Improve Your Communication Skills
Movie Making Camp for Girls – Camp Reel
Have you ever thought about the people who make movies? Did you know that less that 20% of the main decision making positions in the media are held by women? This obviously affects the way that women and girls are portrayed on screen.
With media platforms like YouTube or Vimeo, its easier to get friends together and write, direct, edit your own shows and distribute them for the world to see, but where do you start? How can you make a movie? One way is to take part in a Apple Camp – check the link to see if there is one in your area.
Once you have been making films for a while, you may want to learn more about how movies are made, and how to put them together. A new venture in California aims to help girls do this – on a one week camp.
Our contributor Annie May had a chat with Esther from Camp Reel to find out more.
Facebook For Kids – Good or Bad?
Do you use Facebook? While it is officially banned for under 13 years, a survey last year showed that almost half of Britain’s pre-teens have a Facebook account. Joanna Bradey tells us what she likes about Facebook.
Facebook: What’s it all about?
Facebook is a website created in 2004 by a US college student Mark Zuckerberg. It started off as a way of college students to network with each other, which quickly spread throughout the world, and now has millions of members. Facebook works by people registering and creating a profile for themselves, and then becoming ‘friends’ with other people. A user can update their status to let their friends know what they’re up to, upload photos to share, send private messages to each other, and play games. You need to be at least 13 years old to be a member, and Facebook is banned in some countries altogether, like Syria and Iran.
The thing that I like about Facebook is that it is a quick and easy way to keep in touch with all those people I have met in real-life but don’t have time to write to or call them, like old workmates or family that have moved away. I can upload a photo and anyone I am friends with can see it, and comment on it. In the days before Facebook, if I wanted to share a photo with everyone, I would have to print out lots of copies and send them in the post, which is very expensive and time-consuming. Since I joined Facebook, I am better at communicating with people and I enjoy seeing what all my friends and family are doing. I think that I know them better and it’s easy to keep-in-touch.
I Love You Natty – A Siblings Introduction to Down’s Syndrome
My name is Mia and I’m ten years old.
I’m the first person in my family to write a book. It’s called I Love You Natty and is about my younger sister who has Down’s syndrome. Natty is 7 and there isn’t anything particularly ‘special’ about her, but she does have an extra chromosome in every cell of her body, which looks like a jelly bean.
She needs some extra help sometimes, for example I learnt Makaton to talk with my hands with her. She used to have physio therapy and also had surgery on her heart when she was small. But we all need support sometimes don’t we?
Most of all Natty is just my little sister. I love that when she was small she would force herself to open her eyes to look at me because she recognised my voice. I love Natty and my life wouldn’t be the same without her.
I wrote this book with Mum so that other children could understand what Down’s syndrome means. I did lots of drawings and we chose lots of family photographs to go in the book too.
I hope you enjoy it. Natty does.
You can order I Love You Natty on Amazon or via your local bookstore
What is the Big Deal About Finding Richard III?
As skeleton found under a car park in Leicester has been identified as that of King Richard III, who ruled England from 1483 to 1485. Richard has been pictured as a tyrant king. There’s a story that Richard killed his own nephews, the legendary ‘princes in the tower’ in order to usurp the throne.
Nearly a century after Richard’s death, Shakespeare describes Richard as a ‘bottled spider’, a hunchback. Since Shakespeare’s time writers and artists through history have imagined Richard as a terrifying figure, whose physical disabilities are signs of his cruel inner nature.
Some historians argue that Shakespeare must have been writing propaganda to please his queen, Elizabeth I, whose grandfather Henry VII defeated Richard in battle. These historians argue that Richard’s ‘hunchback’ is an insult made up by Shakespeare, but until now, we haven’t been able to know what the truth is.
How to Clean Water
With poor living conditions and water shortages increasing every year across the world, the question of how to clean water efficiently is becoming ever more important.
Does Everyone Have Clean Water?
When you have clean, safe water available at the turn of a tap it’s very easy to take it for granted. But almost 750 million people don’t have access to clean water; that’s one person from every ten in the world’s population. There are many reasons for this, from poverty to poor management by governments.
But almost 750 million people don’t have access to clean water; that’s one person from every ten in the world’s population. There are many reasons for this, from poverty to poor management by governments.
There are many reasons for this, from poverty to poor management by governments.