Saturday Teatime

by Natasha Chart · 2009-04-04 12:58:00 UTC
Topics:

Raiding the internet fridge ...

- Grist premiers their food section.

- Antarctic ice is melting very, very fast.

- Ryerson University in Canada offers distance learning courses in urban agriculture. As I understood it, tuition is less than $500 for a course, give it a peek.

- The USGS has identified the watersheds responsible for the Gulf of Mexico dead zone, and the agricultural practices responsible for the damage.

- It looks like the Obamas are fashionable in many ways, including their gardening proclivities: Baltimore City Hall will be planting a vegetable garden on the grounds, with the produce going to local charities. An effort may also go through to plant a vegetable garden at the Vermont statehouse. Also, citizens everywhere are investing in 'recession gardens' of their own. In crisis, opportunity, I suppose.

- How to make your possessions last longer.

- Researchers have identified the cause of poorer mental function in children raised in poverty. Turns out, it's all about the stress, which entirely accounts for all observed differences in the size of the working memory available to low income children. This book, Intelligence and How To Get It: Why Schools and Culture Count, probably holds relevant clues as to why. It discusses the praise:criticism ratio in typical working and middle class parenting styles, highlighting that children who are praised more than criticized (which is more common as you move up the income ladder) tend to thrive better in school. Apparently, criticizing kids all the time is bad for their intellect. Who could have ever predicted?

Natasha Chart
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