iWorth's Blog:

Early Numeracy: A Guide for Parents

2012-01-26T03:52:00.000-08:00

It's not just about numbers

The idea of mathematics for pre-school children can seem a bit daunting. However, at this age a lot of maths is about understanding ideas such as size, shape and pattern - things that most adults would not think of as maths at all. If your child gains an early understanding of these concepts, then this can give him or her a flying start with number work.

Shapes

Give your child opportunities to notice and recognize the different shapes around them. Use the proper names when talking to children about 3D shapes and encourage them to find things in the house with the same shape. Look at road signs and discuss the different 2D shapes you see.

Counting

Children enjoy counting real objects.

Counting the stairs as you take your child up to bed each night; count buttons on clothes; count the number of apples into a shopping bag; count 'pennies' in a money box and save up to buy something.

Make up little games and ask your children to fetch 3 books, 4 spoons or do 5 claps, 2 jumps etc.

Draw children's attention to numbers in everyday life. Look for numbers on cars, busses, clocks, houses, telephones. Show your child to write number in a tray of sand or salt.

Counting Rhymes

Recite counting rhymes such as '1, 2, 3, 4, 5 once I caught a fish alive' and read counting books such as ' The Very Hungry Caterpillar.' by Eric Carle.

1, 2, 3, 4, 5, once I caught a fish alive
6, 7, 8, 9, 10, then I let it go again
Why did you let it go?
Because it bit my finger so,
Which finger did it bite?
This little finger on the right.

Pattern

Helping to lay the table encourages children to notice pattern -- 1 knife, 1 fork, 1 plate in each place.

Let your child use beads and cotton reels or pasta tubes for threading. Encourage 'repeating pattern' using 2 colours i. e. blue/green along the string.

Matching

Playing matching games with pairs of socks, shoes, gloves and picture cards can be fun. The ability to match lids to pans and tops to bottles is useful too.

Talking with your child while doing an activity will help him/her develop a vocabulary of words which describe positions, e.g. front, back, down, over, under.

Use words such as big, little; long, short, heavy, light; to describe items when you are shopping for food or clothes.

Early Literacy : A Guide for Parents

2012-01-26T01:31:00.000-08:00

A major part of our work with children is developing Early Literacy skills. One of the most significant steps in learning to read is a gradual understanding that the visual aspects of print, that is the individual letters and groups of letters correspond to the sounds we hear in speaking.

In Nursery as well as at home, we can help children in this process by:

reciting and singing Nursery Rhymes
using rhymes of all kinds to make sounds fun
encouraging the children to dress up and act out their favourite rhymes and stories
drawing the children attention to words that start/end with the same letters and sounds

Number rhymes are also good fun and help children to remember the order of numbers

You are also:

Using lots of plastic, magnetic and sponge letters as well as alphabet puzzles, wall friezes and alphabet books to encourage the children to learn the names and sounds of letters
encouraging the children to recognise his/her own name and its letters
drawing attention to the many labels and signs in the environment

a means of

2011-11-15T14:37:00.001-08:00

Means, plural, but usually treated as single.

Notably, article a/the is used in front of 'means':

These pledges are a means to avoid prosecution.
The pigtail was imposed by the victorious Manchu-Tartars when they finally established their dynasty in 1644, not so much as a badge of conquest, still less of servitude, but as a means of obliterating, so far as possible, the most patent distinction between the two races, and of unifying the appearance, if not the aspirations, of the subjects of the Son of Heaven.

By all means: of course, certainly (granting a permission). May I make a suggestion? By all means.
By any means: in any way, at all (following a negative). I am not poor by any means.
By no means: not at all; certainly not. The outcome is by no means guaranteed.

Longest Customer Service Email Address

2011-10-30T02:12:00.000-07:00

This Customer Service Email of the Bank of China, is specially for such issues as Chinese RMB currency in circulation and anti-counterfeit reporting and complaints.

oxB3F6C4C9D3EBCFD6BDF0B9DCC0EDz FJPJKFBCNYXJGL@email.notes.bank-of-china.com

The username part before @ is in hexadecimal, and has two markups signs, ox means this email username is in the form of hexadecimal, and z means Chinese Pinyin, which is the official system to transcribe Chinese characters into the Roman alphabet. That means, the part before z is representing for some Chinese characters, after z is for some Chinese pinyin.

B3F6C4C9D3EBCFD6BDF0B9DCC0ED mean "cashier and cash management," FJPJKFB means anti-counterfeit Customer Service Department, CNYXJGL represents "the cashier and cash management" in Chinese Pinyin.

Was an Earth year shorter in Adam's time?

2011-10-28T07:30:00.000-07:00

According the Biblical record, Adam lived 930 years and he died, Abramham died at the age of 175.

In Chinese myths, or semi-history, the first of the Three Sovereigns Fuxi lived for 197 years altogether, while Peng Zu supposedly lived 800 years.

Longest-lived vertebrate on earth is tortoise or kind of fish called Koi. Tortoises are known to have lived more than 150 years. A longest-lived Koi named Hanako whose death on July 17, 1977 ended a 226 year life span.

A maximum life expectancy of human being is about 120 years according with current data.

There are skepticism towards the long life span, scientific evidence in biochemistry of aging and theological explanation that God intervened to shorten man's life from 900 to 120. But none of these hypothesis can actually solve the problem of this dramatic change in human life spans.

There could be another hypothesis added to current ones, that is, the YEAR in Adam's time might be shorter due to the evolution of the universe.

I'am not an astronomer, and will not start with the Big Bang theory. Because its quite obvious that all astronomers believes the universe is expanding, the Moon is actually moving away from Earth at a rate of 3.8cm each year. When it was formed it was about 22,530km away. It is now more than 450,000km.

I just want to point out what DAY and YEAR is, and how a DAY and a YEAR means on different planets and satellites.

A day is defined to be from sunrise to sunset for a particular body. A year is defined to be one complete revolution around the sun.

The further distance of the planet from the sun, the longer time it takes to complete the revolution around the sun. The revolution orbit of Earth has obviously been changed during history.

One Mercury day is 58.65 Earth days, and one Mercury year 87.9 Earth days. So Mercury rotates around its axis every two orbits around the Sun. A year is less than two Mercurial days, so you'd have a birthday every other day. Then a 930 Years old Mercurrian actually lived only 1860 days, and 5 Earth Years.

It's quit a different story for Venusian, because on Venus 1 day equals 243 Earth days, and 1 year 225 Earth days. If a 930 years old Venusian actually, according to the current Earth year, he is 576 years old.

The mars is similar to Earth, and scientists have long speculated about the possibility of life on Mars. 1 Day on Mars is 24.62 hours, quite similar, but 1 year equals 687 days! A 930 year old Marsian actually is 1750 Earth years old!

Jupiter day is 9.84 Earth hours, and 1 year equals 11.86. Likewise a 930 years old Jupterian's current Earth age is 10974. Likewise a Saturn year is 29.5 Earth years.

Suppose the life span of human race has never changed, the longest-lived person according to current data is 120, then we suppose Adam was 120 Current Earth Years old, the YEAR in his time must be shorter. The Earth revolved on its orbit either in a higher velocity or the perimeter of the orbit must be shorter.

Earth quake can change Earth's axis, a NASA scientist says that a massive 8.8 earthquake that struck Chile may have changed the entire Earth's rotation and shortened the length of days on our planet. How about a meteor impact which cause the dinosaurs to extinct?

Then how long was an Earth Year in Adam's time suppose the length of Earth Day and the longest possible Life Span of Human Being (120 year on average) has never been changed?

Biblical Earth Year = 120 x 365 / 930 = 47 (days)

Abraham's age was 197, so the Biblical Earth Year changed at his time to 222 days.

The Earth Year has been changed at least TWICE in the history.

Bonzee and Bonzary

2011-10-27T06:54:00.000-07:00

Bonzee was a name referring to Chinese Buddhist used by Jesuit missionaries in 18th Century. And so a Bonzary was a Buddhist convents or temple of Bonzee.

A Chinese Bonzee often seen begging alms in the street with their bowls, a wooden bell which he would beat now and then to announce his approaching or attraction attention of the donor. A begging Bonzee normally kept silent and very solemn.

Buddha was said to go out begging only in the morning and never beg and eat after noon.

A Bonzee beggin

Jesuits believed that it was necessary to become all things to all men, in order to gain over men to Christ,[1] so they in India became a Braman; in Siam a Talapoin; in China either a Bonzee, or a Confucian and philosopher; in Africa they appeared as Marabou. [2]

Some times they appeared before Chinese as a Bonzee or a Confucianist.

----
[1]A Description Of The Solemnities Observed At Pe-king, When The Emperor's Mother Entered On The Sixtieth Year Of Her Age. Miscellaneous pieces relating to the Chinese. Vol. II)

[2]Authentic Memoirs of the Christian Church in China: from the German of J. L. de Mshem. Miscellaneous pieces relating to the Chinese. Vol. II)

Long s and ligature ct

2011-10-21T15:28:00.000-07:00

Many 18th century books or newspapers have curious long s, and ligatures.

Long s is used where s occurred in the middle or at the beginning of a word, except that in the combination sf a short s is used instead.

long-s

Long s is derived from Roman cursive medial s, so it is also called medial s.

The long s has a f-like nub at its middle, but on the left side only, thus many OCR (Optical Character Recognition) technology misread the long-s as an "f".

There was no nub in its italic typeform, which gave the stroke a descender curling to the left, thus it is also called descending s.

Long-s Italic typeform

The character c in quaint ligature ct looks like Greek letter epsilon, or a French cedila on head of c.

ct ligature

Average and spread

2011-10-08T15:20:00.000-07:00

If you have a set of data, say exam marks or heights, and are told to find the ‘average’. So what’s an average? An average indicates the typical value of a set of data, and it could be done in three different ways, which are are mean, median and mode.

(a)The median

The median is the middle number. The data is arranged in order from the smallest to the largest; the middle number is then selected. This is really the central number of the range and is called the median.

If there are two ‘middle’ numbers, the median is in the middle of these two numbers.

(b)The mean

The mean is the most common measure of average. All the data is added up and the total divided by the number of items.

This is called the mean and is equivalent to sharing out all the data evenly.

(c)The mode

The number of items which occurs most frequently in a frequency table is selected. This is the most popular value and is called the mode (from the French ‘à la mode’ meaning ‘fashionable’).

Each ‘average\ has its purpose and sometimes one is preferable to the others.

The median is fairly easy to find and has an advantage in being hardly affected by untypical values such as large or very small values that occur at the ends of the distribution.

(d)Range

In addition to knowing the centre of a distribution, it is useful to know the range or spread of the data.
Range = (largest value) - (smallest value)

Did God lie?

2011-10-07T18:17:00.000-07:00

Many people asked the question that if God lied to Adam and Eve, and the answer is no.

God said, "You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die."

This description gives us an impression that the fruits from the tree of life are poisonous, and Adam and Eve might have died at the day when they ate it. But what if Adam and Eve were created to live forever, i.e. the were immortal? Because they ate the forbidden fruit, they did die when they became old . So God told the truth.

Then the next question: Did the serpent lie? The answer is also no.

"You will not surely die,"he then serpent said to the woman. "For god knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil."

We may conclude from the consequence, the second part of the serpent's words were certainly true, but how about the first part? What the serpent meant was Adam and Eve actually wouldn't die at the spot and/or the minute when they finish eating the fruit of the tree, just like Snow White's fell sleep after a bite of the poisonous apple. The fruit was not poisonous to kill them immediately, but would deprive them innocence and pure perfection when they were created by God. They were supposed to live forever, but now condemned to pain, toil, getting old and ultimately death. God took away eternal life, and replaced with child bearing and reproduction, this actually degraded human being to the level of animal and plant.

So both God and the serpent told the truth. What God meant was that Adam and Eve would not longer live forever, and what the serpent meant was that the fruit was not poisonous, and they wouldn't die at the day when they ate the fruit.

Then every human being dies from that day on, people die they just die, there are no after life, no heaven to go, no hell to suffer:

For the living know that they will die,
but the dead know nothing;
they have no further reward,
and even the memory of them is forgotten.
Their love, their hate and their jealousy have long since vanished;
never again will they have a part in anything that happens under the sun.
(Ecclesiastes:5-6)

Isometric drawing

2011-10-07T17:09:00.000-07:00

When we draw a solid on paper we are making a 2-D representation of a 3-D object.

Here are two pictures of the same cuboid, measuring 4x3x2 units.

cuboid on ordinary squared paper and on isometric paper

The isometric paper has a grid of equilateral triangles instead of square, this isometric view can be obtained by choosing viewing direction in such a way that the angles between the projection of x, y, and z axes are all the same, or 120.

The dimensions of the cuboid cannot be taken from the first picture but they can be taken from the picture drawn on isometric paper. Instead of isometric paper you can also use 'triangular dotty' paper.

triangular dotty paper

Be careful to use it the right way round.

Shape and Space

2011-10-07T12:13:00.000-07:00

Transforming shapes

Reflection: With reflection the object and its image are congruent because they are the same size and shape.

Rotation: You need three things to describe a rotation: (a) the centre (b) the angle (c) the direction (e.g. clockwise).

Enlargement: The scale factor of an enlargement can be found by dividing corresponding lengths on two pictures.

Reduction: Even though a shape has undergone a reduction, mathematicians prefer to call it an enlargement with a fractional scale factor.

Translation: A translation is simply a 'shift'. There is no turning or reflection and the object stays the same size. Translations are described by vector. In a vector the top number gives the number of units across (positive to the right) and the bottom number gives the number of units up/down (positive upwards).

Translation with a vector

Tessellations: A tessellation is formed when a shape (or shapes) fit together without gaps to cover a surface, like jigsaw puzzles to cover a plane.

Bearings: are used where there are no roads to guide the way. Ships, aircraft and mountaineers use bearings to work out where they are. Bearings are measured clockwise from North. The bearing of A from B is the direction in which you travel to get to A from B.

Locus: In mathematics, the word locus describes the position of points which obey a certain rule. The locus can be the path traced out by a moving point.

Three important loci:

(a) Circle: The locus of points are equidistant from a fixed point O, it is a circle with centre O.
(b) Perpendicular bisector: The locus of points are equidistant from two fixed points A and B. It is the perpendicular bisector of the line AB. You can use compasses to draw arcs, or use a ruler and a protractor.
(c) Angle bisector: The locus of points are equidistant from two fixed lines AB and AC. It is the line which bisects the angle BAC. You may use compasses to draw arcs or use a protractor to construct the locus.

Pythagoras' theorem:
Pythagoras (569 - 500 BC) was one of the first of the great mathematical names in Greek antiquity. He settled in southern Italy an formed a mysterious brotherhood with his students who were bound by an oath not to reveal the secrets of numbers and who exercised great influence. They laid the foundations of arithmetic through geometry and were among the first mathematicians to develop the idea of proof.

BIDMAS, BEDMAS, BODMAS, PEDMAS AND CHRISTMAS

2011-09-10T14:03:00.000-07:00

This BBC GCSE Bitesize post says, BODMAS stands for 'brackets', 'other', 'division', 'multiplication', 'addition' and 'subtraction'. It's the order in which we carry out a calculation.

But another article says, the order of operations in Maths called BIDMAS. BIDMAS stands for Brackets, Indices, Division and Multiplication, Addition and Subtraction.

The difference is that the second substitute 'o' with 'i', and we can understand that teacher normally chooses easy way to explain whose pupils can understand, exponent or power or indices are out of reach of foundation students, so teachers uses 'other' instead.

And in this article, 'o' actually stands for 'order', as far as my memory can go, my English teacher never teach me 'order' actually means 'Powers and Square Roots, etc.'

In United States, the mnemonic fo Order of Operation is PEMDAS, because brackets are called parentheses by American, and it stands for Parentheses, Exponents, Multiplication, Division, Addition, Subtraction.

There are other forms in other English speaking countries. BIDMAS, BEDMAS, BODMAS, why Americans PEDMAS, so make up a series of words for the collection of Christmas, Candlemas?

Another nice song of BODMAS

Frost won't start on Ubuntu

2011-09-04T04:59:00.000-07:00

This problem identified in the support mailing list has not been solved for Ubuntu users, this happens at "Initializing Mainframe" with about 20% of the progress bar and then stops progressing.

If you check the log file, you find something wrong with the Java Internationalization (i18n) resources file, the error message says "SEVERE: Resource not found in jar file: /i18n/langres_gb.properties".

The most likely solution is to install Sun Java suggested by Volodya, because Ubuntu uses GNU Java instead of Sun Java. Click Open Ubuntu Software center, search for Sun Java, then install JRE, probably you need to install add-ons too, click more information, and check all add-ons if you don't know which one to choose.

After this, I get Frost up and running, but there are still some problems, I can't add active board list by importing XML file. It show successfully imported but the boards won't appear in the left pane.

It seems that Frost is not so popular, I intended to connect with human rights activists, but I find no dissidents, terrorists, or drug dealers, many die hard pornographers sharing their memories though.

A mid-summer night dinner under the Mulberry tree

2011-08-20T15:32:00.000-07:00

It's the mid-summer night, the sun was setting down at the Brush-holder Mountain in the west, the Sheng's set out dinner table under the mulberry tree in the garden, and the plum tree. They have boiled patatoes and rice porridge for dinner tonight.

The mid-summer breeze is blowing through the pine woods in front of the village, and cicadas are singing everywhere, it's very pleasant night indeed!

As they are eating, the darkness of the night closes in, and fireflies start to flashing around, the adults begin to slap their bare shoulders and legs, cursing the flies, and the children conplaining itching. Then Mr Sheng goes to fetch some special grass and lighted up to repel mosquitoes, the smoke starts to waving in the wind with a pleasant smell.

The younger brother Xian the first who finished his dinner, and started running around to catch the fireflies, several minutes later he caught dozens and put in a straw, swishing like superman's laser sword.

Watching amusingly on it, the eldest boy Biao remarked: "Xian, can you catch hundred, and make a light of firefly, so we don't need to light the oil lamp. "

"Yeah, you may read by the firefly lamp," Mrs. Sheng said, "just as that poor scholar did. "

"How can you see the character in a book by firefly light?" Xian asked.

Mrs Sheng said, "Surely we can. That poor scholar was an orphan, and has not money to buy candles, but he loves studying so much that he often read books late in the night, so he caught hundreds of fireflies,and put in a bag, then he reads his book."

"Wow!" said the boys, "How long would he take to caught so many fireflies?"

"There might be more fireflies in ancient times, so he can catch dozens by one grab. "

"He might use a fly-catcher, something like a net with a handle, so he swished around and easily caught thousands."

"That's fun!" the younger boy said, "how about the winter, there are no firefly in winter."

"He read by the light of snow!" Mr Sheng had been listening quietly all the time, but seems to enjoy these conversations between his sons and his wife, until then he couldn't hold up himself any more, and supplemented the second half of the story.

"Once upon a time, there was also an orphan, he was so poor that couldn't afford to pay charcol to warm himself and buy candle, but he loved studying, he kept reading all day, when it was getting dark inside, he went outside, and continued reading by the weak light of white snow. Because snow can reflect the light."

The brothers and sisters fell quiet for several seconds, then the young brother said, "he must feel very cold."

"How about the spring and autumn, then?" the young sister asked, "it's not too hot to have firefly, and not too cold to have snow, what did he do? "

The parents laughed merrily at this idea. "Good question," the father turned to his eldest daughter and said, "Eh, I suppose that you know the answer, because you have just learned this story in your literature lesson."

Until then, Eh had never interrupted their conversation, he seems shy at the present of her father. Reluctantly she said on her father's request: "Well, the poor scholar just happened to have a rich neighbour, he cut a hole on the wall and stole the lights of his neighbour."

These sterotyped stories have been lost in the Great Culture Revolution, now they picked up bits and pieces of these once treated as cliche and harmful. The children seemed to be amazed by them.

While they were taking, they finished potatoes, and their porridge. Mr Sheng lighted his pipe, and Mrs cleared the bowls and plates.

Weathervane

2011-08-03T12:52:00.000-07:00

A weathervane has four steady arms. Each arm bears a letter telling in which direction in points, E, S, W, or N.

Above the four arms is an arrow that turn about with the wind. When the west wind blows it turns the arrow round so that its point points to the west. When an east wind blows round goes to the east. The "point" of the arrow always points to whatever wind is blowing. If you look at the arms you can tell in what direction the arrow points. If it points somewhere between the north arm and the west arm, a north-west wind is blowing.

Sometimes a weathervane has a cock on it instead of an arrow. It is then called a weathercock. The beak of the cock always points to the wind that is blowing, and we can tell the name of the wind by looking at the arms. If the beak points in the same direction as the N-arm, a north wind is blowing.

Solicitors and Barristers

2011-08-01T12:13:00.000-07:00

Both solicitors and barristers are lawyers, but their tasks are somewhat different. In the main the barrister is the advocate who "plead" before the judge and jury, and his branch of the profession is usually regarded as the higher one. The solicitor is concerned with advising clients, and he "briefs" the barrister, that is gives him all the facts about the case so that the barrister can present it properly before the judge. A barrister too, is usually specially learned in one particular branch of the law and his views may be sought by solicitor on some knotty point.

In this case the solicitor will say that he has "Counsel's Opinion" and some barristers are largely occupied in this kind of works, particularly when they have specialised in some highly technical for complicated side of the law, as, for instance, Patent Law. The solicitor is more concerned with the preparation of legal deeds such as partnership agreements, transferred of property, leases of land, wills, and many matters in which some kind of legal and binding arrangement is desirable.

Barristers themselves are divided into two classes: the ordinary barrister and the higher ranking K. C. or King's Counsel. To become K. C. a man must have attained some eminence as a barrister before being nominated by the Lord Chancellor The expression "to take silk," sometimes used when a man becomes a K. C., comes from the fact that he wears a silk gown instead of the usual stuff gown of the ordinary, or junior, barrister.

The weirdest job in the world

2011-07-30T06:38:00.000-07:00

You can find many articles on the internet, which list top 10, top 20, or top 50 weirdest job in the world. But they seem all miss one oddest job, that's Steward of Chiltern Hundreds, an office of the crown in United Kingdom!

A hundred is a traditional division of an English county, and the three hundreds of Stoke, Desborough, and Burnham are in Buckinghamshire. These three hundreds are situated in the hilly, wooded Chiltern Hills, which were once notorious as a hiding place for robbers. The hundreds have been Crown property since at least the 13th century and a Crown Steward and a Bailiff was appointed to maintain law and order in the area.

In UK, an MP cannot resign, but under certain conditions he may be compelled to retire. He cannot for instance, hold an office of profit under the Crown and remain an MP. So it come about that when a member wishes to resign for health or other personal reasons he applies for the post of Steward of the Chiltern Hundreds.

There are no duties attached to this position, but it carries a nominal salary of 20s. a year (some say one pound a year).

Having accepted this post of profit under the Crown, the MP automatically retires. He ceases to be an MP, and naturally he speedily give up his position as Steward of the Chiltern Hundreds, leaving it vacant for the next applicant.

The Stewardship of the manor of Northstead in Yorkshire has been granted in the same way since 1841, but a application for this is much less frequent than for the better-known Chiltern Hundreds.

Sans Foy, Sans Joy and Sans Loy

2011-07-26T11:00:00.000-07:00

Sans: without

The origin of sans was Old French sanz, from a variant of Latin sine 'without', influenced by Latin absentia 'in the absence of'.

Sans Serif, a typeface without short line at the top or bottom of a letter.

In the long poem 'The Faerie Queene' by Edmund Spenser, three dark knights called Sans Foy, Sans Joy and Sans Loy, meaning "Faithless", "Joyless" and "Lawless", they fought Red Cross Knight Sir George, they are brothers.

sans-culotte, literally 'without knee breeches', was a lower-class Parisian republican in the French Revolution. an extreme republican or revolutionary.

Cold light

2011-07-15T14:13:00.000-07:00

How do glow worms produce light?
http://www.ehow.com/how-does_5272834_do-glow-worms-produce-light.html

An New York time article, Scientists, Seeking Cold Light, Find Some Persons Faintly Luminous
http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?res=F50A11F93E5E1A738DDDA10A94DD405B828EF1D3

Phosphorous and cold light
http://www.encognitive.com/files/Phosphorus.pdf

Glorify your family name

2011-07-13T01:10:00.000-07:00

"Glorify thy name" is the purpose of Christians. To glorify the family name and ancestor was historically the purpose of Chinese Literati.

We often find a family name become a household word through great achievement by the of one family member.

Macadam road. Loudon Macadam was a great surveyor and engineer of modern road constructor. Macadam's name is still used whenever we speak of a macadam road. His principle was to cover the roadway with evenly-spread layers of hard stone broken small, which the weight of the traffic would jam together till they gave a hard, smooth surface.

Newtown's Law of Gravity. Sir Isaac Newton found evoled gravitational theory by observing a falling apple. The unit of measurement of force is the newton (symbol N), which is the force required to accelerate a one kilogram mass at a rate of one meter per second squared.

Halley's Comet. It was Halley who told us about the comet which bears his name.

The Italian professor, Count Alessandro Volta, made considerable progress in his experiments and was first to construct a Voltaic battery and in the word 'volt' his contribution to discoveries in electricity is permanently commemorated.

Andre Marie Ampere added considerably to our knowledge of the connection between electricity and magnetism; he worked out the theory of electo-dynamics and laid down the laws which govern this science of electricity in motion. His name, too, is commemorated by word 'ampere.'

G. S. Ohm published his work on connection between current strength in a conducting wire and electomotive force. The word 'ohm' has taken place with 'volt' and 'ampere' among well-known electrical terms.

The cardigan sweater (or jumper) was named after James Brudenell, 7th Earl of Cardigan, a British military commander, following his service in the Crimean War. When he came back from Crimean, the style of his sweater became fashion overnight, although people found out soon after his most notorious exploit in command of the Light Cavalry Brigade at the battle of Balaclava, that cost the lives of about 107 out of the 674 men.

The Wellington boot was worn and popularised by Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington. This novel "Wellington" boot then became a fashionable style emulated by the British aristocracy in the early 19th century.

Eco-friendly energy sources

2011-07-12T14:00:00.000-07:00

With oil prices on the rise, and the worries of greenhouse effect, finding alternative and eco-friendly energy become an urgent issue.

Wind power is the conversion of wind energy into a useful form of energy, such as using wind turbines to make electricity, windmills for mechanical power, windpumps for water pumping or drainage, or sails to propel ships.

Hydro power, hydraulic power or water power is power that is derived from the force or energy of moving water.

Tidal power, also called tidal energy, is a form of hydropower that converts the energy of tides into useful forms of power - mainly electricity.

Geothermal energy originates from the heat retained within the Earth since the original formation of the planet, from radioactive decay of minerals, and from solar energy absorbed at the surface. Engineers have started drilling a hole 2,000 meters below Newcastle and discover a natural source of hot water - with a temperature of about 80C - below the surface of the city.

Solar power is the conversion of sunlight into electricity, either directly using photovoltaics (PV), or indirectly using concentrated solar power (CSP). Concentrated solar power systems use lenses or mirrors and tracking systems to focus a large area of sunlight into a small beam. Photovoltaics convert light into electric current using the photoelectric effect.

Lightning is produced by the discharge of electricity between two clouds, or between the cloud and the earth, and accompanied by thunder.

Lightning appears in three separate forms: forked or zig-zag, sheet lightning. Forked lightning gives the appearance to the naked eye of a blinding streak of light; photographically it appears as a sinuous line, usually branched and often resembling a map of a large river and its tributaries. Sheet lightning is caused by a glow from lightning below the horizon or at a considerable distance away. Ball lightning, which is only rarely seen, appears as a luminous ball moving slowly in aire and breaking up explosively on contact with some object, wrecking anything in its path.

Lightning strikes have been the subject of scientific investigation dating back to the time of Benjamin Franklin, but they are still not fully understood. The research on lightning can help evaluate and test its affect on lightning-sensitivity of airplanes and critical infrastructure such as power lines.

A leader of a bolt of lightning can reach temperatures approaching 30,000 °C (54,000 °F), hot enough to fuse silica sand into glass channels which are normally hollow and can extend some distance into the ground. Over the whole surface of the earth there are at any given moment about 1,800 thunderstorms occurring while lightning fashes are appearing at the rate of 100 every second. And each flash of lightning realeases suffient electrical energy to light 150,000,000 light bulbs.

In 2006, Alternate Energy Holdings announced the successful development of a model prototype to demonstrate the 'capturing' capabilities of marketable lightning farm technology. By collecting power from the ground area surrounding a lightning strike and converting it into usable electricity to be sold through existing power grids. It is reported that the company has abandoned the project

European scientists, in 2008, deliberately triggered electrical activity in thunderclouds for the first time, by aiming high-power pulses of laser light into a thunderstorm.

Possibly one day some means will be found of harnessing the mighty electric power in a thunderstorm and making good use of it.

Tornadoes, Typoons and Waterspouts

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The Great Circular Storms occur in sub-tropical belt. They may be as much as 1,200 miles in diameter and in the storm ring the wind blows at 100 miles per hour. the rainfall is enormous and thunder and lightning add to the terror. In the centre is an area of dead calm in which the sun shines brightly.

The Typhoon of the China seas is similar in character.

Then there is a small but even more terrible type of circular storm, the Tornado or whirl-wind, sometimes no more than a hundred yards in diameter. It shows as a funnel-shaped cloud, purple-black in colour, with edges white as snow, and it leaps and dances across the country like a mad giant. Nothing can stand against its force.

A Waterspout is really a tornado at sea. It is a violent whirlpool which produces a dark, funnel-shaped cloud tapering down-wards towards the sea so that it resembles a spout or trunk joining the sea to the cloud.

A Costly Joke of Richard Wilson

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Richard Wilson was a landscape painter, and known as ''the Father of British Landscape". Though he achieved great fame, he died in poverty, just because of a costly joke.

In 1776 he sent to the Academy a picture of "Sion House from Kew Garden", which attracted the notice of king George III., and which he thought of buying. The King told Lord Bute thought the price too high, whereupon Wilson smilingly said: "Tell His Majesty he may pay for it by instalments." Lord Bute took the laughing remark seriously and was profoundly shocked. Poor Wilson lost the little favour that the Court ever showed to artists, and for the last years of his life his income was no more than £50 a year.

Lies and Excuses

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Pinocchio, the wooden puppet, often led into trouble by his propensity to lie. His nose grew with every lie.

Kant believes that his moral theory prohibits lying under all possible circumstances, even those where there is a murderer at the door wondering if the innocent victim is in your house.

But Confucius codemns a son who testified against his father for appropriating a sheep. He said: ' The father conceals the wrongs of his son, and the son conceals the wrongs of his father. ' A person have to lie to conceals a wrongs, and Confucius believes this is justice.

Confucius lied himself, too. Once, one of his disciples Ju Pei wished to see Confucius, who excused himself on the ground of sickness, but when his messenger had gone out at the door, he took up his harpsichord and began to sing, so that Ju Pei might hear it. A mother makes excuse for her daughter not to the party on the ground of chickenpox.

Proverbs

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Look before you leap;

Too many cooks spoil the broth;

Two's company, three's none;

Birds of a feather flock together;

A stitch in time saves nine;

All that glisters is not gold;

Strike while the iron's hot;

Enough is as good as a feast;