Sunday, April 26, 2020
#29: Nightmare videos of children's Youtube
Writer and artist James Bridle uncovers a dark, strange corner of the internet, where unknown people or groups on YouTube hack the brains of young children in return for advertising revenue. From "surprise egg" reveals and the "Finger Family Song" to algorithmically created mashups of familiar cartoon characters in violent situations, these videos exploit and terrify young minds -- and they tell us something about where our increasingly data-driven world is headed. "We need to stop thinking about technology as a solution to all of our problems, but think of it as a guide to what those problems actually are, so we can start thinking about them properly and start to address them," Bridle says.
Monday, April 13, 2020
#28: That Discomfort You’re Feeling Is Grief
HBR Staff/d3sign/Getty Images
We’ve made our coronavirus coverage free for all readers. To get all of HBR’s content delivered to your inbox, sign up for the Daily Alert newsletter.
Some of the HBR edit staff met virtually the other day — a screen full of faces in a scene becoming more common everywhere. We talked about the content we’re commissioning in this harrowing time of a pandemic and how we can help people. But we also talked about how we were feeling. One colleague mentioned that what she felt was grief. Heads nodded in all the panes.
If we can name it, perhaps we can manage it. We turned to David Kessler for ideas on how to do that. Kessler is the world’s foremost expert on grief. He co-wrote with Elisabeth Kübler-Ross On Grief and Grieving: Finding the Meaning of Grief through the Five Stages of Loss. His new book adds another stage to the process, Finding Meaning: The Sixth Stage of Grief. Kessler also has worked for a decade in a three-hospital system in Los Angeles. He served on their biohazards team. His volunteer work includes being an LAPD Specialist Reserve for traumatic events as well as having served on the Red Cross’s disaster services team. He is the founder of www.grief.com, which has over 5 million visits yearly from 167 countries.
Kessler shared his thoughts on why it’s important to acknowledge the grief you may be feeling, how to manage it, and how he believes we will find meaning in it. The conversation is lightly edited for clarity.
HBR: People are feeling any number of things right now. Is it right to call some of what they’re feeling grief?
Kessler: Yes, and we’re feeling a number of different griefs. We feel the world has changed, and it has. We know this is temporary, but it doesn’t feel that way, and we realize things will be different. Just as going to the airport is forever different from how it was before 9/11, things will change and this is the point at which they changed. The loss of normalcy; the fear of economic toll; the loss of connection. This is hitting us and we’re grieving. Collectively. We are not used to this kind of collective grief in the air.
You said we’re feeling more than one kind of grief?
Yes, we’re also feeling anticipatory grief. Anticipatory grief is that feeling we get about what the future holds when we’re uncertain. Usually it centers on death. We feel it when someone gets a dire diagnosis or when we have the normal thought that we’ll lose a parent someday. Anticipatory grief is also more broadly imagined futures. There is a storm coming. There’s something bad out there. With a virus, this kind of grief is so confusing for people. Our primitive mind knows something bad is happening, but you can’t see it. This breaks our sense of safety. We’re feeling that loss of safety. I don’t think we’ve collectively lost our sense of general safety like this. Individually or as smaller groups, people have felt this. But all together, this is new. We are grieving on a micro and a macro level.
What can individuals do to manage all this grief?
Understanding the stages of grief is a start. But whenever I talk about the stages of grief, I have to remind people that the stages aren’t linear and may not happen in this order. It’s not a map but it provides some scaffolding for this unknown world. There’s denial, which we say a lot of early on: This virus won’t affect us. There’s anger: You’re making me stay home and taking away my activities. There’s bargaining: Okay, if I social distance for two weeks everything will be better, right? There’s sadness: I don’t know when this will end. And finally, there’s acceptance. This is happening; I have to figure out how to proceed.
Acceptance, as you might imagine, is where the power lies. We find control in acceptance. I can wash my hands. I can keep a safe distance. I can learn how to work virtually.
When we’re feeling grief there’s that physical pain. And the racing mind. Are there techniques to deal with that to make it less intense?
Let’s go back to anticipatory grief. Unhealthy anticipatory grief is really anxiety, and that’s the feeling you’re talking about. Our mind begins to show us images. My parents getting sick. We see the worst scenarios. That’s our minds being protective. Our goal is not to ignore those images or to try to make them go away — your mind won’t let you do that and it can be painful to try and force it. The goal is to find balance in the things you’re thinking. If you feel the worst image taking shape, make yourself think of the best image. We all get a little sick and the world continues. Not everyone I love dies. Maybe no one does because we’re all taking the right steps. Neither scenario should be ignored but neither should dominate either.
Anticipatory grief is the mind going to the future and imagining the worst. To calm yourself, you want to come into the present. This will be familiar advice to anyone who has meditated or practiced mindfulness but people are always surprised at how prosaic this can be. You can name five things in the room. There’s a computer, a chair, a picture of the dog, an old rug, and a coffee mug. It’s that simple. Breathe. Realize that in the present moment, nothing you’ve anticipated has happened. In this moment, you’re okay. You have food. You are not sick. Use your senses and think about what they feel. The desk is hard. The blanket is soft. I can feel the breath coming into my nose. This really will work to dampen some of that pain.
You can also think about how to let go of what you can’t control. What your neighbor is doing is out of your control. What is in your control is staying six feet away from them and washing your hands. Focus on that.
Finally, it’s a good time to stock up on compassion. Everyone will have different levels of fear and grief and it manifests in different ways. A coworker got very snippy with me the other day and I thought, That’s not like this person; that’s how they’re dealing with this. I’m seeing their fear and anxiety. So be patient. Think about who someone usually is and not who they seem to be in this moment.
One particularly troubling aspect of this pandemic is the open-endedness of it.
This is a temporary state. It helps to say it. I worked for 10 years in the hospital system. I’ve been trained for situations like this. I’ve also studied the 1918 flu pandemic. The precautions we’re taking are the right ones. History tells us that. This is survivable. We will survive. This is a time to overprotect but not overreact.
And, I believe we will find meaning in it. I’ve been honored that Elisabeth Kübler-Ross’s family has given me permission to add a sixth stage to grief: Meaning. I had talked to Elisabeth quite a bit about what came after acceptance. I did not want to stop at acceptance when I experienced some personal grief. I wanted meaning in those darkest hours. And I do believe we find light in those times. Even now people are realizing they can connect through technology. They are not as remote as they thought. They are realizing they can use their phones for long conversations. They’re appreciating walks. I believe we will continue to find meaning now and when this is over.
What do you say to someone who’s read all this and is still feeling overwhelmed with grief?
Keep trying. There is something powerful about naming this as grief. It helps us feel what’s inside of us. So many have told me in the past week, “I’m telling my coworkers I’m having a hard time,” or “I cried last night.” When you name it, you feel it and it moves through you. Emotions need motion. It’s important we acknowledge what we go through. One unfortunate byproduct of the self-help movement is we’re the first generation to have feelings about our feelings. We tell ourselves things like, I feel sad, but I shouldn’t feel that; other people have it worse. We can — we should — stop at the first feeling. I feel sad. Let me go for five minutes to feel sad. Your work is to feel your sadness and fear and anger whether or not someone else is feeling something. Fighting it doesn’t help because your body is producing the feeling. If we allow the feelings to happen, they’ll happen in an orderly way, and it empowers us. Then we’re not victims.
In an orderly way?
Yes. Sometimes we try not to feel what we’re feeling because we have this image of a “gang of feelings.” If I feel sad and let that in, it’ll never go away. The gang of bad feelings will overrun me. The truth is a feeling that moves through us. We feel it and it goes and then we go to the next feeling. There’s no gang out to get us. It’s absurd to think we shouldn’t feel grief right now. Let yourself feel the grief and keep going.
We’ve made our coronavirus coverage free for all readers. To get all of HBR’s content delivered to your inbox, sign up for the Daily Alert newsletter.
Some of the HBR edit staff met virtually the other day — a screen full of faces in a scene becoming more common everywhere. We talked about the content we’re commissioning in this harrowing time of a pandemic and how we can help people. But we also talked about how we were feeling. One colleague mentioned that what she felt was grief. Heads nodded in all the panes.
If we can name it, perhaps we can manage it. We turned to David Kessler for ideas on how to do that. Kessler is the world’s foremost expert on grief. He co-wrote with Elisabeth Kübler-Ross On Grief and Grieving: Finding the Meaning of Grief through the Five Stages of Loss. His new book adds another stage to the process, Finding Meaning: The Sixth Stage of Grief. Kessler also has worked for a decade in a three-hospital system in Los Angeles. He served on their biohazards team. His volunteer work includes being an LAPD Specialist Reserve for traumatic events as well as having served on the Red Cross’s disaster services team. He is the founder of www.grief.com, which has over 5 million visits yearly from 167 countries.
Kessler shared his thoughts on why it’s important to acknowledge the grief you may be feeling, how to manage it, and how he believes we will find meaning in it. The conversation is lightly edited for clarity.
HBR: People are feeling any number of things right now. Is it right to call some of what they’re feeling grief?
Kessler: Yes, and we’re feeling a number of different griefs. We feel the world has changed, and it has. We know this is temporary, but it doesn’t feel that way, and we realize things will be different. Just as going to the airport is forever different from how it was before 9/11, things will change and this is the point at which they changed. The loss of normalcy; the fear of economic toll; the loss of connection. This is hitting us and we’re grieving. Collectively. We are not used to this kind of collective grief in the air.
You said we’re feeling more than one kind of grief?
Yes, we’re also feeling anticipatory grief. Anticipatory grief is that feeling we get about what the future holds when we’re uncertain. Usually it centers on death. We feel it when someone gets a dire diagnosis or when we have the normal thought that we’ll lose a parent someday. Anticipatory grief is also more broadly imagined futures. There is a storm coming. There’s something bad out there. With a virus, this kind of grief is so confusing for people. Our primitive mind knows something bad is happening, but you can’t see it. This breaks our sense of safety. We’re feeling that loss of safety. I don’t think we’ve collectively lost our sense of general safety like this. Individually or as smaller groups, people have felt this. But all together, this is new. We are grieving on a micro and a macro level.
What can individuals do to manage all this grief?
Understanding the stages of grief is a start. But whenever I talk about the stages of grief, I have to remind people that the stages aren’t linear and may not happen in this order. It’s not a map but it provides some scaffolding for this unknown world. There’s denial, which we say a lot of early on: This virus won’t affect us. There’s anger: You’re making me stay home and taking away my activities. There’s bargaining: Okay, if I social distance for two weeks everything will be better, right? There’s sadness: I don’t know when this will end. And finally, there’s acceptance. This is happening; I have to figure out how to proceed.
Acceptance, as you might imagine, is where the power lies. We find control in acceptance. I can wash my hands. I can keep a safe distance. I can learn how to work virtually.
When we’re feeling grief there’s that physical pain. And the racing mind. Are there techniques to deal with that to make it less intense?
Let’s go back to anticipatory grief. Unhealthy anticipatory grief is really anxiety, and that’s the feeling you’re talking about. Our mind begins to show us images. My parents getting sick. We see the worst scenarios. That’s our minds being protective. Our goal is not to ignore those images or to try to make them go away — your mind won’t let you do that and it can be painful to try and force it. The goal is to find balance in the things you’re thinking. If you feel the worst image taking shape, make yourself think of the best image. We all get a little sick and the world continues. Not everyone I love dies. Maybe no one does because we’re all taking the right steps. Neither scenario should be ignored but neither should dominate either.
Anticipatory grief is the mind going to the future and imagining the worst. To calm yourself, you want to come into the present. This will be familiar advice to anyone who has meditated or practiced mindfulness but people are always surprised at how prosaic this can be. You can name five things in the room. There’s a computer, a chair, a picture of the dog, an old rug, and a coffee mug. It’s that simple. Breathe. Realize that in the present moment, nothing you’ve anticipated has happened. In this moment, you’re okay. You have food. You are not sick. Use your senses and think about what they feel. The desk is hard. The blanket is soft. I can feel the breath coming into my nose. This really will work to dampen some of that pain.
You can also think about how to let go of what you can’t control. What your neighbor is doing is out of your control. What is in your control is staying six feet away from them and washing your hands. Focus on that.
Finally, it’s a good time to stock up on compassion. Everyone will have different levels of fear and grief and it manifests in different ways. A coworker got very snippy with me the other day and I thought, That’s not like this person; that’s how they’re dealing with this. I’m seeing their fear and anxiety. So be patient. Think about who someone usually is and not who they seem to be in this moment.
One particularly troubling aspect of this pandemic is the open-endedness of it.
This is a temporary state. It helps to say it. I worked for 10 years in the hospital system. I’ve been trained for situations like this. I’ve also studied the 1918 flu pandemic. The precautions we’re taking are the right ones. History tells us that. This is survivable. We will survive. This is a time to overprotect but not overreact.
And, I believe we will find meaning in it. I’ve been honored that Elisabeth Kübler-Ross’s family has given me permission to add a sixth stage to grief: Meaning. I had talked to Elisabeth quite a bit about what came after acceptance. I did not want to stop at acceptance when I experienced some personal grief. I wanted meaning in those darkest hours. And I do believe we find light in those times. Even now people are realizing they can connect through technology. They are not as remote as they thought. They are realizing they can use their phones for long conversations. They’re appreciating walks. I believe we will continue to find meaning now and when this is over.
What do you say to someone who’s read all this and is still feeling overwhelmed with grief?
Keep trying. There is something powerful about naming this as grief. It helps us feel what’s inside of us. So many have told me in the past week, “I’m telling my coworkers I’m having a hard time,” or “I cried last night.” When you name it, you feel it and it moves through you. Emotions need motion. It’s important we acknowledge what we go through. One unfortunate byproduct of the self-help movement is we’re the first generation to have feelings about our feelings. We tell ourselves things like, I feel sad, but I shouldn’t feel that; other people have it worse. We can — we should — stop at the first feeling. I feel sad. Let me go for five minutes to feel sad. Your work is to feel your sadness and fear and anger whether or not someone else is feeling something. Fighting it doesn’t help because your body is producing the feeling. If we allow the feelings to happen, they’ll happen in an orderly way, and it empowers us. Then we’re not victims.
In an orderly way?
Yes. Sometimes we try not to feel what we’re feeling because we have this image of a “gang of feelings.” If I feel sad and let that in, it’ll never go away. The gang of bad feelings will overrun me. The truth is a feeling that moves through us. We feel it and it goes and then we go to the next feeling. There’s no gang out to get us. It’s absurd to think we shouldn’t feel grief right now. Let yourself feel the grief and keep going.
Thursday, April 9, 2020
#27: Forget old screen ‘time’ rules during coronavirus. Here’s what you should focus on instead
COVID-19 has left parents grappling with the challenges of online learning, entertainment and work. It’s natural the time children spend using screens will now increase.
But that’s OK. Screen time recommendations we’ve enforced for so long no longer apply to our situation. There are ways to make the best of kids’ increased use of screens.
More than just screen ‘time’ keep them happy (without resorting to Netflix)Screen quality matters more what your child does on their screen than how long they’re doing it for. Shutterstockscreen experience that mattersScreen buddies while you're stuck at home tips for parents
Screen “time” has become an important aspect of our health and well-being. It relates to measuring how many hours and minutes a person uses a digital screen such as mobile phone, tablet, television or computer.
Screen time has become a particularly important focus for parents who want to help their child establish healthy technology habits.
We gain our screen time recommendations from several sources. These are primarily health and psychology authorities. They include the World Health Organisation, which has published guidelines for children five years old and younger; and the American Academy of Paediatrics and Australian Department of Health, which have each published their own guidelines for children up to 18 years old.
These guidelines bear similarities to each other. They mainly state children under 18 months should get no screen time except for video calls such as Skyping a grandparent. Children aged two to five should limit their use to an hour, ideally watching a screen with an adult.
Guidelines for school-aged children and adolescents are less definitive. There are no recommended minutes or hours per day. The guidelines depend on the lifestyle of the child, and it’s left to the parent to manage.
If we dissect published screentime recommendations, there are three factors embedded in what comprises healthy technology use.
They include:
1. time using a screen
2. quality of screen content
3. who you use a screen with.
Screen “time” gets all the airplay, but with families confined to home, the other two factors – quality and screen buddies – are just as important, if not more, for healthy technology use.
The benefits of technology on children’s health, well-being, social and emotional outcomes, and school achievement, depends less on time and more on the type of content they engage with when using a screen.
Consider a five-year-old watching 30-minutes of early childhood educational content, such as the ABC’s PlaySchool. Compare this to the same child playing 30 minutes of a highly violent video game.
Both involve 30 minutes of screen time, but the experience for the child and the impact on them will be vastly different with each.
Quality screen content is defined by three combined features: it is interactive, educational and age-appropriate.
But just because something is categorised as “educational” doesn’t mean it’s a good learning experience. The term education is often used as a way of organising apps in the App Store or Google Play store, or to market apps.
Truly educational content requires a child to think, be creative and socially interactive. These kinds of apps don’t have too many distracting bells and whistles but aim to keep the child’s attention on the learning.
A great example of an educational app for your children is Thinkrolls Space. The app has fun, odd-ball alien-themed puzzles that encourage problem-solving, as well as thinking logically and strategically.
The app design encourages children to persevere to solve the problem. And it doesn’t encourage in-app purchases to easily power up without solving the problem.
For high school children, the app DragonBox Algebra 12+ is an innovative STEM game that helps supercharge kids’ learning of algebra.
The game is designed to help kids build a strong understanding, with lots of opportunities to practise new skills and then move through to more complex problems; and it does this is a really fun way.
It’s not very healthy for a child of any age to be alone on a device for hours on end. Engaging with your child and varying how a child engages socially when using a screen is important to developing healthy screen habits.
This is sometimes explained using the term “co-view”, which is when a child uses a screen with their parent who can explain ideas to them.
“Co-engaging” is a much more powerful idea for older children. It simply means using a screen with someone equally engaged (not just an onlooker or explainer). It may be playing an online game with a parent or another person.
It can also mean engaging with the online content with someone virtually, such as Skyping a class friend or taking part in a virtual study group.
Healthy screen use is about balancing all three factors: time, quality and buddies. So, if you think your child may be using a screen for longer periods of time because of the changes COVID-19 has brought, then ensure screen quality and screen buddies are in check. You can do this now, by:
- setting up a time to engage with a screen, together with your child, in way that then is more than just watching on as a bystander
- checking through the apps and games your child currently uses. Try to identify which are quality (educational, interactive and age-appropriate)
- looking for new quality educational experiences online for your child. Don’t settle for something simply labelled “educational”. Investigate it and make sure it qualifies as a great educational experience.
Too much screen time is not the end of the world. Aiming for healthy screentime using all three factors – time, quality and buddies – is much more important.
https://theconversation.com/forget-old-screen-time-rules-during-coronavirus-heres-what-you-should-focus-on-instead-135053?utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Latest%20from%20The%20Conversation%20for%20April%2010%202020%20-%201590115225&utm_content=Latest%20from%20The%20Conversation%20for%20April%2010%202020%20-%201590115225+CID_1c445d03109bd50057621243f08ecea3&utm_source=campaign_monitor&utm_term=Forget%20old%20screen%20time%20rules%20during%20coronavirus%20Heres%20what%20you%20should%20focus%20on%20instead
Sunday, March 29, 2020
#26: Community update 30/3/2020
Good Morning ISHCMC Community,
We hope that you are well and have had a good weekend. We
are pleased to let you know that two of our three teachers who have been
detained since Spring Break at quarantine facilities were released yesterday
and the third will be released this morning. All three have remained negative
for Covid 19.
Yesterday the People’s Committee issued communication No:
1156/UBND-VX which extend the period of school closure to April 19th. This
came as no surprise given the transport directives, closure of shops and the move
towards increasing social distancing policies. Hence, ISHCMC will continue with
home learning and teaching from home until this date. On the school calendar, April
2nd is a national holiday celebrating King Hung’s birthday and April
3rd is a school holiday giving families a long weekend. Given our
present learning program teachers have been asked to provide work for
students to follow on Thursday and Friday to support you as a family, and to
allow students to consolidate, recap and reflect upon their learning. Please
use this work as you see fit. If you believe your daughter/ son needs a break
from technology then use the long weekend to achieve this goal. Teachers have
been given the option of being online but this is not an expectation, as they also
need a wellness break from teaching from home. All students will be assumed to
be present and working on both days.
As we have already informed you the IB Diploma examinations
for May have been canceled. You may have been wondering how Diplomas would be awarded
this year. On Friday we heard from the IB that they will be using vast historical assessment data to ensure
that they follow a rigorous process of due diligence in what is a truly
unprecedented situation. They will be undertaking significant data analysis
from previous exam sessions, individual school data, subject data as well as
comparative data of schools who have already completed uploading requirements
and those who have not. All schools have been instructed to upload all
internal assessment and predicted Grades by April 20. Hence the IB will be maintaining
its reputation, rigor, and value of the Diploma.
To complete this morning’s update we thought that we would
share this untitled poem by Kitty O'Meara that was shared
with us and is going viral on social media. It is a lovely poem and links with
the NY Times article that we are also sharing with you, What the Coronavirus Means for Climate Change. The two link together very well in their
provocation that as we human suffer and recover from Covid 19, are forced to change
our way of living, this allows our Earth to recover from our misuse and mistreatment.
This is well illustrated in HCMC with the beautiful days, blue skies, clear
visibility and low AQI readings. So the question arises; do we have to be
suffering a global pandemic to enjoy the beauties of nature, or is it possible
for us to reflect and use this moment to change our relationship with our Earth
for the better?
Kitty O’Meara’s Poem. You will find this being circulated in many different formats and linked to different events in human history some going back to famines in the 19th century. The truth is that Kitty O’Meara is still alive today and is in fact a housewife living in Madison, Wisconsin, US.
And the people
stayed home. And read books, and listened, and rested, and exercised, and made
art, and played games, and learned new ways of being, and were still. And
listened more deeply. Some meditated, some prayed, some danced. Some met their
shadows. And the people began to think differently.
And the people healed. And, in the absence of people living in
ignorant, dangerous, mindless, and heartless ways, the earth began to heal.
And when the danger passed, and the people joined together again,
they grieved their losses, and made new choices, and dreamed new images, and
created new ways to live and heal the earth fully, as they had been healed.
Here is a video link to
the poem that could be used for a short meditation or mindfulness activity
together as families on Thursday and Friday.
Have a good week.
Keep safe and healthy,
Yours,
Adrian
Tuesday, March 24, 2020
#25: Could home learning be more applicable for the future than learning in school?
Everyone knows that home learning isn’t the same as learning
in school. They are different, but it doesn’t mean that what we regard as traditional learning is right, or better, than what we are going through at home today.
In 1665 Isaac Newton was confined to learning at home due to the Great Plague of London. At the time he was a student at Cambridge University and due to social distancing had to work from his home at Woolsthrope Manor about 60 miles from Cambridge. Newton worked at home for about a year without his teachers to guide him. He referred to this period as his 'years of wonder,' because he thrived given the opportunity to inquire. During this period he developed early calculus, new theories on optics and the first thoughts about gravity and that famous apple from the tree. Hence, it is not always that we are at our most creative and learn the most when we are learning in an institution.
We must also remember that not all students learn in the same way and that many, as was obviously the case with Newton, enjoy setting their own parameters for inquiry, investigation, and problem-solving.
The aim of this post is not to suggest that all students working at home are going to be Isaac Newton, or are enjoying the experience of home learning, but rather to provoke thinking about the future, what we need to learn and how we might be doing this. Hence, I am going to share two videos with you.
The first is Humans Need Not Apply. This video supports much of my fears about the future of employment and why we need to be looking at what is really important in schools and how the school prepares students for a future ruled by AI. Given what is happening in the world with Covid 19 this world might come quicker than previously anticipated because AI doesn't get impacted by human viruses, doesn't get tired, and doesn't need sick leave.
Hope you found this interesting and gave you something to think about beyond Covid 19.
Tuesday, March 17, 2020
#24 Humans need not apply
We all know the world is changing. We all know that it will be a different world of work for our children. We believe that with all these changes will come new jobs that our children will fill.
That sounds great and stops us from thinking about changing things like education. But what happens if the new jobs are filled by bots, not humans?
That sounds great and stops us from thinking about changing things like education. But what happens if the new jobs are filled by bots, not humans?
Friday, February 7, 2020
#23: Bottled water.......is it safe?
This is a 17-minute video about bottled water in Canada. It is very interesting to think that the country with 25% of the earth's freshwater throws out 12,000 plastic water bottles every 4 minutes. What are the rest of us doing?
Last year the WHO announced in a report that microplastics in water were not a health threat and this started a discussion on this topic. Of course we don't know much yet, because we have only just discovered this potential threat to our health. Here is a BBC article on this topic.
" And although the available evidence suggests the health risks associated with ingesting microplastics, and the chemicals associated with them, are minimal, the studies so far contain significant data gaps, which need to be corrected in future research, according to the report's co-author Jennifer de France.
"We need to know the number of particles that have been detected, the size of these particles, the shapes, as well as the chemical composition," she says.
So this report on the health consequences of microplastics is likely to be the first of many. Because microplastics are present not just in water, they are in the air, and in our food. In the next few years, the WHO would like to see a report looking at what this "total environmental exposure" means for our health as well."
#22 Viruses
Dear parents,
Hopefully, you are being asked by your children about the reasons that school is closed. Of course at the center of this is a virus called coronavirus.
Not all of us did well in Biology at school so I thought these three short videos might help you answer your daughter and son's questions.
A video about viruses:
How do viruses jump between species?
How do pandemics spread?
Saturday, January 18, 2020
#21: Do you really see your child
Take a moment and fast forward in your mind to a day in the future when your child, now an adult, looks back and talks about whether she felt truly seen and embraced by you. Maybe she’s talking to a spouse, a friend or a therapist — someone with whom she can be totally, brutally honest. Perhaps she’s saying, “My mom, she wasn’t perfect, but I always knew she loved me just as I was.” Or, “My dad really got me, and he was always in my corner, even when I did something wrong.” Would your child say something like that? Or would she end up talking about how her parents always wanted her to be something she wasn’t, or didn’t take the time to really understand her, or wanted her to act in ways that weren’t authentic in order to play a particular role in the family or come across a certain way?
Put another way, do our kids feel seen by us? Do they feel truly seen for who they are — not for who we’d like them to be, and not filtered through our own fears or desires?
Parents in the United States today feel increasing pressure to practice some form of “hyper-parenting,” a time- and resource-intensive style of child-rearing also known as helicopter parenting. Even though a majority of parents now see it as the optimal approach, hyper-parenting is mainly practiced by the affluent, who spend huge amounts of time and money in an effort to give their kids every possible advantage — from baby Mandarin classes and private oboe lessons to travel soccer teams and SAT tutoring.
Intensive parenting is problematic not only because of the pressure it puts on parents, but because some research suggests that all this exhausting parental striving may not be the best way to raise children. In fact, our research and experience suggest that raising happy, healthy, flourishing kids requires parents to do just one key thing. It’s not about reading all the parenting best sellers or signing your kids up for all the right activities. You don’t even have to know exactly what you’re doing. Just show up.
Showing up means bringing your whole being — your attention and awareness — into this moment with your child. When we show up, we are mentally and emotionally present for our child right now. Naturally, no one can do this for everyone all the time, but as we explain in our new book, “The Power of Showing Up,” the idea is to approach parenting being present and aware in your interactions with your child — and to make repairs when that doesn’t happen.
Longitudinal research on child development suggests that one of the best predictors for how any child turns out — in terms of happiness, social and emotional development, meaningful relationships, and even academic and career success — is having received sensitive, supportive care early in life. We believe the key element is an adult who supported the child by offering what we call the “Four S’s” — helping them feel 1) safe — where they feel protected and sheltered from harm; 2) seen — where they know you care about them and pay attention to them as they really are; 3) soothed — where they know you’ll be there for them when they’re hurting; and 4) secure — which develops from the other S’s so they trust you to predictably help them feel “at home” in the world.
In the world of intensive hyper-parenting, the third S — “seen” — often seems to get left behind. We all know we should keep our kids safe and secure, and most of us believe we should soothe them when they’re upset. But what about really seeing them?
You know the clichés of the dad who pushes his disinterested son to be an athlete, or the mom who rides her child to make straight A’s, regardless of the child’s inclinations. These are parents failing to see who their kids really are. If they happen occasionally over the course of a childhood they won’t make a huge difference — no one can truly see a child 100% of the time. But over time the child’s sense of not being seen can not only harm the child, but the parent and the relationship.
That sets up a heartbreaking reality: there are kids who live a majority of their childhoods not being seen. Never feeling understood. Rarely having the experience that someone feels their feelings, takes on their perspective, knows their likes and dislikes. Imagine how these children feel — invisible and alone. When they think about their teachers, their peers, even their parents, one thought can run through their minds: “They don’t get me at all.”
What keeps a child from feeling seen and understood? Sometimes, it’s when we see the child through a lens that has more to do with our own desires, fears, and issues than with our child’s individual personality, passions, and behavior. Maybe we become fixated on a label and say, “He’s the baby,” or “She’s the athletic (or shy or artistic) one.” Or “He’s stubborn, just like his dad.” When we define our kids like this, using labels or comparisons to capture and categorize them, we prevent ourselves from seeing them for who they are.
Even in our most well-meaning moments, we can fall into the trap of hoping our kids will be something other than who they really are. We might want our child to be studious or athletic or artistic or neat or achievement-oriented or something else. But what if he just doesn’t care about kicking a ball into a net? Or is even unable to do so? What if she has no interest in playing the flute? What if it doesn’t seem important to get straight A’s, or it feels inauthentic to conform to gender norms?
Seeing our kids also means being willing to look beyond our initial assumptions and interpretations. If your child is quiet when she meets an adult, you might assume she is being impolite and try to improve her social skills. But she may simply be feeling shy or anxious. Rather than immediately correcting manners, you should first observe where she is right now, and work to understand the feelings behind the behavior.
The point is to develop an attitude of curiosity rather than immediate judgment. When your toddler plays the “let’s push the plate of spaghetti off the highchair” game, your initial assumption might be that he’s trying to press your buttons. But if you look at his face and notice how fascinated he is by the red splatter on the floor and the wall, you might feel and respond differently. You might be just as frustrated about having to clean it up, but maybe you could pause and ask yourself, “I wonder why he did that?” If your curiosity can lead you to see him as a young researcher gathering data as he explores this world that’s so new to him, you can respond with intentionality and patience, even as you clean up his experiment. (And perhaps draw your own conclusion and put a towel down the next time you serve pasta.)
Each child is an individual. When our own desires and assumptions lead us to perceive that child as something other than who they are, we are unable to see them clearly. And if we can’t see our kids, then what do we really mean when we say we love them? How can we embrace them as the individuals they are?
In the end, truly seeing your kids isn’t about being some sort of super-parent. You don’t have to read minds or transcend your shortcomings or achieve spiritual enlightenment. And you certainly don’t have to drive yourself and your family insane trying to attend every available enrichment activity. You just have to show up, allowing your kids to feel that you get them and that you’ll be there for them, no matter what. When you do that, you’ll be teaching them how to love, and how relationships work. They’ll be more likely to choose friends and partners who will see and show up for them, and they’ll learn how to do it for others, meaning they’ll build skills for healthy relationships, including with their own kids, who can then pass the lesson on down the line through future generations. That’s what it means to see — really see — your children.
Then, maybe someday, they’ll sit down with you for that cup of coffee and let you know how grateful they are for the way you saw them for who they were, and for the ways you showed up in their life.
ttps://parenting.nytimes.com/preschooler/daniel-siegel-tina-payne-bryson?type=roundup&link=intro&te=1&nl=nyt-parenting&emc=edit_ptg_20200118?campaign_id=118&instance_id=15274&segment_id=20449&user_id=251c3ceecbefb1fd9665db85131f1f61®i_id=100524991dit_ptg_20200118
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