If you don't want to lose your faculties, you need to keep your brain alive. People with active brains live longer.
Being busy is not enough..many are busy but do not use their brain.
Its not what you have but what you do with it that counts
http://activeenglishspeaking.com
The Overlanders
Passage from The Great Treasury of Australian Folklore
The Overlanders were the men who drove cattle long distances.
They are commemorated at the Stockman's Hall of Fame and The Outback heritage centre at Longreach Queensland
Robo Boy Prototype Robot Child
Description:
CB2, the Robo-Boy prototype of the next generation
http://www.news.com.au/technology/story/0,28348,25301664-5014239,00.html
A BALD, child-like creature dangles its legs from a chair as its shoulders rise and fall with rythmic breathing and its black eyes follow movements across the room. It's not human - but it is paying attention.
Below the soft silicon skin of one of Japan's most sophisticated robots, processors record and evaluate information. The 130cm humanoid is designed to learn just like a human infant.
The creators of the Child-robot with Biomimetic Body, or CB2, say it is slowly developing social skills by interacting with humans and watching their facial expressions, mimicking a mother-baby relationship. "Babies and infants have very, very limited programs. But they have room to learn more," said Osaka University professor Minoru Asada, as his team's 33kg invention kept its eyes glued to him.
The team is trying to teach the pint-sized android to think like a baby who evaluates its mother's countless facial expressions and "clusters" them into basic categories, such as happiness and sadness. With 197 film-like pressure sensors under its light grey rubbery skin, CB2 can also recognise human touch, such as stroking of its head. The robot can record emotional expressions using eye-cameras, then memorise and match them with physical sensations, and cluster them on its circuit boards, Prof Asada said.
Since CB2 was first presented to the world in 2007, it has taught itself how to walk with the aid of a human and can now move its body through a room quite smoothly, using 51 "muscles" driven by air pressure, he said.
In coming decades, Prof Asada expects science will come up with a "robo species" that has learning abilities somewhere between those of a human and other primate species such as the chimpanzee. And he hopes that his little CB2 may lead the way, with the goal to have the robo-kid speaking in basic sentences within about two years, matching the intelligence of a two-year-old child.
By 2050, Prof Asada wants a robotic team of football players to be able take on the human World Cup champions - and win. Welcome to the cutting edge of robotics and artificial intelligence.
More than a decade since automaker Honda stunned the world with a walking humanoid P2, a forerunner to the popular ASIMO, robotics has come a long way. Researchers across Japan have unveiled increasingly sophisticated robots with different functions - including a talking office receptionist, a security guard and even a primary school teacher.
Electronics giant Toshiba is developing a new model of domestic helper, AppriAttenda, which moves on wheels and can fetch containers from a refrigerator with its two arms. Last month also saw the debut of Japan's first robotic fashion model, cybernetic human HRP-4C, which can strut a catwalk, smile and pout thanks to 42 motion motors programmed to mimic flesh-and-blood models.
A Tokyo subsidiary of Hello Kitty maker Sanrio, Kokoro - which means heart or mind in Japanese - has also produced advanced talking, life-size humanoids. "Robots have hearts," said Kokoro planning department manager Yuko Yokota. "They don't look human unless we put souls in them. When manufacturing a robot, there comes a moment when light flickers in its eyes.
That's when we know our work is done."
http://Activeenglishspeaking.com http://Ladymaggic.podomatic.com
Spoken Words actually alter Physical Brain
The Learning Brain by Eric Jensen
Words can be just as powerful as prescription drugs in behavior modification. Carefully chosen words can activate the same areas of the brain as highly prescribed drugs.
The theraapeutic value of Language indicates that words can heal as well as motivate
http://activeenglishspeaking.com
Italy Bids Farwell to Quake Dead
Italy Bids Farwell to Quake Dead
http://au.news.yahoo.com/a/-/world/5491430/italy-bids-final-farewell-quake-dead/
L'AQUILA, Italy (AFP) - Italy bade a final farewell Friday to the nearly 300 people killed in the earthquake that devastated the central Abruzzo region, with thousands attending an emotional funeral.
The families of 205 of the 290 victims laid them to rest after the ceremony, with top government and Catholic Church dignitaries among a throng of more than 5,000.
Many broke into sobs at the sight of so many coffins covered with floral wreaths and arrayed on red carpets at a military college near the devastated Abruzzo capital L'Aquila nestled in a valley of the Apennine mountains.
Small white children's coffins set atop brown ones holding adult victims deepened the sense of loss at the ceremony on Good Friday, the most sombre day of the Christian calendar marking the death of Jesus Christ .
A toy motorcycle was attached to one of the baby coffins.
Pope Benedict XVI told the mourners in a message: "In this tragic hour ... I feel spiritually close to you and share your anguish."
The pontiff, who is expected to visit the region after Easter , wished for "rapid healing for the wounded and courage to have the strength to continue," in the message read out by his personal secretary Georg Ganswein.
Many of the mourners had lost their homes in Monday's earthquake, and found their way to the funeral from one of the tent camps dotted around the area.
More than 800 aftershocks have rattled the region since Monday, and did not even stop for the funeral.
"It is with great mercy that we embrace with our thoughts the many victims torn from their families too soon by a cruel death," said Vatican Secretary of State Tarcisio Bertone in his homily.
"The day after tomorrow we will celebrate Easter , and it will be your Easter , an Easter that will once again be a rebirth from the rubble for a people who have already suffered so many times through history," said Bertone, the Vatican's number two.
Imam Mohammed Nour recited prayers for the six Muslim victims "in the name of the one God", voicing his "solidarity and support for all those who survived."
Flags few at half mast on the national day of mourning for the dead, and the funeral was broadcast live on several television networks, while all the country's airports observed a minute of silence.
After the funeral, lines of hearses jammed the winding road leading up to a nearby hillside cemetery overlooked by snow-capped Apennine peaks.
There, a woman grasped the marble slab covering the burial niche where her son was laid to rest, sobbing: "Francesco! Francesco! Why did you leave me? I want to be in there with you! You were only 24!"
Some of the relatives prayed quietly by the tombs, others attached flowers and photographs of the departed to the slabs.
Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, who comforted mourners along with President Giorgio Napolitano and other top Italian officials, said later Friday that he would open his homes to quake survivors.
"Many people have already offered up their houses to help the homeless from the earthquake and I too will do what I can by offering some of my residences," said the self-made billionaire, who owns at least four luxury villas around Italy.
Officials say nearly 40,000 people lost their homes, with a large chunk -- 24,000 -- scraping by in tent villages with a dearth of hot water, showers and electricity.
The earthquake, the worst in nearly 30 years, turned the area around the medieval walled city of L'Aquila into a disaster zone and flattened surrounding villages.
President Napolitano, while touring region on Thursday, blamed "widespread irresponsibility" for the collapse of many modern buildings and called for an "examination of conscience" by those responsible.
"How is it possible that essential standards were not applied, and why were the necessary inspections not carried out?" he asked.
The Italian government says billions of euros will be needed to repair or rebuild some 10,000 buildings damaged in the quake, and Berlusconi has said he expected European Union funds of up to 500 million euros (650 million dollars) over the next three years.
Read by Maggi Carstairs
http://activeenglishspeaking.com
The Online Virtual Classroom
http://activeseniormates.ning.com/profiles/blogs/set-in-our-ways-the-age-of
http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=set-in-our-ways&sc=WR_20081223
Personality can continue to change somewhat in middle and old age, but openness to new experiences tends to decline gradually until about age 60. After that, some people become more open again, perhaps because their responsibilities for raising a family and earning a living have been lifted.
The Age of Openness
Psychologists have long identified openness to new experiences as one of the “Big Five” personality traits, which also include extroversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness and neuroticism. Considerable disagreement exists about how much these personality traits change after age 30, but most research suggests that openness declines in adulthood.
“Clear age trends are observable,” says psychologist Peter Borkenau of Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg in Germany. “People tend to become more reliable and agreeable with age, but their openness to novelty drops at the same time.”
In a comprehensive survey of more than 130,000 participants published in 2003, psychologist Sanjay Srivastava, now at the University of Oregon, and his colleagues assessed the Big Five traits in 21- to 60-year-olds using standard psychological tests on the Internet. They found that openness increased modestly up to age 30 and then declined slowly in both men and women. The survey results suggest that men begin adulthood slightly more open to new experiences than women but decline in openness during their 30s at a faster rate than women.
Age 30 is not a magical turning point, however. Openness declines gradually over many years, often beginning in the 20s. As the years wear on, novelty becomes less and less stimulating, and the world outside someone’s own private and professional sanctums becomes increasingly less attractive.
This change happens to almost everyone, regardless of individual personality. That does not mean that everyone reaches the same level of openness in later life, however. Some toddlers love to go back to the same playground day after day, whereas others get bored after a day or two of digging in the same sandbox with the same shovel. Children who are less open to new experiences than their peers are will continue in adulthood to cleave to the conventional more than their more adventurous childhood friends will. As psychologist Richard W. Robins of the University of California, Davis, showed in a longitudinal study, those who begin life with a more open personality remain relatively more open in their later years.
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This is an interesting study....I know that many English Teachers in Korea and China,many in their mature years, have left the security of their homes, families, friend, and countries to live and work in another country and culture, and there are other people in other occupations either working or doing voluntary tasks enjoying the freedom of being able to live without the responsibilities of younger ages.
I plan to return to my own country next year to work, but still within the freedom to change and travel that I found in Asia, and now with a new direction. The Online Virtual Classroom has widened my horizons, and made living anywhere in the world, and still working at the Virtual Online School, a huge possibility, because the Power of Internet has brought the world to me, and I am the International Entrepreneur with a potential International clientele.
We have moved into a New World which is smaller and smaller, as now the whole world is our marketplace and potential clients. When I opened my first Florist Shop, I serviced local people. Then I became the first Intertel Florist, where I could theoretically service anyone in the world by having them respond to my Yellow Page and other advertising, and order flowers from anywhere, to be sent anywhere. Then I developed a series of Florist contacts by searching the web, and gave them orders, and had them return orders when they needed flowers in Australia. It was the 'Daisy Chain' that got Interflora concerned, but they decided I was not going to be a threat, and let me run my InterWorld Floral service. The limitation then was that I could reach the market I advertised to, and was dependent on the orders I received from local people, who were very international, as my shops were in Balaclava, Caulfield and Glenhuntly, a very International Community.
Today, the concept of the Online Virtual Classroom is the same as the World linked florist shops. The only difference is that it is 20 years later that this has become possible through the modern technology that has made it possible. The potential was always there, but not with the ease and comfort today, and the wonderful thing is, this Virtual Classroom is not restricted to Education. You can use the same technology to run a Shop, a service business, an Art Gallery, Advice and Assistance, and even a medical service. The presenter is visible to the client, the client can see the product through the camera, through photos and files, and communication is the same as being with the person, except you are anywhere in the world. Furthermore, you can share the session with up to 500 people if you wish, and give them the same privileges. The Social Chat sessions I have organised is a prime example of the Power of the Internet to bring a group of people together from all over the world into one Room. Take a look at the Classroom in Action in the two sessions, one public, and the other by invitation from one of my links. You need the link to access the Session, and remember, this is a potential for you to run an online business using this powerful tool.
Christmas Day Around the World 25 December by Maggi Carstairs
Get your own Virtual Classroom
Change is not relegated to young people. Change that brings enormous changes in life styles are possible with people of any ages, of any culture, of any denomination, if they are free from responsibility.
You can create change in your life by simply taking the first step. Change always involves risk, so this is a part of that change. You cannot break up a marriage and follow a dream expecting everything to fall into place, as you move on. Its not that easy. If you want to break up a marriage and find a new partner, you make the change, and accept the consequences of that change. There will be upset ex's and children missing the other parent. There will be friends who get very angry because you are destroying something they perceive as wonderful, and see you as irresponsible. The new partner may not accept you as readily and there will be adjusting stages. You will see the responsibilities you left are still there, and you now have new ones. Change is not easy, but if it what you desire, you should take the step, and make the changes in your life, and accept the consequences and complications, and become the new change.
Change is more stressful than dying. One is an end to life as we know it. The other is adjusting to a whole new life, while still transiting from the previous. Many people cannot lose the previous life, and tango with both, trying to make two worlds work together. A woman with an ex-husband and a new partner and lover, still has the haunts of the ex-husband, the presence of children who cannot fully understand what and why this has happened, and then the new aspects...a new partner, new routines, new events all trying to meld and fit into the known. It is not easy as all those who have taken this step know. But, staying with the old because of fears of the new, is where most people are today.
You have to take the change if you desire the change.
People who complain endlessly about a situation and do not change it, have only themselves to blame. No-one demands that you stay in your current job if it is not what you desire. No-one insists you stay lonely, if you need to make new friends, and no-one makes you do anything that you do not choose to do.
This rule applies to Teaching. It is virtually impossible to teach someone who does not want to learn. Teaching is not assimilation, nor a rub off because of attendance. Effective teachers know that they have to make the student want to learn what they are teaching, and then learning happens. We do not do anything because we have to do it. On the contrary. People have been known to make wrong choices, because they did not wish to take the choice someone else made for them.
Life is change. Every time you learn something new, you change. Alvin Toffler, wrote about adapting to change more than 50 years ago, and yet we still do not listen. Is it because we are not ready to learn?
Life is change and constantly we are exposed to changes, some of which we do not like. Some are major and life challenging,and others are small issues like what to eat for dinner tonight. Whatever the choice, we consciously make the decision and act accordingly. We are constantly making choices. You choose to do it, or not do it, or, you choose to ignore the choice.
I do not go with the research that claims people have different levels of change factor, and that this is determined from birth. I believe we all have the same powers, but some develop them more strongly, and individuals make their choices, and live the lives they choose to live from the moment they are born. Babies know what is acceptable behavior from the start. The baby who cries for attention gets it. If constant crying gets constant attention, he becomes a crier. He learns from the very beginning to manipulate his environment, and the people he starts manipulating is his mother and his family. They have the choice to be manipulated, and they accept that they will constantly be giving in to the demanding baby. He has learnt that this is his way of creating change, and he grows up doing the same thing in the world where he finds others who will do what he wants. From the day he was born, he had the choice to cry or not cry, and he made the choice and accepted the consequences.
What is your choice? What is your change? Do you want to change something in your life? If you do, don't talk about it, do it. Talk is not action, or even potential action. Make it happen.
Create your own change, and be the change you want to be in the world.
Maggi Carstairs 2008
http://activeseniormates.ning.com/profiles/blogs/set-in-our-ways-the-age-of
http://activeenglishspeaking.com
Dictionary or Translator
Dictionaries and Translators
http://english4koreans.pbwiki.com/Dictionary-and-Translators
Yahoo! Babel Fish
You do not need to carry a dictionary around with you when you are talking to a Westerner.
What you need is to let the westerner explain the word to you, and you to try and understand.
It is easy to refuse to understand and look blank.
That does not help the Teacher who is prepared to slowly explain the word to you.
Many times you do not have a Dictionary to help, so you have to let the teacher explain the word, and try and work it out together.
Many Koreans can read. Write down the word and work it out together.
Walking away or refusing to try is not the answer in a situation where you have to deal with a westerner on your staff or workplace.
Every time you understand a new word, you learn a new word, and that is how you learn to speak English....by using English
Many Koreans use Korean Dictionaries.
It is better to use an English Dictionary.
Remember, you already have English....this is teaching you to use the English you already have.
This is what I do with my University classes...I do not go through a repetition of Grammar and teaching reading as the students already know that, I have the students start using the English they already know.
I teach them to speak what they already know.
You use a dictionary or a translator to give you a meaning to a word you do not know.
babelfish.yahoo.com/
http://english4koreans.pbwiki.com/Dictionary-and-Translators
Hunger For English
A Hunger for English Lessons
http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/03/24/news/english.php?page=1
A timid junior high school student, stood before her English teacher fidgeting. The smiling teacher held up a green pepper and asked in clear, enunciated English: "What is this?"
"Peemang!" the South Korean teenager blurted out, then covered her mouth with a hand as if to stop - too late - the Korean word that had left her mouth.
Mortified, she tried again. Without looking the teacher in the eye, she held both her hands out and asked, this time in English: "May I have green pepper?"
Kim took the vegetable with a bow, and darted back to her giggling classmates - beaming and feeling relieved that she had successfully taken a small first step toward demolishing what South Koreans consider one of their biggest weaknesses in global competitiveness: the fear of speaking in English to Westerners.
…..
With few natural resources, South Korea realized early on that it must push exports and produce high-quality work forces. Education is an obsession. Mastering English is a nationwide quest from kids to office minions in corporate giants like Samsung and Hyundai.
"It's funny because Koreans know English," said Jeffrey Jones, former president of the American Chamber of Commerce in Korea who heads the Paju complex. "They spend a lot of time learning English. They can read, probably better than I can. But they have trouble speaking."
Jones, a longtime resident of South Korea, says that when many Koreans see a Westerner coming their way on the street, they detour or run away.
"They are afraid that they might have to speak English," Jones said. "So one of the things we do here is to break the wall of fear. And students come away not being afraid of foreigners and Westerners particularly."
South Korea has become one of the most aggressive countries in Asia at teaching English to its citizens. The language is taught from the third year of school; beginning in 2008 it will begin in the first year. Outside the school system, parents are paying an estimated 10 trillion won a year to help their children learn English at home or abroad.
Yet many college graduates falter in chats with native speakers. South Korean officials are often accused of grouping together in international conferences, afraid to mix with native English speakers. That, linguists say, is a result of a national school system that traditionally stresses reading and rote memorization of English grammar and vocabulary at the expense of conversation.
In Korea University of Seoul, 30 percent of all classes are now in English.
There is also growing pressure at home. South Korean mothers have been instrumental in sending their children to language classes or international schools in the United States and, when immigration rules there tightened, to Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Malaysia, the Philippines, and even Fiji and Togo. The mothers often go with them, while the fathers stay home to finance a phenomenon known as an "overseas expedition to master English."
Speaking English with a native accent has become such a status symbol that some parents reportedly put their children through the clinically questionable surgery of snipping the thin tissue under the tongue to make it longer and supposedly nimbler, helping the children to pronounce the R sound better.
http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/03/24/news/english.php?page=1
http://english4Koreans.pbwiki.com
Obana Versus McCain...VP Choice for McCain
Obana versus McCain...the VP Choices
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080829/ap_on_el_pr/cvn_convention_rdp
Republican John McCain shook up the presidential race with his surprise choice of little-known Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin as his running mate on Friday. Democrat Barack Obama, entering a crucial stage of the campaign fresh off his historic nominating convention, began a tour of battleground states.
Obama left the convention city of Denver as the first black man to be nominated for president by a major political party. The 47-year-old Illinois senator won over the party faithful — even some die-hard backers of Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton — but the broader electorate awaits.
McCain, who turned 72 on Friday, worked to grab the spotlight with his selection of Palin, 44, the first woman to be a Republican vice presidential nominee.
"I have found the right partner to help me stand up to those who value their privileges over their responsibilities, who put power over principle, and put their interests before your needs," McCain said at a raucous rally in the swing state of Ohio.
The Republican presidential nominee-to-be stunned some party officials by choosing the self-styled hockey mom and political reformer, who has been governor of her state for less than two years, over several more prominent prospects including Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney and former Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Ridge.
"It turns out that the women of America aren't finished yet," she said, praising Clinton, "and we can shatter that glass ceiling once and for all."
Seizing on themes Obama has made trademarks of his candidacy, she added, "If you want change in Washington, if you hope for a better America, we're asking for your vote."
Democrats quickly pounced on Palin as inexperienced; noting that Republicans have argued Obama is not ready to be president.
"John McCain has made his candidacy about a single argument — experience — and Sarah Palin doesn't have it," Rep. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md., said in a statement.
McCain and his newly minted running mate were to make a midday appearance at a rally in swing-state Ohio and continue to rallies in Pennsylvania and Missouri in the run-up to the Republican National Convention, which starts Monday in St. Paul, Minn.
Polls show a tight race between Obama and McCain, with some two months before the election and three high-stakes debates. Neither contender can allow the other to jump out to a big post-convention lead.
Obama was flying to Pittsburgh, where he and running mate Joe Biden will kick off a bus tour of Pennsylvania, Ohio and Michigan. Their goal is to maintain the buzz of a convention that culminated Thursday night with Obama addressing an energetic, flag-waving crowd of 84,000 packed into Denver's pro football stadium.
"Change happens because the American people demand it — because they rise up and insist on new ideas and new leadership, a new politics for a new time," Obama told the adoring crowd at Invesco Field. "America, this is one of those moments."
In the jam-packed football stadium, Obama promised an end to eight years of "broken politics in Washington and the failed policies of George W. Bush" and argued that McCain "doesn't get it."
He pledged to cut taxes for nearly all working-class families, end the war in Iraq and break America's dependence on Mideast oil within a decade. Portraying a McCain administration as a continuation of the current Bush White House, Obama said, "On Nov. 4, we must stand up and say: 'Eight is enough.'"
Obama accepted his party's nomination on the 45th anniversary of Martin Luther King Jr.'s "I Have a Dream" speech. He alluded to the historic parallel — and its promise — toward the end of his 44-minute speech.
"What the people heard ... people of every creed and color, from every walk of life — is that in America, our destiny is inextricably linked. That together, our dreams can be one," Obama said.
In Ohio Friday, McCain and Palin both noted that he was choosing her as his vice presidential running mate the week of the 88th anniversary of women's suffrage.
Palin has a strong anti-abortion record, and her selection was praised warmly by social conservatives whose support McCain needs to prevail in the campaign for the White House.
"It's an absolutely brilliant choice," said Mathew Staver, dean of Liberty University School of Law. "This will absolutely energize McCain's campaign and energize conservatives."
Palin has five children, the youngest born in April with Down syndrome.
Read By Marguerite
http://Activeenglish.biz
English for Listening, Comprehension, Reading and Writing.
Created for the Hearing Impaired, and for those learning English
http://Activeenglishspeaking.com
I am providing a free Language experience for students and all people who wish to improve their English Speaking Skills so they can talk to people who speak English.
This is a selection of favorite poetry, prose, and articles for you to listen to and learn from, and also enjoy.
http://activeenglishspeaking.com
