Art & History

Early English – The Latin Alphabet

In our last post, we discovered the runic alphabet and the Futhorc, and now we are going to look at what came next. The Latin alphabet.

The Futhorc was gradually replaced by the Latin alphabet. However, it seems that the Latin alphabet was not perfectly suited to represent English, which contained sounds that did not exist in Latin, and so people adapted it with the addition of a few runes: thorn to represent ‘th’ and wynn to represent ‘w’, as well as a few adaptations in usage of the already existing Latin letters in order to make them better suited to representing English sounds.

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Home, Health & Style, Written By You

Make Up For Girls – Is It Necessary? Written By You

At school today I was talking to a friend and he was telling me about the random thoughts that he sometimes thinks about. One of the many philosophical thoughts that were swooping round in his crowded head was; ‘why do girls wear make-up and boys don’t?’
Then that got me thinking. Boys have every right to wear make-up just as much as girls have the right not to. Both genders try to make the best of their bodies by doing exercise, being healthy and wearing nice clothes as well as many other things.

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Sports

Stories from the Stables Part 2 – Topper. Ouch!

Our Stories from the Stables series from Carolyn Ward continues with a  flea-bitten grey with a shocking attitude.

 

Topper.  I swear that pony could scowl.

It was my week to ride him, and I had just hauled him all the way down to the outdoor school and stood him in the middle to check his girth and stirrups.  As I reached under to tighten up the girth he turned his head toward me and eyeballed me, then stepped over with his nearside foreleg; and stamped on my left foot.

I hissed a very rude word and frantically pushed him to move him off. My foot sunk into the woodchip surface with his heavy weight crushing it down.  By now he was still looking directly at me, so I started punching his shoulder to try and get him to step off.  Today’s teacher was a crosspatch I have no fond memories of; if she had found out about it I’d have been bawled out for having my foot in the wrong place or something.

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Art & History

Great Women You Should Know: Joan Whittington

You might know about the very important work the Red Cross does all over the world to help people in a crisis. Wherever there is war or natural disaster, their familiar symbol can be seen on flags above makeshift hospitals and parcels of emergency food supplies.
You probably know less, though, about the brave and generous individuals who dedicate their lives to the Red Cross. These people work tirelessly to help those in need and seek no recognition for what they do, but recently we came across the story of a real-life heroine that  more people need to know about.

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Art & History

Great Women You Should Know… Hedy Lamar

You probably do not know who the actor Hedy Lamarr was as her last film credit was in 1958. If you ask your parents they may have a vague recollection or at least know her name.
What they probably don’t realize is that she wasn’t only an actor. She was a philosopher and, most importantly this month as we remember the World Wars and the sacrifices made during those wars, she was an inventor. She and avant-garde composer George Antheil worked together to create the first broad-spectrum frequency hopping wireless communications.
“What on earth is that?”, you’re probably thinking!

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