Parents may find it difficult to get their kids to put down electronic devices so they can help with the dishes or take out the trash.
Good news! Now there’s an app for that.
A new generation of chore apps, designed primarily for the under-12 set, aims to turn kids into bed makers, laundry folders and toy picker-uppers by offering rewards ranging from funny collectible monsters to redeemable digital coins.
Researchers in Sweden studied the heart rates of choir members as they joined their voices together in song. Their findings, published this week in Frontiers in Neuroscience, confirm that heart rates become synchronized while the music produces calming effects.
When the choir began to sing — and exhale — in unison, the heart rates slowed down and became entrained, first appearing on the monitor as individual jagged lines, then quickly transforming to fairly uniform waves.
As Congress evaluates the Obama administration’s plans for universal preschool, several states are already inching toward that goal.
Alabama Gov. Robert Bentley announced last month 93 grants totaling $7.26 million to boost access to pre-kindergarten programs. Michigan and Minnesota lawmakers did the same to help students from low-income families attend pre-kindergarten.
(READ the story from the USA Today)
A Puerto Rican design student at London’s Royal College of Art has created a customized bicycle that grinds discarded plastic containers at one end and spits out a colorful plastic ribbon at the other end, useful for weaving into chairs, baskets or pop art. (See photo here)
Victor Monserrate has placed the plans for his simple machine online and says the recycler, designed with the developing world in mind, can be made out of old bicycle and toaster parts.
Another young designer, this time from New Zealand, was inspired to use scrap pieces of woolen carpet along with a biodegradable resin to create, among other things, an attractive hardshell suitcase that will naturally biodegrade in about 3 years if discarded.
The James Dyson Foundation is funding production for Dan Mclaughlin‘s ideas.
Finally, the BBC video below highlights an Italian designer’s modern foldable lamps, called “IN-EI”, which look like origami paper but are actually made from recycled bottles. The way they collapse into a flat shape no bigger than a magazine will help reduce shipping costs and CO2 emissions.
(WATCH the wonderful video featuring these three designers – made by Dougal Shaw for the BBC)
After the truck he was working on fell off the jack, Adam Simmons, a Plymouth, Mass., resident, was caught under the vehicle.
Simmons’ 22-year-old daughter, Rachael, heard the screaming and performed an incredible feat, lifting the SUV to help rescue her father.
People living in crowded urban centers will be interested in a remarkable window invented by South Korean researchers. By exploiting some exotic acoustic techniques, the window lets the fresh air flow in while keeping unwanted noise out.
The simple design comes from Sang-Hoon Kima at the Mokpo National Maritime University in South Korea and Seong-Hyun Lee at the Korea Institute of Machinery and Materials, have achieved.
In 2011, a homeless man who was sleeping in his car, had the medical problems of an old man, though he was only 40.
That year, he visited the emergency room in Portland 15 times — and was admitted to the hospital 11 times.
As part of the nation’s health care overhaul, Oregon has been given permission to conduct its own experiments.
You may have heard that frogs are in trouble, with about a third of the world’s species currently threatened by a disease called chytrid fungus. But you might not know that you can easily help.
FrogWatch USA helps scientists collect data by using volunteers to count these amphibians. You can do it even if you live in a big city, and kids can participate too.
The problems began in the 1980’s and were so widespread that researchers realized they’d need a lot of data — and there weren’t enough scientists to go around. That’s why the FrogWatch program was started. “It was recognized that having lots of different people out there collecting data… would really make a difference,” says Rachel Gauza, FrogWatch USA national coordinator at the Association of Zoos & Aquariums.
400 volunteers on the Caribbean island of Bonair ensure that each year the endangered loggerhead sea turtles hatching on the beaches make it safely to the waves.
In one location two year ago the babies were all killed after they walked the wrong way. Airport lights, which resembled the moon’s reflection in the ocean, confused the hatchlings — bright light being the telltale symbol for home in their migratory animal GPS.
So this year, on July 1, volunteers surrounded the babies on three sides, blocking any light except the bright ocean view, which drew them safely home.
This photo comes from the group, Sea Turtle Conservation Bonair, via ABC News.
(READ more from ABC News)
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Late Monday night, Sports Illustrated writer Richard Deitsch tweeted, “How many of you have a photograph of the single best moment of your life? If so, what a gift.”
A flood of people tweeted back at him with photos of them at their happiest.
The Mashable editors compiled their 30 favorite responses and snapshots saying they had elicited a few tears of joy even in newsroom.
It took twenty-three hours of constant paddling over sometimes rough waves for a youthful trio to make it across Lake Michigan from Wisconsin to Michigan.
The two brothers and female friend, ages 19-23 took turns paddling through the night, with the other two riding in the 40-foot support boat that tailed them for the 80-mile journey.
After trying to fetch a big stick, the Boston Terrier was suddenly at the bottom of the clear lake, motionless, breathless and lifeless.
Pastor Randy Passons had been trained as an emergency medical technician 20 years ago and had heard of people giving cardio-pulmonary resuscitation to animals.
“So I did chest compressions,” said Passons, the Bigfork pastor who also credits divine intervention.
The speed of the evacuation of Asiana Flight 214 suggested to observers a textbook example of how to get more than 300 people off a plane after a crash and before it burns.
Cabin Manager Lee Yoon-hye who was “apparently the last person to leave the burning plane,” was called a hero by one business passenger.
“This tiny, little girl was carrying people piggyback, running everywhere, with tears running down her face. She was crying, but she was still so calm and helping people.”
(READ the Telegraph story)
Thanks to social media’s love of science fair winners, we are hearing more stories these days about teenagers inventing marvelous machines and making scientific breakthroughs. President Obama loves these stories too. He hosted the first ever White House science fair in 2010 and posted a video with highlights.
Even in the realm of cancer research, teens have displayed their brilliance. A 15-year-old Maryland teen, Jack Andraka, won the top prize at the 2012 Intel Science Fair for his new and simple dip-stick method to detect pancreatic, lung and ovarian cancer, which is 90% accurate and 28 times less expensive.
Oliver Sacks wrote in the New York Times, “My father, who lived to 94, often said that the 80s had been one of the most enjoyable decades of his life. He felt, as I begin to feel, not a shrinking but an enlargement of mental life and perspective.”
“Eighty! I can hardly believe it.”
His 80th birthday is today, but he still feels like the youngest guy in the room.
Solar Impulse has had a long journey since May 3, when the manned plane began its first flight across the U.S., flying day and night without a single drop of fuel.
At 11:09 p.m. local time Saturday, Solar Impulse safely touched down in New York City, bringing its journey to a close.
But the adventure, which started as an idea in Switzerland, continues to inspire the world. Next up, a circumnavigation of the globe.
As a foster child, Brittney finished her freshman year with a 0.00 GPA and just didn’t care. And yet four years later she is graduating from Novato High School, with honors, and going to college.
What changed? She got the right foster parents — Roy and Claudia Asprer.
Only about a 3 percent of foster kids go to college. But your odds improve dramatically if you’re one of the 90 lucky children who have been nurtured and guided by Claudia and Roy.
One of the world’s largest offshore wind farms has been opened by Prime Minister David Cameron off the east Kent coast.
The London Array has been built in the Thames Estuary – 10 miles north of Ramsgate.
Its backers say the 175 turbines will produce enough electricity to power nearly 500,000 homes.
The Sacramento Food Bank used to hand out bags of processed foods, carbohydrate-laden government commodities and day-old breads and sweets.
One day five years ago, then-new CEO Blake Young had an epiphany: “I kept seeing people coming through the line and they were getting fatter and fatter. I realized we were killing them.”
So Young set about to remake how food banks operate, especially ones that are situated in California’s rich agricultural heartland.
From the lawns of Wimbledon to the lochs of Scotland, all of Britain can celebrate.
Andy Murray made it possible Sunday, winning his country’s hallowed tennis tournament to become the first British man in 77 years to raise the trophy at the All England Club.
Yes, this was history, and Murray’s hard-fought 6-4, 7-5, 6-4 victory over top-seeded Novak Djokovic was a fitting close to nearly eight decades of British frustration in its own backyard.
