September 1, 2010
The Flying Spaghetti Monster (FSM) is the deity of the parody religion the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster or Pastafarianism, a satirical movement that promotes a light-hearted view of religion and opposes the teaching of intelligent design and creationism in public schools. Created in 2005 by Oregon State physics graduate Bobby Henderson, it was originally intended as a satirical protest against the decision by the Kansas State Board of Education to permit the teaching of intelligent design as an alternative to evolution in public schools. In an open letter, Henderson parodied the concept of intelligent design by professing belief in a supernatural creator which closely resembles spaghetti and meatballs. Henderson further called for his theory of creation to be allotted equal time in science classrooms alongside intelligent design and evolution.
In his letter he wrote, ‘I think we can all look forward to the time when these three theories are given equal time in our science classrooms across the country, and eventually the world; one third time for Intelligent Design, one third time for Flying Spaghetti Monsterism, and one third time for logical conjecture based on overwhelming observable evidence.’
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Posted in Education, Humor, Philosophy |
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August 10, 2010
In the United States, a Sadie Hawkins Dance is usually a less formal dance sponsored by a high school, middle school or college, in which female students invite male students. This is contrary to the usual custom of male students inviting females to school dances such as Prom, in the spring and Homecoming, in the fall.
The Sadie Hawkins dance is named after the Li’l Abner comic strip character Sadie Hawkins, created by cartoonist Al Capp. In the strip, the unmarried women of Dogpatch got one day a year to chase the bachelors and ‘marry up’ with the ones they caught. The event was first introduced in a daily strip which ran on November 13, 1937.
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August 9, 2010
The Montessori [mon-tuh-sawr-ee] method is an approach to educating children based on the research of Italian physician and educator Maria Montessori (1870–1952). The focus of the method is on providing the student freedom to manage their own education. The role of the teacher (sometimes called director, directress, or guide) is to watch over the learning environment to remove any obstacles that would interfere with the student’s natural development.
The method is primarily applied with young children (2–6), due to the young child’s unique instincts and sensitivity to conditions in the environment. However, it is sometimes conducted with elementary age (6–12) children and occasionally with infants and toddlers, as well as at the middle and high school level.
Posted in Education, Philosophy |
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June 30, 2010
Simple English Wikipedia is an English edition of the online encyclopedia Wikipedia, primarily written in Basic English (an 850-word auxiliary language created by Charles Kay Ogden in the 1920s for learning English as a second language) and Special English (avoids idioms; created in 1959 and still presented daily by the Voice of America broadcast). Launched in 2003, the site has the stated aim of providing an encyclopedia for ‘people with different needs, such as students, children, adults with learning difficulties and people who are trying to learn English.’
Articles on the Simple English Wikipedia are usually shorter than their English Wikipedia counterparts, typically presenting only basic information: Tim Dowling of ‘the Guardian’ newspaper explained that ‘the Simple English version tends to stick to commonly accepted facts.’ The interface is also more simply labeled; for instance, the ‘Random article’ link on the English Wikipedia is replaced with a ‘Show Any Page’ link; users are invited to ‘change’ rather than ‘edit’ pages; clicking on a red link shows a ‘not yet started’ message rather than the usual ‘page does not exist.’
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