KEUNFAST worldwide

Brazilian schools have it all for students — except accreditation

By JUN HONGO

Staff writer

KAMISATO, Saitama Pref. — Toshio Saito’s school for Japanese-Brazilian children in Kamisato, Saitama Prefecture, is equipped with a computer room, wall-size projection screens to aid lecturers and an 80 million yen gym with indoor soccer field and two basketball courts.

Toshio Saito, founder of Instituto Educacional TS Recreacao, stands inside his 80 million yen school gym in Kamisato, Saitama Prefecture. JUN HONGO PHOTO

But lacking state accreditation as an educational institution, none of its 150 students can get student discounts for commuter passes, let alone be recognized as having received an elementary and junior high school education upon graduation.

None of the five ninth-graders at the school was eligible to take public high school entrance exams given this month.

“I can’t tell if we are a (proper) school or just a private cram school. I don’t know what we are,” said Saito, a second-generation Japanese-Brazilian.

A change in immigration policy in 1990 enabled second- and third-generation Japanese-Brazilians to obtain long-term resident visas to work in Japan. That led to an influx of Japanese-Brazilian workers and the population of children accompanying their parents and those born in Japan increased accordingly.

(more…)

19-02-2007 (UNESCO)

“Education uses less than a quarter of all languages” states UNESCO’s Director-General on the occasion of International Mother Language Day.

He is therefore launching an appeal for national and regional language strategies to be promoted so as to build a harmonious environment for all the world’s languages. Over half of them are otherwise doomed to extinction. 

Contact: n.andriamiseza@unesco.org 

Read the UNESCO Director General’s statement in full

Programme of activities at UNESCO headquarters

International Mother Language Day web page

 Article Date: 19 Feb 2007 – 0:00 PST

A number of scientific studies suggest that some types of cocoa contain substances that could enhance blood flow in the brain and improve brain function.An international panel of scientists presented their findings yesterday at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS).

The session was titled “The Neurobiology of Chocolate: A Mind- Altering Experience?” It was sponsored by Mars Incorporated. The company has been sponsoring research on the nutritional and medical potential of cocoa’s naturally occurring flavanols for the last 15 years. The scientists suggested that a special cocoa could be made to retain the naturally occurring compounds known as flavanols to help keep the brain healthy and to prevent cognitive decline and dementia.

The Chief Science Officer at Mars Inc, Dr Harold H. Schmitz, said that many laboratories are coming to the same conclusion about flavanol-rich cocoa and its beneficial effects on health. He said the discoveries suggest that products containing “this cocoa could be developed to help maintain healthy brain function throughout several life stages. More research examining the potential of this cocoa in this important area of public health need is clearly warranted.”

The scientists reported several studies where the flow of blood to the brain was observed in different groups of people after consuming a specially prepared cocoa rich in flavanol. The drink was supplied by Mars Inc.

Dr Ian Macdonald of the UK’s Nottingham Medical School looked at changes in regional brain blood flow in participants who drank the flavanol-rich cocoa. He suggested that cocoa flavanols could be used to treate vascular impairments in the brain.

He said the study showed “that acute consumption of this particular flavanol-rich cocoa beverage was associated with increased blood flow to grey matter for 2 to 3 hours.”

Dr Macdonald added that the food components like cocoa flavanols could be used to increase blood flow in the brain and enhance “brain function among older adults or for others in situations where they may be cognitively impaired, such as fatigue or sleep deprivation.”

Another scientist from Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, US, Dr Norman K. Hollenberg, presented the results of his work with the Kuna Indians of Panama. The Kuna drink a type of cocoa rich in flavanols on a daily basis and have unusually low blood pressure and rates of cardiovascular disease.

The study is published in the International Journal of Medical Sciences.

Dr Hollenberg and colleagues used death certificates from 2000 to 2004 to compare cause of death between the Kuna who live on the San Blas islands and those who live on mainland Panama. The Kuna who live on mainland Panama do not drink the flavanol-rich cocoa.

There were 77,375 deaths in mainland Panama and 558 on the islands. Only Kuna live on the San Blas islands.

They found that the island-dwelling Kuna had much lower rates of death due to diseases that cause death in much of the world. For instance on mainland Panama the rate of cardiovasculat disease (the leading cause of death) was 83.4 plus or minus 0.70 age-adjusted deaths per 100,000, compared to 9.2 plus or minus 3.1 for the San Blas dwellers.

The rates for cancer on the mainland was 68.4 plus or minus 1.6 compared with 4.4 plus or minus 4.4 on the islands. Similar contrasts were found for diabetes mellitus. Dr Hollenberg and colleagues concluded that the comparatively lower risk of death from these causes among the Kuna in the San Blas “possibly reflects a very high flavanol intake”. But they also stressed that there “are many risk factors and an observational study cannot provide definitive evidence.”

The panel of scientists suggested that these various independent observations of the effect on the blood vessels of drinking flavanol rich foods could be because of the increase in circulating nitric oxide, which helps the circulation by dilating blood vessels and keeping them pliable.

Dr Hollenberg also got healthy volunteers who were over 50 to drink flavanol-rich cocoa. He noticed a “striking blood flow response” emerging over several weeks.

“Since this cocoa preparation is so well tolerated, it raises hope that the brain blood flow response it stimulates can result in maintenance of healthy brain function and cognition, which is an issue that unfortunately plagues many older adults today,” said Dr Hollenberg.

Most commercially available cocoa is low in flavanol because it imparts a bitter taste. That is why a special flavanol-rich version was used in the tests. Mars Inc are starting to market flavanol-rich versions of chocolate bars and cocoa. Other producers are also following suit.

Another scientist, Dr Henriette van Praag of the Salk Institute for Biological Studies reported on a study of the effect of a particular flavanol, Epichatechin, in mice. She said the compound influenced the hippocampus, a gland in the brain that affects memory.

When the flavanol was added to their food, she said the mice demonstrated improved skill in solving and remembering a maze compared to mice who did not consume the compound.

“Does Flavanol Intake Influence Mortality from Nitric Oxide-Dependent Processes? Ischemic Heart Disease, Stroke, Diabetes Mellitus, and Cancer in Panama.”
Vicente Bayard, Fermina Chamorro, Jorge Motta, Norman K. Hollenberg
Int. J. Med. Sci. 2007, 4: 53-58

Click here for Abstract.

Click here for more information on Chocolate and Health (Mars Inc).

Written by: Catharine Paddock
Writer: Medical News Today

While Specific Praise Can Be Good, Too Much Praise Can Bring Down Kids’ Performance

Feb. 15, 2007 —

“Wow, you got an A without even studying.”
“Your drawing is wonderful — you’re my little Picasso.”
“Keep it up and you’ll be the next Peyton Manning.”

If you’re like most parents, you offer praise to your children believing it is the key to their success — those flattering words can boost a child’s self-esteem and performance. But according to a new study, praise may do more harm than good. For the study, researchers divided 128 fifth-graders into groups and gave them a simple IQ test. One group was told it did really well and must be very smart. The other group was told it did really well and must have worked hard. One group was praised for intelligence, the other for effort. Asked if they wanted to take a slightly harder test, the kids praised for their intelligence were reluctant. Of those praised for their effort, however, 90 percent were eager for a more challenging task. And on a final test the effort group performed significantly better than the group praised for its intelligence. Many of the kids who had been labeled “smart” performed worst of all. The “hard workers” got the message that they could improve their scores by trying harder, but the “smart” kids believed they should do well without any effort. Source: ABCnews 

“Contrary to popular belief, praising children’s intelligence did not give them confidence and did not make them learn better,” said Carol Dweck, a professor of developmental psychology at Stanford University and author of “Mindset: The New Psychology of Success.”

Her surprising research, which she has repeated with hundreds of kids from all socioeconomic backgrounds, was published recently in the journal Child Development.

Dweck found that children’s performance worsens if they always hear how smart they are. Kids who get too much praise are less likely to take risks, are highly sensitive to failure and are more likely to give up when faced with a challenge.

“Parents should take away the fact that they are not giving their children a gift when they tell them how brilliant and talented they are,” Dweck says. “They are making them believe they are valued only for being intelligent, and it makes them not want to learn.”

When parents, teachers and coaches label a child, they tell the child that he or she is the label and is judged for this label, not for his actual capabilities. The child becomes risk-averse and doesn’t want to chance messing up and being labeled “dumb.” In other words, a “smart” child often believes that expending effort is something only “dumb” kids have to do.

Be Specific About Praise and Don’t Be Afraid to Withhold It

The key is to be specific about the praise you give. “Parents should praise children for their effort, their concentration, their strategies,” Dweck said.

For instance, next time your son gets an A on an exam for which you know he hardly studied, tell him you think he should try a tougher class next semester. When he scores the winning touchdown, instead of telling him he’s the best player on the team, ask him how he trained to run so fast.

The flip side is that parents must be honest when their children do not perform as well as their peers. If your daughter finishes last at the track meet, and you know it is because she’s younger and less experienced than other competitors, it is better to tell her that she did not deserve to win because she still needs improvement than to tell her you thought she was the best, no matter what the judges said.

But it’s hard to refrain from telling children how smart or perfect they are.

“We believe that by telling them they’re smart, they’ll believe they’re smart, and if they believe they’re smart, they’ll attack their schoolwork with confidence,” said Po Bronson, a father of two who wrote the cover story in the current issue of New York Magazine, “How Not to Talk to Your Kids: The Inverse Power of Praise.” Writing the article forced Bronson to re-evaluate his own parenting techniques after learning of Dweck’s research.

“I was frightened of this idea that telling a child that they’re smart makes them think that effort is only for dummies, and if you’re smart you shouldn’t have to rely on effort,” Bronson said.

It has not been easy, but Bronson and his wife have changed their ways.

“I have found that I just need to be honest,” Bronson said. “Being honest is going to serve us better in the long run.”

Source: ABCnews