Areas to Support Children’s Learning and Development

Areas to Support Children’s Learning and Development Supporting Children’s Learning and Development Children are developing all the time and their learning reflects this, so, for example, when a child can pull themselves up they can suddenly reach things they couldn’t before or when they learn new words they begin to label objects such as ball or drink. The revised EYFS uses the term Learning and Development to describe seven areas of learning. These are all related to each other however, they are divided into prime and specific areas. Prime Areas Personal, Social and Emotional Development Communication and Language Physical Development Specific Areas Literacy Mathematics Understanding the World Expressive Arts and Design In addition the revised EYFS refers to the different ways that children learn as the characteristics of learning: playing and exploring – children investigate and experience things and ‘have a go’. Active learning – children concentrate and keep on trying if they encounter difficulties and enjoy achievements. Creating and thinking critically – children have and develop their own ideas, make links between ideas and develop strategies for doing things. Together with the prime and specific areas these comprise the knowledge, skills and experiences that are developmentally appropriate for children from birth to 5 years. Personal, Social and Emotional Development – Involves helping children to form positive relationships, to develop social skills and learn how to manage their feelings and develop respect for others. Personal, Social and Emotional Development is made up of these aspects: Self Confidence and Self Awareness – Children are confident to try new activities and say why they like some activities more than others. They are confident to speak in a familiar group, talk about their ideas and say when they do or don’t need help. Managing Feelings and Behaviour – Children talk about how they and others show feelings, talk about their own and others behaviour and that some behaviour is unacceptable. They work part of a group and understand to follow rules. Making Relationships – Children play co-operatively, taking turns with others. They take account of one another’s ideas about how to organise their activity. They show sensitivity and form positive relationships with adults and other children. Communication and Language – Involves giving children the opportunity to develop their confidence and skills. To give children the best opportunity for developing communication and language. Communication and Language is made up of these aspects: Listening and Attention – Children listen attentively in a range of situations. They listen to stories and respond to what they hear with relevant comments or questions. They give their attention to what others say and respond appropriately while engaged in another activity. Understanding – Children follow instructions involving several ideas or actions. They answer ‘how’ or ‘why’ questions about their experiences and in response to stories and events. Speaking – Children express themselves effectively. They use past, present and future forms accurately when talking about events that have happened or are to happen in the future. They develop their own narratives and explanations by connecting ideas or events. Physical Development – Involves providing opportunities for young children to be active and interactive, and to develop their co-ordination, control and movement. Children must also be helped to understand the importance of physical activity and to make healthy choices to food. Physical Development is made up of these aspects: Moving and Handling – Children show good control and co-ordination. They move confidently in a range of ways. They handle equipment and tools effectively, for example, pencils for writing and climbing equipment. Health and Self Care – Children know the importance for good health of physical exercise and a healthy diet and talk about ways to keep healthy and safe. They manage their own basic hygiene and personal needs including dressing and going to the toilet independently. The Specific Areas Literacy – Literacy development involves encouraging children to link sounds and letters and to begin to read and write. Children must be given access to a wide range of reading materials such as books to ignite their interests. Literacy Development is made up of these aspects: Reading – Children read and understand simple sentences. They use phonic knowledge to decode regular words and read them aloud accurately. They demonstrate understanding when talking with others about what they have read. Writing – Children use their phonic knowledge to write words in ways which match their spoken sounds. They write simple sentences which can be read by themselves and others. Practitioners could support writing skills by providing sand to promote writing. Mathematics – Involves providing children with opportunities to develop and improve their skills in counting, understanding and using numbers, calculating simple addition and subtraction problems and to describe shapes, spaces and measures. Mathematics is made up of these aspects: Numbers – Children count reliably from 1-20 place them in order and say which number is one more or one less than a given number. Using quantities and objects, they add and subtract two single digit numbers and count on or back to find the answer. Practitioners could supply building blocks and numbered jigsaws to help support this. Shape, Space and measures – Children use everyday language to talk about size, weight, distance, time and money to compare quantities and objects and to solve problems. They recognise, create and describe patterns. They explore characteristics of everyday objects and use mathematical language to describe them. Different sizes and shapes of building bricks and blocks could be used to promote this. Understanding the World – Involves guiding children to make sense of their physical world and their community through opportunities to explore, observe and find out about people, places, technology and the environment. Understanding the World is made up of these aspects: People and Communities – Children talk about past and present events in their own lives and family members. They know about similarities and differences between themselves and others and among families, communities and traditions. Practitioners could use pictures and photographs to display different cultures. The World – Children know about similarities and differences in relation to places, objects, material and living things. They talk about their own environment and how environments might vary from one another. Children will also develop an understanding to care for their environment. Practitioners should support this by getting children to care for plants or a small vegetable patch. Technology – Children recognise that a range of technology is used in places such as homes and schools. They select and use technology for particular purposes. Younger children use mechanical toys while older children could take, in turn, using a computer. Expressive Arts and Design – Involves enabling children to explore and play with a wide range of media and materials. This area supports children’s curiosity and play. They explore and share their thinking, ideas and feelings in music, in art, movement and dance, role play and technology. Expressive Arts and Design is made up of these aspects: Exploring and using Media and Materials – Children sing songs, make music and dance. They safely use and explore a variety of materials, tools and techniques experimenting with colour, design, texture, form and function. Practitioners could use tape recorders, cd players and musical instruments. Being imaginative – Children use what they have learnt about media and materials in original ways thinking about uses and purposes. They represent their own ideas, thoughts and feelings through design and technology, art, music, dance, role play and stories. Practitioners should provide a variety of role play materials and support children’s imaginative ideas. Children develop and learn in different ways. Practitioners need to look at what skills and knowledge the children are demonstrating and consider ways to support the child to strengthen and deepen their current learning and development skills. This will ensure that the individual needs of the child are met. There are 3 characteristics of effective learning to help us focus on and understand how children learn. Playing and Exploring Finding out and Exploring Using what they know in their play Being willing to have a go This characteristic of learning focuses on a children’s engagement with the resources they use, the environment they are in and the people around them. Children should have opportunities to be involved in open ended, hands on experiences prompted by their own curiosity. Children’s play experiences should enable them to seek things out that interest them, initiate activities, seek challenges, develop a ‘can do’ attitude, and be willing to take a risk in trying out new experiences and begin to see ‘failures’ as a learning opportunity. Play also provides the link to the areas of learning and development and gives the opportunity for children to explore their own feelings, views and ideas. Active Learning Being involved and Concentrating Keep Trying Enjoying and Achieving which they set out to do Active Learning focuses on the role of intrinsic motivation which supports long term success. Children need to be able to follow their interests for long periods of time, fully engaged in what they are doing and concentrating deeply. In their activities, children should be encouraged to face challenges and keep on trying if they encounter difficulties. Practitioners should help children to value the rewards of their own success. Creating and Thinking Critically Having their own ideas Using what they already know to learn new things Choosing ways to do things and finding new ways Creating and thinking critically highlights the importance of observing how children are thinking. Children have and develop their own ideas. Children should have many opportunities to be creative, generating new ideas, being inventive, finding problems and challenges and figuring out their own ways to solve them. By respecting children’s ideas will give them confidence to try out new experiences. Children from a very young age enjoy organising and processing information, creating patterns and making predictions based on what they already know. Children develop and learn in different ways. There is a great deal of overlap between the ages and stages because all children develop at different rates and at their own pace. This should be remembered when planning activities. Birth to 11 months – babies enjoy being held and cuddled. They enjoy the company of others. Practitioners should ensure that all staff are aware of the importance of attachment and to get staff to say ‘hello’ and ‘goodbye’ as this develops a secure and trusting relationship. Practitioners should plan to have one to one contact with babies and provide toys/objects to be sucked and squeezed and provide space to roll around and explore. 8 – 20 months – babies and young children will now start to build relationships with special people. They start to show an interest in activities so practitioners could provide push along toys and trikes for outdoor play. 16-26 months – children start to play alongside others and play co-operatively with a familiar adult. Practitioners could then play name games to get everyone to know each other. Plan play activities to get children to explore new toys and environments such as trikes, pushchairs for dolls, dough, sand and cd’s and story books. 22-36 months – children now show an interest with others and want to join in. Many form special friendships with others. Practitioners can provide resources that promote co-operation between two children like a bat and ball. Provide safe spaces so children can run around safely, kick a ball and use A frames. Practitioners can discuss with other staff how each child responds to activities and build on this to plan future activities. 30-50 months – children now play within a group and initiate play. Practitioners need to provide space and materials for group play, for example, lego. 40-60 months – Practitioners need to ensure that children have opportunities to play with everyone in the group and to provide activities that involve taking turns and sharing. Practitioners need to plan time and space for energetic play and plan activities where children can practice moving, throwing, climbing and kicking. Experiment different ways of moving.

Preferential Hiring in the North Essay

Inuit in the north, specifically in Nunavut, have an agreement with the government that they receive special benefits to help with day-to-day problems because of what happened to their people in the past. It is common knowledge that when explorers and traders first went to the north, they mistreated the aboriginals up there. They introduce alcohol and tobacco, they forced them to become sedentary by killing off their sled dogs and setting up trading booths for fur trades and such, and they quickly made them become â€Å"Europeanized†. This is not a proud part of Canadian history, and there have been measures taken to try and make up for the wrongs that were done. One of these measures is preferential hiring for Inuit. Although preferential hiring may seem like a fair arrangement given all that has happened, it is incredibly unjust and creates unnecessary problems. It is a fact that in the north the government has to hire a certain percent of Inuit when they are filling job pos itions. I do not agree with this because what ends up happening is that to be able to meet the agreed amount of beneficiaries hired, the government then has to employ people who may not have the qualifications necessary for the job, or who aren’t as trained and competent as other candidates. What also happens in many cases is that the requirements necessary to apply for a position get watered down until they are simple enough to target a larger crowd. This results in a slow-moving government with poor decision-making skills and no proficiency nor productivity. For example, a couple of years ago, in Iqaluit, there was a position as a secretary of a school that needed to be filled. However, there were no Inuit who applied that had enough qualifications for the job, so the school board then had to change the contract, saying that the minimum education requirement was a grade 10 education. A secretary of a school has many responsibilities, and I feel that it is needless to say that a pers on working in a learning facility should have a minimum of a high school diploma. That example was not an uncommon occurrence, it happens far too regularly in the north. It is a huge part of the reason why there is no motivation for a higher education in the youth of the north. These individuals know that if they can at least graduate high school, then they are almost guaranteed a job, and often a six digit salary (or very close to  it). They become lazy, and do not want to waste their time going to get a post-secondary education when they can easily get a job without one. This leads to my next point. There are many people who apply for the government jobs who have all the necessary qualifications and have the proper training and experience for the job, who don’t even get considered simply because of their nationality; if they aren’t Inuit, they aren’t wanted. This is borderline racism. The most qualified person should receive the job; all other factors (within reason) should be irrelevant. It is unfair towards all those who take the time and spend their money going through university, to be overlooked because there was a beneficiary with a high school diploma who also applied for the job. My final point is that there is no reason whatsoever for an Inuit not to have the proper credentials for a job apart from pure laziness. They are given all the opportunities imaginable, and it is their own fault if they do not take them. There is no excuse anymore for them not to have an education, because the government pays for their entire schooling. In fact, Inuit students get paid to go to university and other educational facilities. They are actually making money instead of going in to debt like most students. Therefore, one might wonder, why would someone not want to go to university and get a higher education if they are being paid for it? And the answer is because they do not need an education to get well-respected and well-paid jobs. There are plenty of examples why preferential hiring for Inuit is in fact handicapping them instead of helping them. The efficiency of the government in the north is nowhere near the same as the rest of Canada, and it is due to a lack of qualifications of those who are preferentially hired. By eliminating preferential hiring, you would be increasing motivation for a higher education and a better working society.

The Chernobyl Nuclear Accident

The Chernobyl disaster was a fire at a Ukrainian nuclear reactor, releasing substantial radioactivity within and outside the region. The consequences to human and environmental health are still felt to this day. The V.I. Lenin Memorial Chernobyl Nuclear Power Station was located in Ukraine, near the town of Pripyat, which had been built to house power station employees and their families. The power station was in a wooded, marshy area near the Ukraine-Belarus border, approximately 18 kilometers northwest of the city of Chernobyl and 100 km north of Kiev, the capital of Ukraine. The Chernobyl Nuclear Power Station included four nuclear reactors, each capable of producing one gigawatt of electric power. At the time of the accident, the four reactors produced about 10 percent of the electricity used in Ukraine. Construction of the Chernobyl power station began in the 1970s. The first of the four reactors was commissioned in 1977, and Reactor No. 4 began producing power in 1983. When the accident occurred in 1986, two other nuclear reactors were under construction. The Chernobyl Nuclear Accident On Saturday, ​April 26, 1986, the operating crew planned to test whether the Reactor No. 4 turbines could produce enough energy to keep the coolant pumps running until the emergency diesel generator was activated in case of an external power loss. During the test, at 1:23:58 am local time, power surged unexpectedly, causing an explosion and driving temperatures in the reactor to more than 2,000 degrees Celsius—melting the fuel rods, igniting the reactor’s graphite covering, and releasing a cloud of radiation into the atmosphere. The precise causes of the accident are still uncertain, but it is generally believed that the series of incidents that led to the explosion, fire, and nuclear meltdown at Chernobyl was caused by a combination of reactor design flaws and operator error. Loss of Life and Illness By mid-2005, fewer than 60 deaths could be linked directly to Chernobyl—mostly workers who were exposed to massive radiation during the accident or children who developed thyroid cancer. Estimates of the eventual death toll from Chernobyl vary widely. A 2005 report by the Chernobyl Forum—eight U.N. organizations—estimated the accident eventually would cause about 4,000 deaths. Greenpeace places the figure at 93,000 deaths, based on information from the Belarus National Academy of Sciences. The Belarus National Academy of Sciences estimates 270,000 people in the region around the accident site will develop cancer as a result of Chernobyl radiation and that 93,000 of those cases are likely to be fatal. Another report by the Center for Independent Environmental Assessment of the Russian Academy of Sciences found a dramatic increase in mortality since 1990—60,000 deaths in Russia and an estimated 140,000 deaths in Ukraine and Belarus—probably due to Chernobyl radiation. Psychological Effects of the Chernobyl Nuclear Accident The biggest challenge facing communities still coping with the fallout of Chernobyl is the psychological damage to 5 million people in Belarus, Ukraine, and Russia. The psychological impact is now considered to be Chernobyls biggest health consequence, said Louisa Vinton, of the UNDP. People have been led to think of themselves as victims over the years, and are therefore more apt to take a passive approach toward their future rather than developing a system of self-sufficiency.† Exceptionally high levels of psychological stress have been reported from the regions around the abandoned nuclear power station.   Countries and Communities Affected Seventy percent of the radioactive fallout from Chernobyl landed in Belarus, affecting more than 3,600 towns and villages, and 2.5 million people. The radiation-contaminated soil, which in turn contaminates crops that people rely on for food. Surface and ground waters were contaminated, and in turn plants and wildlife were (and still are) affected. Many regions in Russia, Belarus, and Ukraine are likely to be contaminated for decades. Radioactive fallout carried by the wind was later found in sheep in the UK, on clothing worn by people throughout Europe, and in rain in the United States. Various animals and livestock have been mutated by this as well. Chernobyl Status and Outlook The Chernobyl accident cost the former Soviet Union hundreds of billions of dollars, and some observers believe it may have hastened the collapse of the Soviet government. After the accident, Soviet authorities resettled more than 350,000 people outside the worst areas, including all 50,000 people from nearby Pripyat, but millions of people continue to live in contaminated areas. After the breakup of the Soviet Union, many projects intended to improve life in the region were abandoned, and young people began to move away to pursue careers and build new lives in other places. In many villages, up to 60 percent of the population is made up of pensioners, said Vasily Nesterenko, director of the Belrad Radiation Safety and Protection Institute in Minsk. In most of these villages, the number of people able to work is two or three times lower than normal. After the accident, Reactor No. 4 was sealed, but the Ukranian government allowed the other three reactors to keep operating because the country needed the power they provided. Reactor No. 2 was shut down after a fire damaged it in 1991, and Reactor No. 1 was decommissioned in 1996. In November 2000, the Ukranian president shut down Reactor No. 3 in an official ceremony that finally closed the Chernobyl facility. But Reactor No. 4, which was damaged in the 1986 explosion and fire, is still full of radioactive material encased inside a concrete barrier, called a sarcophagus, that is aging badly and needs to be replaced. Water leaking into the reactor carries radioactive material throughout the facility and threatens to seep into the groundwater. The sarcophagus was designed to last about 30 years, and current designs would create a new shelter with a lifetime of 100 years. But radioactivity in the damaged reactor would need to be contained for 100,000 years to ensure safety. That is a challenge not only for today  but for many generations to come.

Cuándo un Divorcio Afecta la Residencia

Una de las formas mà ¡s rà ¡pidas y frecuentes de obtener la  tarjeta de residencia permanente  es mediante el matrimonio, bien sea celebrado en Estados Unidos o en otro paà ­s. Pero  ¿quà © sucede con la green card si la relacià ³n termina en divorcio? Es importante resaltar que la residencia solo se verà ¡ afectada si el beneficiario obtuvo su estatus migratorio exclusivamente por matrimonio. Si la persona llegà ³ a Estados Unidos con una visa de trabajo, se casà ³ posteriormente con un ciudadano americano y luego se divorcià ³, su estatus migratorio no està ¡ en peligro. Estos son los dos casos en los que el divorcio afecta la residencia del cà ³nyuge beneficiario: Si el divorcio sucede antes de que se reciba la green card: entre la entrega de papeles a la oficina de USCIS y la obtencià ³n de la tarjeta de residencia pueden pasar entre seis y doce meses. Si el divorcio sucede antes de que se reciba la tarjeta, el beneficiario pierde todos los derechos. Si el divorcio sucede por maltrato o violencia de parte del ciudadano americano, el no-residente tiene opciones para quedarse legalmente (esta là ­nea 1-800-799-7233 puede ser de gran ayuda).Si el divorcio sucede cuando la residencia es temporal: si la residencia se obtuvo de manera temporal (dos aà ±os) porque los papeles se presentaron antes de los dos aà ±os de casados, el beneficiario pierde los beneficios migratorios. Quienes recibieron la residencia permanente y piden el divorcio al poco tiempo de recibida la green card deben saber que: Un futuro proceso de naturalizacià ³n (ciudadanà ­a) puede verse afectado dado que el matrimonio podrà ­a parecer no legitimo.Un futuro proceso de renovacià ³n de la residencia puede generar preguntas acerca de la naturaleza del matrimonio y las causas del divorcio.Los procesos de inmigracià ³n en todos los puertos pueden generar preguntas acerca de la naturaleza del matrimonio y las causas del divorcio.Un futuro matrimonio entre el beneficiario de la green card y otro inmigrante no tiene beneficios de residencia por cinco aà ±os. Quienes obtengan su residencia por matrimonio, se divorcien, y se casen nuevamente, deberà ¡n esperar cinco aà ±os desde que obtuvieron su green card para pedir beneficios para su nuevo esposo/a. Quienes patrocinaron a su cà ³nyuge inmigrante deben saber que: Al firmar el affidavit of support està ¡n comprometidos durante aà ±os a la manutencià ³n econà ³mica de su pareja, asà ­ està ©n legalmente divorciados.  ¿Quà © Hacer Antes de Divorciarse? Antes de hacer el papeleo de divorcio es importante asesorarse de un abogado de inmigracià ³n, sobretodo en los casos en los que no existen pruebas documentales que sirvan para apoyar el carà ¡cter del matrimonio (propiedades o cuentas de banco conjuntas, viajes, hijos en comà ºn, fotos, facturas). Este artà ­culo es informativo y no pretende ser asesorà ­a legal.