearing kind of
monster."
Children drew all kinds of
monsters.
For instance, there's "Old
Scratch," a witch of a child's nightmares with no saving grace, drawn
by Kimberly DeVries,
another niece, when she was 7.
"She's scary," said
Kimberly, now 13. "My dream was that she would come and get you and take
you
down to the underworld. Drawing her
showed me that this can really happen to you. Drawing makes
me feel better."
But then there's the happy face
monster that Alexandra DeLiberto of
hearts at people and they fall in love.
What's so scary about that?
"It's scary because it comes out at night and is twice the size of
people," Alexandra said.
A now-older Jessica DeVries of
dinosaur-like, "No. No. No.
Monster," who is in the book and on exhibit - and was the original
inspiration for the project.
"It shows that monsters are
only in your imagination, in what you draw," said Jessica, now 13.
"[From the project] children
learn, 'I control my imagination. I control the monster.'Ÿ"
DeVries'
passion about children's art and their
imagination is contagious.
"Every time I saw David, I
drew a lot of pictures and I'd be so excited," said Chelsea DeLiberto,
12, of
with that picture."
DeVries, an illustrator who has done
posters, calendars, and trading cards of Captain Marvel,
Batman and Superman, thought back
the other day to the horror of 9/11. He wondered how a
superhero of his childhood fantasies would
handle it. "It's how your mind tries to comprehend
something that is overwhelming," he
said. "I think kids do the same thing. I understand them."
Michelle Oram,
director of Stage Struck Performing Arts Center in
- where DeVries gives workshops - said the illustrator has a
special connection with kids. "He
gets off on their energy and they from
his. ... It's wonderful the way they derive from each
other," she said.
A former professor at
Murray Tinkelman
called his former student "outrageously talented" and his project
"a stroke of
genius."
"An important part of this
project is his profound respect for the youngsters," said Tinkelman.
"It speaks of David's outgoing
nature how he encompasses people and art, how he makes them
inclusive rather than exclusive."
Tinkelman said an illustrator initiating his
own work, rather than being assigned work, is
entrepreneurial and the wave of the future for
artists.
"I previewed the exhibition in
a crowded room of professors of art and they praised this project
highly," he said.
The artist is elated that others
see the originality of the idea. "It's important that it's
unique and helps people," he said.
DeVries has also taught courses in
"Build a Monster" at elementary schools in Oradell, Basking
Ridge and
His deep regard and passion for
what children have to say in drawings is rooted in his own
childhood, when he says people viewed
children's art as something cute to hang on the
refrigerator door.
"I genuinely think what they
are doing is important when they draw," he said. "So when I tell
them how much I love a drawing and want
to hear what they have to say, it is genuine and makes
them feel important. Teachers have told
me it raises their self-esteem."
DeVries does not pretend to be a
psychologist: "I don't have a degree for that." But when he
first started interviewing children, he
noticed a boy who drew a two-headed monster, one head
with a beard.
"I could see that he and one
of the other kids were in pain and there really was no way for them
to express it," he said.
"Another kid I could tell wasn't listened to by the people around him.
He brightened up because someone
wanted to hear him."
The entire experience has stirred DeVries' own childhood perceptions. "The thing I
remember about
childhood is the sense of awe, the
magic," he said. "If you look at kids, they are just absurd.
There's no logic there. You have to
be willing to be absurd if you want to reconnect with that
childhood sense of wonder. You have to be
willing to embarrass yourself."
DeVries would like to do "Monster
Engine II," a sequel.
"Then I'd like to change the
subject matter, do a hero engine," he said. "It could be the circus
engine, the dinosaur engine. ... You can
plug into any subject a child can draw. At this point
it's an experiment in children's art I
don't know where it's going to lead but the point is to
continue exploring children's art
more."
He remembers one little boy who
came for a session angry and withdrawn. He didn't want to be
there, and when DeVries
asked him to do a drawing the boy sneered and walked away. By the end of
the night, he walked up to DeVries and handed him a drawing.
"That proved to me that kids
want to express themselves and they want somebody to listen, no
matter how dark their thoughts are,"
he said.
Paintings of
children –
BY DEEPTI HAJELA
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Oct 31, 2004
NEW YORK There are
no stiff faces or falsely cherubic smiles in these paintings.
In artist John Singer Sargent's view, children were individuals with
personalities, and he tried
to capture that in the portraits he
painted of them throughout his career.
More than 40 of those works are on
display at the
Singer Sargent Painting Children." The works will be on view through
Jan. 16.
The show also will be traveling to
the Chrysler Museum of Art in
Museum in
Sargent, one of the foremost American
painters of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, moved
the painting of children beyond
sentimental imagery, said Barbara Dayer Gallati, curator of the
show.
"Children had the potential to
be individuals rather than these little blank things that were
ready to be molded," she said.
So the shy little girl is shown
clearly wanting to leave; another girl, known for being outgoing,
seems almost in motion; and a boy, arms
folded and eyes serious, looks like he just wants the
painting to be finished.
"What he's doing is diverging
from a common style of portraying children," Gallati
said of
Sargent.
Sargent's work reflected a larger societal
trend, she added, as around the turn of the century
more attention was focused on childhood
as a distinct stage of life. Laws were put in place to
protect children from overwork and to
encourage public education.
Gallati said she hoped the show would
encourage viewers to think about the issues raised, as well
as give them a chance to enjoy Sargent's work.
"He is one of the finest
artists in the history of American art, and there is always that visual
pleasure of looking at his paintings, no
matter what the subject," she said. "I would like them
to come away thinking about childhood
and examining their own points of view."
http://www.timesdispatch.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=RTD%2FMGArticle%2FRTD_BasicArticle&c=MGArticle&cid=1031778787857&path=!flair!ae&s=1045855936372
Adopting
children from S. Korea a sure thing for Brighton family –
The Greens now have 4 children and
are working to adopt their 5th child
Friday, October 29, 2004
BY LISA CAROLIN
News Staff Reporter
http://www.mlive.com/news/aanews/index.ssf?/base/news-3/109906377719450.xml
The Green family home in downtown
chattering. That's just the way it is with
four children under the age of 5.
And there's a fifth child on the
way for 30-something parents Kim and Ben Green, who have adopted
all of their children from
"We were drawn to
international adoption because the birth parent can't change her mind,"
explains 31-year-old Kim Green. "When
we found out that it would be difficult to have a baby, we
decided to adopt," she says.
The Greens have been married for
eight years. They met while students at
University and live in
be more centrally located for his job
as a sales representative for Giant Bicycle.
"We were here for a while
before anyone said hi to us in the park," says Ben. "Some people give
us funny looks and that's
disappointing. People were more accepting in the
there is more diversity."
"We get good stares too, but
we also get not-so-good stares, especially as we increase the number
of children," says Kim.
"There are more and more
people adopting internationally in this area, and we have an adoption
play group in Brighton with children
from
The Greens began the adoption
process in 1999 with an agency called Americans for International
Aid and Adoption based in
children but have worked with the same
social worker who does the home studies. Their oldest son,
Benjamin, who is 41/2, was born
Nov. 24, 1999, and was adopted by the Greens in April of 2000
when he was 5 months old.
"Ben and I both flew to
family and get an insight into how he
began his life."
"I'll never forget flying over
to get Benjamin," says Ben. "It was so neat seeing him for the
first time."
Parents adopting from
Kim has chosen to fly to
"I love
kids need a home. It's a blessing to
them and to us."
The Greens chose
foster care and receive good medical
care. The most common reason that South Korean babies are
put up for adoption is that their
parents aren't married, and the children would be stigmatized.
Bloodlines are very important in
Another reason for adoption is that
some babies have special needs. Two of the Green's children
have special needs. Eli, the
17-month-old the hope to adopt later this year, also has a number of
medical problems. The Green's year-old
baby, McKenna, has had several minor eye surgeries. She
was thought to having a hearing
impairment but that is not the case. She also could not sit up at
an appropriate age, but has since caught
up developmentally.
Three-year-old Parker has a form of
dwarfism. Eli has ectodermal dysplasia,
which means that he
has no eyelashes or eyebrows and his
teeth are spaced. The Green's first two children, Benjamin,
and Kya, who
is 3, did not have any health problems.
The Greens like to cook Korean food
for their family, which the children all enjoy. Kim says she
hasn't been able to find any place to buy
Korean food in
the county. They've invited friends
and relatives for several dinner parties with Korean food at
which they have been raising money to go
toward Eli's adoption.
"We've even got people eating
and liking Kim Chee," says Ben, referring to the
Korean dish of
pickled cabbage. "Kya
loves raw onions and garlic and Benjamin loves mandu,
which are Korean
dumplings."
Parker says, "I like pancakes
and getting chocolate ice cream at the Yum Yum
Tree."
Benjamin adds, "I like the choo choo train keeps going
around."
Benjamin enjoys collecting and
identifying insects and doing tricks on his two-wheel bike. Kia
and Parker like to paint. Kim has a
degree in teaching special education and plans to home-school
the children for a while.
"I want to wait to send them
to school until they have strong enough character to face what they
have to face like discrimination and
racism," says Kim. "Each child is so different. Kya
is
strong willed and has a strong
personality. We want to do what's best for our kids."
"For me the most rewarding
part of adoption has been seeing the change in our children, says Kim.
"McKenna cried, wouldn't sit
up and was terrified when we got her. Six months later, she is
confident and running around."
Different countries and adoption
agencies have varying rules when it comes to adoption. To adopt
from
at least two years and who are not
obese, because they look upon that as being unhealthy.
The cost of adoption varies ranging
from $15,000 in
Adoptive families can earn a
$10,000 tax credit for an adopted child, which can be carried
forward for five years.
Kids Vote
offered in
Oct 30 2004 12:00AM By
REGISTER-PAJARONIAN STAFF REPORT
http://www.zwire.com/news/newsstory.cfm?newsid=13254487&title=%3Cp%3EKids%20Vote%20offered%20in%2
0Santa%20Cruz%20County%20by%20elections%20office&BRD=1197&PAG=461&CATNAME=Community%20News&CATEGO
RYID=403
Young people from kindergarten to
12th grade will have the opportunity to cast their votes for
President of the
Santa Cruz County Clerk/Elections
Department has partnered with a seventh and eighth grade class
at
opportunity to vote on real issues with real
ballots on Election Day.
The class has assembled Kids Vote
packets for all of the 163 polling sites in
and will tally the kids' votes after
the polls close at 8 p.m. on Tuesday. The candidates' name,
party affiliation and picture will be
provided on the ballot to assist in the election process.
The goal of the program is to make
voting a family experience, according to the
Clerk/Elections
Department.
It's also a way to teach young people about the importance of voting.
Results of Kids Vote will be posted
after Tuesday on www.votescounts.com. For more information,
call the elections department at
454-2060.
Colours, tunes, quiz & dhaak-
A STAFF REPORTER
http://www.telegraphindia.com/1041021/asp/calcutta/story_3906336.asp#
A creative flair for colours set the Mahasaptami mood
at most of the 60 housing complexes
enlisted with The Telegraph Hand in Hand puja programme, promoting
community camaraderie across
the city.
In the south, Sikharbindu
Co-operative Housing kicked off with a sit-and-draw, following up with
a spot quiz and antakshari
in the evening. The song session saw the eager residents showing off
their musical prowess, while the youngsters
were engrossed in testing their grey cells.
At Happy Nook, near
offering anjali,
while the men cheered them on.
A child resident
of Saptaparni at the sit-and-draw Saptami
event. Picture
by Sanjoy
Chattopadhyaya
At
and a sumptuous lunch. The evening was
reserved for the teens to flaunt their Puja wardrobe
at
the fashion show, while antakshari was meant for all with a fondness for melody.
Sit-and-draw also kept the kids
busy at Saptaparni, on
Purbayan Apartment, it was the drawing
contest coupled with a spot quiz.
In
with paint and palette for the
sit-and-draw contest. Split up in three age groups, the event
found the contestants at their creative
best. Later in the day, eight teams of five participants
each squared off for antakshari. “Both the contests had a tremendous response
with all of us
either taking part in the contests or
cheering the participants,” added Anutosh Mukherjee of
Labony Housing.
In Behala,
the little residents of ODRC Rental took to paint brush and crayons with great
gusto.
“Around 35 children in two age
groups took part in the sit-and-draw, and for the antakshari,
we
had 20 teams of two each trying the
preliminary round,” said Himangshujyoti Choudhury.
In the northern end of town, a
fierce battle of wits followed lunch at CMDA Housing Estate in
Barrackpore with teams of
two participants each. But more was in store at night, when the girls
in all their finery took the stage
for creative dance. Spot quiz was what kept the youngsters and
their families on tenterhooks at both
Dum.
At Purbayan
Udayan Sangho in Sodepur, the evening took off on a musical note with the
residents
teaming up for antakshari
and spot quiz keeping the spirits high.
At Aurobindo
Arena in Khardah, the women showed off their
conch-blowing skills after the children
performed for the creative dance contest.
Conch-blowing stole the evening show at Basant Bihar,
in Belghoria,
too, while Minakshi Housing, on
sit-and-draw, before wrapping up Saptami with spot quiz.
©Register-Pajaronian
2004
What’s Dalapuligadaritt? These kids don’t have to
think twice to answer – MUMBAI,
Four out of six West Zone finalists
of India Child Genius are city kids
Debanjana Chaudhuri
http://cities.expressindia.com/fullstory.php?newsid=104525
Mumbai, October 24: What’s the
capital of the
13-year-old Shachit Shankaran Iyer, without a second’s pause.
Iyer is the West Zonal champion of
Britannia’s
by quiz master Siddhartha Basu on Star World.
Iyer, along with Jesika
Hasmukh Haria (11), Ronak Rajendra Nagori (12) and Hardik Vimal Ashar
(12)—all from Mumbai,
have qualified for the semi-finals of the ICG.
While the Oxford English Dictionary
describes a genius as one who has an exceptional natural
ability, each of these students has their
own explanation.
‘‘When you achieve something even
talent finds difficult to attain, you are a genius,’’ says
Haria, who is referred to by her friends
as ‘‘Jessi jaisi koi nahin’’ because of her
academic
superiority and co-curricular achievements.
‘‘Encyclopedias are my favourite game,’’ says Iyer, who
spends hours going through his collection
of CD ROMS. Among his varied
interests, Iyer is currently reading up on assassins
and phobias.
Besides consistently standing first
in their respective classes, each one has numerous other
achievements and championships to their credit.
Ashar ranked sixth among 7,000 students
in the Mid-School Scholarship Exams conducted by the
competitions and various talent hunts.
But it isn’t easy being brilliant.
‘‘Especially on a show like ICG, where you’re on TV and
everyone’s watching you,’’ says Nagori, who is often gripped by bouts of nervousness.
Ashar’s solution to the pressure is to
participate with enthusiasm and ‘‘just give it my best’’.
‘‘The rest is God’s grace,’’ philosophises Iyer.
For now, they’re concentrating on
the upcoming zonal semi-finals. Only one will be selected to
represent
Tucking away cash prizes in savings
accounts for further studies and even cramming through
encyclopedias, these young geniuses don’t forget
to live their dreams.
Reading Sherlock Holmes and Nancy
Drew Case Files, playing volleyball and cricket or watching
Tamil movies and even cooking up
gooey pav bhaji for
parents, there’s lots to do.
And there’s no stopping till Haria becomes a biotechnologist, Nagori
a cardiologist, Ashar a
pilot and Iyer
a do-gooder scientist who will one day eradicate computer viruses from the face
of
the earth.
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