Parents in Oman advised to check time tables to limit books in children' school bags

By Times News Service - 19/9/2015

On its part, the Ministry of Education (MoE) has advised parents to check their children’s school time-table online so that they do not have to carry unnecessary books to school.

“This will help children to carry a fewer number of books,” said a teacher at a government school.

Rajagopal T. Naganathan, medical director, Atlas Hospital in Ruwi, who is also an orthopaedic surgeon, said that ideally the school bag should not weigh more than 10 to 15 per cent of the child’s body weight.

“Children can develop serious back pain because of the weight of bags they carry to school. So it is very important to carry less weight in school bags and sit in the right posture in the classroom,” he told the Times of Oman.

This advice comes after city-based doctors reported a rise in cases of spinal abnormalities in students, including disfiguring curvatures known as scoliosis.

The surprise of a lifetime - Inspiring work by Ozlem and Samsung

Posted by Poorna de Silva.
Video courtesy : Samsung duyan eller, Turkey

This video was a part of a term-end lesson at Sri Lankan School Muscat. Enjoy!

Beautiful Quotes

“I touch the future. I teach.” ~ Christa McAuliffe

“The greatest gift that you can give to another is knowledge, for knowledge is power—power to build and to dream. What you can envision in your mind, you can achieve.” ~ Jack Podojil

“Good teachers know how to bring out the best in students.” ~ Charles Kuralt

“Most of us end up with no more than five or six people who remember us. Teachers have thousands of people who remember them for the rest of their lives.” ~ Andy Rooney

“In teaching, you cannot see the fruit of a day’s work. It is invisible and remains so, maybe for twenty years.” ~ Jacques Barzun

“A child miseducated is a child lost.” ~ John F. Kennedy

“If your plan is for one year, plant rice. If your plan is for ten years, plant trees. If your plan is for one hundred years, educate children.” ~Confucius

“Good teachers are costly. Bad teachers cost more.” ~ Bob Talbert

“I’m not a teacher, but an awakener.” ~ Robert Frost

“Nine-tenths of education is encouragement.” ~ Anatole France

The Sultanate records a population of 4.155 million

Source: Times of Oman

Posted by Poorna de Silva; Anjalie Silva

Muscat: Oman's population touched 4.155 million by the end of last March with a growth rate of 0.4 per cent.

Omani citizens' population was 2,325,982, while the expatriates numbered 1,892,143.  

The latest statistics issued by the National Centre for Statistics and Information (NCSI) show that a majority of the Sultanate's population resides in the Governorate of Muscat.

SAI & TIMES OF OMAN

OPEN ESSAY WRITING AND POSTER MAKING COMPETITION - 2015

 “SPREADING THE LIGHT THROUGH HUMAN VALUES”

On Saturday, 11^th April, 2015 at the Indian School Al Ghubrah (0945hrs)

TOPICS CHOSEN FOR 2015 COMPETITION

 

Group	Grade	Topic
A	1st, 2nd, 3rd	I Love my Garden
B	4th, 5th, 6th	A Good Book is the Best Friend
C	7th, 8th, 9th	Serve the Society with Modesty
D	10th, 11th, 12th	Blessed Oman Beautiful Oman

Participants will be given 90 minutes for Essay Writing and 120 minutes for Poster Making.

SUGGESTED WORD LIMIT FOR ESSAY WRITING:

Approximately 400 words for the A and B groups and 700 words for the C and D groups. 

PLEASE NOTE – IMPORTANT

·      Each Group in a particular category (essay/poster) can have 05 students only. (05 members for essay + 05 members for poster making)

·      Students who wish to participate in this competition are requested to contact Mr Poorna de Silva without delay.

iPads and other tablets could affect children's ability to control their emotions

Source : The Independent UK 

Posted by Poorna de Silva & Anjalie Silva

The emotional development of many children is being stunted by the excessive use of mobile technology, such as tablets or iPads, new research claims.

Child psychologists at Boston University School of Medicine in the US found that children who heavily used devices were unable to control their emotions.

Instead, they end up masking or displacing them on to technology-related activities.

Dr Jenny Radesky, a clinical instructor in Developmental-Behavioural Paediatrics at the university, said: “It has been well-studied that increased television time decreases a child's development of language and social skills.

“Mobile media use similarly replaces the amount of time spent engaging in direct human-human interaction,” she told the Daily Telegraph.

The research, published in Pediatrics journal, did find that television programmes are educationally beneficial for pre-school aged children but that children ages under 30 months cannot learn from television and videos.

At this age, children are dependent on “real-life interactions”.

Sri Lanka ravaged by mystery kidney disease that has killed 20,000 people in 20 years

Posted by Poorna de Silva and Anjalie Silva

Additional Reporting by Associated Press 

Source : The Independent UK (18th January 2015) 

There is a mystery kidney disease that for years has been killing thousands of farmers in Sri Lanka's rice basket — and as it spreads, locals are becoming increasingly fearful.

In this July 16, 2013 photo, Kumaradasa, a Sri Lankan farmer suffering from a chronic kidney disease of unknown etiology, bathes helped by his wife outside their house in Medavachchiya, Sri Lanka. The cause of his disease, which affects anywhere from an estimated 70,000 to 400,000 people in Sri Lanka's rice basket, remains an enigma without a name. Kumaradasa died on June 8, 2014. (AP Photo/Eranga Jayawardena) 

In 20 years the disease has killed up to 20,000 people and sickened up to 400,000 more; some villages report it causes as many as 10 deaths a month.

As the disease progresses and kidneys fail, sufferers become unable to pass liquids on their own and are prohibited from drinking more than just a bottle of water a day — their extremities retain water and become fat with fluid.

Its cause is not yet known, though there are long-held suspicions that agrochemicals are to blame, and Sri Lanka is lacking in the dialysis required to effectively treat the many sufferers.

Though no cases have been reported outside of the North Central province's dry zone, where farming was transformed in the 1960's and 70's following the introduction of modern techniques, the disease has slowly spread from two districts to seven.

A report published by the World Health Organisation two years ago could not find a clear cause for the disease, though it pointed to cadmium, pesticides and other factors, such as arsenic, as possibilities.

Similar diseases are wiping out thousands of farmers in parts of Central America, India and Egypt — and agrochemicals are widely blamed there as well.

Questions remain over whether heavy metals could be leaching into the soil and groundwater from pesticides and fertilizers, which have been found to have high levels of cadmium in previous studies.

Sri Lanka's Agriculture Ministry claims samples are regularly tested and come back within permitted limits — which are much stricter than those in neighbouring countries.

Still, farmers douse their fields with too many chemicals, often using concoctions that include kerosene and multiple poisons. Most do not wear protective gear.

The country of 20 million, which emerged from a quarter-century of civil war in 2009, has just 183 dialysis machines, forcing most villagers to receive less than the three recommended weekly treatments.