Congratulations to the Middle School for winning the Green Cup Challenge!
We hope you choose something delicious for the special lunch prize!
Friday, March 11, 2011
The Ghosts of the Upper School
By Jack L., Brandon S., Maggie S., and Olivia S.
Unusual things have been happening recently within the Upper School. In Ms. Zamora’s room, mysterious sounds have been coming from the roof. We do not know for sure, but we think that there is a haunting going on. The other day, our sidekicks, Midge and Liver, noticed the lights flickering on Parents’ Day. We think that the ghosts are trying to hypnotize us and turn us into zombies, so that we will obey them and be their minions. The ghost is tampering with the clock and he is trying to make us stay at school longer. Many teachers helped us in our investigation, including Mr. Lilley, Mr. Giggi, Ms. Fri, Ms. Purcell, Mr. Delehaunty, and Mr. Fredo.
Mr. Lilley said it was probably the ghost of a past Latin teacher. He told us to go down and check out the old building. We are pretty sure that he was just trying to get us to leave him alone.
Then we went down to Mr. Giggi’s room. Mr. Giggi said that the lights had been flickering and that his printer was going crazy, printing things out that weren’t supposed to be printed. The light sensor wouldn’t go off till he was at his desk.
We then went over to Ms. Fri’s room. She said that there were no strange noises or occurrences, but there were strange people right in front of her. Despite this, she did say that things were disappearing from her room.
Then, we went over to Ms. Purcell’s room… Crazy things happen in this room every night. After school, she always hears noises from her room. Then Harry Potter flew by on his Firebolt. Aside from that, Alice Hudson has been shocked by lights. Ms. Purcell thinks that she is being watched by her dead animals, and they mingle in the middle of the night. She is pretty sure that there is a spirit in the science room. We are pretty sure that this spirit is a dementor, for dementors cannot be seen by muggles. Therefore, we decided that the Ghostbusters crew is a bunch of Squibs.
Our final stop was to Mr. Fredo’s room. We saw him out in the hallway and then we asked him “Have you noticed anything strange going on in the Upper School?”
He then replied, “The only strange things I’ve seen is you guys…”
“Too Much Caribbean Adventure”
Kate C.
Well, this was an amazing day. We woke up late, had an amazing brunch, and spent the entire day at the beach. Oh! And we found a sea turtle. It was a perfect day in the Caribbean. The only way to end it was to drive off a cliff. Wait, what?
Five years ago, my family took an amazing spring vacation in St. John. We had a big house, we went swimming, and we went hiking and did all those other cool Caribbean activities. But we also had our not-so-cool moments. One time we went on an Easter night hike to the top of the highest mountain in St. John and on the way down, all of our flashlights ran out of battery power and it was pitch black. My mom also fell on a cactus, but that was pretty funny. Not so funny for her, though. But the worst thing that happened was on the way to our beach house.
We were driving up the cliff that the house was on top of in our new rental jeep. My dad had to drive slowly because the cliff was extremely steep. The narrow, one lane dirt road was like a giant spiral staircase, and it was very scary to look out the window on the cliff side of the road. It wasn’t very pretty on the other side of the road either because there was a giant cliff wall there. Suddenly, my dad stopped. I was scared because, being seven, I thought we were going to roll back down the cliff. Then I rolled down my window and looked out in front of us. There was a giant cement truck blocking us! Now this doesn’t seem very bad, but the road was barely wide enough for one car, much less two.
All of a sudden, everyone started honking and screaming and yelling. My mom started yelling at my dad to back down the cliff and let the truck through, and my dad was yelling at her that if he tried to do that we would fall off the edge of the cliff. The truck driver was honking at us to do something, and my sisters were yelling at everyone to “shut up.” So by now, being the youngest, I was crying. This was because I hated to see people yelling and mad at each other and because most likely, whatever we did, we were going to die.
The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly: The New Egypt
By Alec B.
Cairo, Egypt - After 18 days of protest, President Hosni Mubarak decided to resign. The president, under fire because of economic failure and embezzlement of public funds, had created a dictatorship out of a democracy. After coming into power in 1981, he led his country through the good, the bad, and the ugly. He was the last of a long line of extended presidents. His predecessors had led the country to modernization. The opposition leader, Mohamed El Baradei, who led the UN search of WMD’s in Iraq, said, “it is a dream come true.” In an interview over the phone with Al Jazeera, he also said, "I can't tell you how every Egyptian feels today. We have been able to restore our humanity ... to be free and independent."
Mubarak resigned on Friday, February 11, leaving many happy. Tahrir Square, the home-base of the protest movement, was in absolute joy. “Jumping, joy, crying, happiness and other emotions were present,” said NBC foreign news correspondent Richard Engle. The end of an empire brings the dawn of a new one. The Supreme Council of Armed Forces confirmed the resignation and “is analyzing the situation of the country before choosing the next leader.” In the front running are defense minister Field Marshal Mohammed Hussein Tantawi and Mr. El Baradei.
The future of Egypt seems uncertain. There are several issues that must be considered. There are hopes that trade will come out of Egypt and turn the country back into a powerhouse. The issue of continuing friendship between Israel and Egypt is important. Also, the Muslim Brotherhood, sometimes called a terrorist group, has more power than before and it is possible, according to the Christian Science Monitor that “Israelis are increasingly concerned that (Mubarak’s) departure will empower the Islamist Muslim Brotherhood and threaten Israel’s longstanding peace treaty with Egypt.” “This is history in the making,” says NCCS’s own Mrs. Post. Only time will tell. For now, it seems all the Egyptians can do is dance in the street.
Letter From the Editors
Welcome to The Column. This is New Canaan Country School’s student newspaper, in case you’ve forgotten, because there hasn’t been a new issue since November. Well, finally we have a new issue and it’s right here in your hands and fantastic. You should read all the articles from our dedicated writers.
Wednesday, February 16, 2011
Sally: Grandma's Hairless Cat
By Matt P.
You may or may not have a cat as a pet, but you have most likely seen one. While you were at your grandma's house observing her hairless cat, did you take the time to look at the magic of how he or she drinks? A recent paper has gone into detail of the wonderful complexity of just exactly how cats go about drinking. After reading those first sentences, you may be wondering what I could possibly be talking about. In your mind, you've most likely thought that cats drink in a simple manner. They form a ladle with their tongue and scoop the liquid into their mouth. Wrong. The method I just described is used by dogs, but cats employ a completely different method. Cats, being the intelligent creatures they are, take advantage of the liquid's inertia. Inertia is the laziness of an object, in simple terms. Inertia is the unwillingness of an object to change unless it is manipulated by another force. In this case, we will make the liquid milk and the manipulator gravity. As your grandma's hairless cat stealthily approaches the milk filled bowl (while wearing kitten mittens), he prepares to take full advantage of the inertia of the milk. Your grandma's cat, henceforth known as Sally, dips her tongue, which is the same color as her fur (or lack thereof), into the milk. Almost as quickly as the tongue enters the milk, she pulls it, yanking the milk up into the air. For a split second, the inertia of the milk suspends it in the air, and in this moment, Sally surrounds the milk with her mouth and swallows it. After that split second of suspension, gravity, the manipulator, kicks in, snapping the milk back down into the bowl. Still thirsty, Sally repeats the complex and intricate process again until her thirst is quenched.
The intricacy of this seemingly simple process was discovered by a team of scientists led by Pedro Reis. The team went about observing this by using high speed cameras, as cats dip their tongues down into the liquid an astounding three and a half times per second. Even more astoundingly, when the tongue shoots back into the mouth, it moves at a speed of seventy-eight centimeters per second. When Reis first began the experiment, he and his team figured that the roughness of the cat's tongue would play a role; a prediction that was drastically wrong. In actuality, the tip of the tongue that penetrates the surface of the liquid is smooth, and the smoothness is actually very good for lapping up the milk or water. Throughout the research, Reis and his team found that the viscosity of the liquid, and least between the bounds of what a cat would logically drink, did not affect the process. Rather, the determining factors were the inertia and gravitational pull. One may think that this is an odd thing to research or that somebody must have done it before, but as Rebecca Z. German of Johns Hopkins School of Medicine says, "What we know about mammalian feeding is woefully incomplete."
Here are some videos, one of a cat lapping up milk in slo-mo, and the other of a simulator demonstrating the inertia of water.
FAST LAPS from Science News on Vimeo.
TONGUE SUBSTITUTE from Science News on Vimeo.
So now you know, and next time you see your grandma's hairless feline lapping up some milk, you can explain to all your friends what Sally is really doing.
Source:
http://www.sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/65379/title/Cats_drink_using_lap-and-gulp_trick
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-481062/Puss-Hood-Hairless-Sphynx-cat-keeps-warm.html
You may or may not have a cat as a pet, but you have most likely seen one. While you were at your grandma's house observing her hairless cat, did you take the time to look at the magic of how he or she drinks? A recent paper has gone into detail of the wonderful complexity of just exactly how cats go about drinking. After reading those first sentences, you may be wondering what I could possibly be talking about. In your mind, you've most likely thought that cats drink in a simple manner. They form a ladle with their tongue and scoop the liquid into their mouth. Wrong. The method I just described is used by dogs, but cats employ a completely different method. Cats, being the intelligent creatures they are, take advantage of the liquid's inertia. Inertia is the laziness of an object, in simple terms. Inertia is the unwillingness of an object to change unless it is manipulated by another force. In this case, we will make the liquid milk and the manipulator gravity. As your grandma's hairless cat stealthily approaches the milk filled bowl (while wearing kitten mittens), he prepares to take full advantage of the inertia of the milk. Your grandma's cat, henceforth known as Sally, dips her tongue, which is the same color as her fur (or lack thereof), into the milk. Almost as quickly as the tongue enters the milk, she pulls it, yanking the milk up into the air. For a split second, the inertia of the milk suspends it in the air, and in this moment, Sally surrounds the milk with her mouth and swallows it. After that split second of suspension, gravity, the manipulator, kicks in, snapping the milk back down into the bowl. Still thirsty, Sally repeats the complex and intricate process again until her thirst is quenched.
The intricacy of this seemingly simple process was discovered by a team of scientists led by Pedro Reis. The team went about observing this by using high speed cameras, as cats dip their tongues down into the liquid an astounding three and a half times per second. Even more astoundingly, when the tongue shoots back into the mouth, it moves at a speed of seventy-eight centimeters per second. When Reis first began the experiment, he and his team figured that the roughness of the cat's tongue would play a role; a prediction that was drastically wrong. In actuality, the tip of the tongue that penetrates the surface of the liquid is smooth, and the smoothness is actually very good for lapping up the milk or water. Throughout the research, Reis and his team found that the viscosity of the liquid, and least between the bounds of what a cat would logically drink, did not affect the process. Rather, the determining factors were the inertia and gravitational pull. One may think that this is an odd thing to research or that somebody must have done it before, but as Rebecca Z. German of Johns Hopkins School of Medicine says, "What we know about mammalian feeding is woefully incomplete."
Here are some videos, one of a cat lapping up milk in slo-mo, and the other of a simulator demonstrating the inertia of water.
FAST LAPS from Science News on Vimeo.
TONGUE SUBSTITUTE from Science News on Vimeo.
So now you know, and next time you see your grandma's hairless feline lapping up some milk, you can explain to all your friends what Sally is really doing.
Source:
http://www.sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/65379/title/Cats_drink_using_lap-and-gulp_trick
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-481062/Puss-Hood-Hairless-Sphynx-cat-keeps-warm.html
TIB: Christopher
By Shelby M.
I never really got to know my cousins until I was eight years old. That’s when
we moved to Connecticut from Washington D.C. and moved in down the street
from them. I had spent time with them over numerous holidays. However, I soon
got to know my cousins a lot better, particularly Christopher. I remember being
flabbergasted when I would see my ten-year old cousin watching Barney, clapping
his hands, and bouncing up and down like a four-year-old kid after drinking a Red
Bull. I didn’t understand why Christopher couldn’t ask for chicken fingers and would
instead grab them off some one else’s plate. He couldn’t talk; he could only groan. I
couldn’t understand why Christopher acted so differently than me.
Christopher has Down Syndrome and is autistic. He has trouble with things
that we take for granted. He can’t read, write, or talk. When I was younger, I would
pray to someone, anyone, that Christopher would get better. I would pray that he
would one day be able to say his brother’s name, tell his parents he loves them, or
thank them for everything they’ve done for him in his life and every day to come.
What’s worse than Christopher’s disability is the way that other people
perceive his inability. The easiest way to describe this is to reference a feeling I
know almost everyone in this room has felt. It’s the feeling of getting on an airplane
or any means of transportation, and seeing a baby in the seat behind you. For the
whole flight, you groan as you hear the baby wailing behind you, disrupting your
flight. However, as the flight lands, you play peekaboo with the cute little baby,
asking how old he/she is, forgetting about the disruption the baby created. I believe this is because once
the flight is over, we realize that the baby’s behavior wasn’t its fault.
This is similar to the feelings my family and I endure whenever we are out in
public with Christopher. We get the same glares and quizzical faces. However, they
never see Christopher as I do, or as my family does. They can’t see the look on my
Grandma’s face when he hugs her. They just hear his moans, and nothing else.
In order to really understand anything or anyone, we have to look beyond
the surface. When I was in the second grade, I met Julia. I wasn’t afraid to look at
her, while most people had the tendency to look away from her as soon as they
realized she was different. Julia was confined to a wheelchair and suffered from
brain seizures. I wasn’t afraid of her or her disability, because of Christopher. From
my experience with Christopher, I wasn’t afraid to go up to Julia during class and
talk to her, although she couldn’t respond. When most people see Julia, all they can
see is her disability. Looking beyond her disabilities, I was able to see her for her
abilities. For example, I was amazed to learn that Julia was taking piano lessons.
However, I don’t think most people can imagine a person as severely disabled as
Julia being able to play the piano. I know I didn’t. I learned to see Julia for what she
could do, not for what she couldn’t do.
During the Special Olympics last year and this year, I was greatly affected by
the athletes. The goal of the Special Olympics is to make the athletes feel like they can do anything and
can succeed with their disability. Through the sense of hope
and strength, the athletes were able to feel special. We gave them the opportunity to
be special. Everywhere else, they are looked upon as different. However, we were
able to make them feel special.
The feeling of belonging is probably one of the greatest feelings in the world.
It is the feeling that you have a place in the world, and that someone else cares
about you. When people are different than we are, it’s easy to look the other way
and treat them as if they are invisible. Even worse is to see them only for their
disability, to see them only for their faults. I believe everyone deserves to feel like
they belong. In order to do this, I believe we have to accept people for who they are.
Everyone has been touched by someone who has some kind of disability, whether it
is physical or mental. There is no reason to hide or be embarrassed by it, and we
should instead embrace it. This I believe; everyone has a place in the world, and we
are all on our way to finding it.
I never really got to know my cousins until I was eight years old. That’s when
we moved to Connecticut from Washington D.C. and moved in down the street
from them. I had spent time with them over numerous holidays. However, I soon
got to know my cousins a lot better, particularly Christopher. I remember being
flabbergasted when I would see my ten-year old cousin watching Barney, clapping
his hands, and bouncing up and down like a four-year-old kid after drinking a Red
Bull. I didn’t understand why Christopher couldn’t ask for chicken fingers and would
instead grab them off some one else’s plate. He couldn’t talk; he could only groan. I
couldn’t understand why Christopher acted so differently than me.
Christopher has Down Syndrome and is autistic. He has trouble with things
that we take for granted. He can’t read, write, or talk. When I was younger, I would
pray to someone, anyone, that Christopher would get better. I would pray that he
would one day be able to say his brother’s name, tell his parents he loves them, or
thank them for everything they’ve done for him in his life and every day to come.
What’s worse than Christopher’s disability is the way that other people
perceive his inability. The easiest way to describe this is to reference a feeling I
know almost everyone in this room has felt. It’s the feeling of getting on an airplane
or any means of transportation, and seeing a baby in the seat behind you. For the
whole flight, you groan as you hear the baby wailing behind you, disrupting your
flight. However, as the flight lands, you play peekaboo with the cute little baby,
asking how old he/she is, forgetting about the disruption the baby created. I believe this is because once
the flight is over, we realize that the baby’s behavior wasn’t its fault.
This is similar to the feelings my family and I endure whenever we are out in
public with Christopher. We get the same glares and quizzical faces. However, they
never see Christopher as I do, or as my family does. They can’t see the look on my
Grandma’s face when he hugs her. They just hear his moans, and nothing else.
In order to really understand anything or anyone, we have to look beyond
the surface. When I was in the second grade, I met Julia. I wasn’t afraid to look at
her, while most people had the tendency to look away from her as soon as they
realized she was different. Julia was confined to a wheelchair and suffered from
brain seizures. I wasn’t afraid of her or her disability, because of Christopher. From
my experience with Christopher, I wasn’t afraid to go up to Julia during class and
talk to her, although she couldn’t respond. When most people see Julia, all they can
see is her disability. Looking beyond her disabilities, I was able to see her for her
abilities. For example, I was amazed to learn that Julia was taking piano lessons.
However, I don’t think most people can imagine a person as severely disabled as
Julia being able to play the piano. I know I didn’t. I learned to see Julia for what she
could do, not for what she couldn’t do.
During the Special Olympics last year and this year, I was greatly affected by
the athletes. The goal of the Special Olympics is to make the athletes feel like they can do anything and
can succeed with their disability. Through the sense of hope
and strength, the athletes were able to feel special. We gave them the opportunity to
be special. Everywhere else, they are looked upon as different. However, we were
able to make them feel special.
The feeling of belonging is probably one of the greatest feelings in the world.
It is the feeling that you have a place in the world, and that someone else cares
about you. When people are different than we are, it’s easy to look the other way
and treat them as if they are invisible. Even worse is to see them only for their
disability, to see them only for their faults. I believe everyone deserves to feel like
they belong. In order to do this, I believe we have to accept people for who they are.
Everyone has been touched by someone who has some kind of disability, whether it
is physical or mental. There is no reason to hide or be embarrassed by it, and we
should instead embrace it. This I believe; everyone has a place in the world, and we
are all on our way to finding it.
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