No discussion on educational reform will be complete without looking into the educational philosophy espoused by John Dewey. The progressive education movement was led by John Dewey. Progressive education sought to revolutionize the way students learn from a traditional test-driven, textbook and rote learning-oriented system to an experiential and project-based mode of learning.His educational philosophy was well laid out in his book Experience and Education. He laid emphasis on a hands-on approach rooted in experience for nurturing and stimulating the curiosity of students. However, he was against a rigid or dogmatic adherence to one particular approach and felt an open approach incorporating the best practices of different approaches towards learning was the way forward. John Dewey voiced his concern that the extremes of progressive and child-centred education which focused on complete freedom could result in chaos and felt a flexible structured approach was important in experiential learning.John Dewey put forward a theory of experience to be incorporated into the educational approach that he envisioned. In his theory of experience, John Dewey defined two aspects necessary for imparting education in an experiential mode, namely continuity and interaction.Continuity takes into the account the importance of each prior experience affecting each new experience of a student or individual and shaping their perspectives and insights. John Dewey thus highlighted the importance of experiential learning building on a learner’s prior experience and knowledge and the importance of continuity in a learning experience.Interaction refers to the level of involvement of the learner to a particular learning experience which directly correlates with the prior experience of the learner and the learner’s own inner motivation, perceptions and goals.John Dewey’s philosophy on education also laid great emphasis on the psychological and social aspects of a student’s life that had a great impact on his/her experience. Traditional approaches on the other hand neglected this important factor that affected each experience of a student. He felt that the teacher needs to be a facilitator and guide who empathizes with the learner instead of an authoritarian figure who invokes fear in the minds of the learner. He felt that each new experience should arouse the curiosity of the student to develop new interests and broader perspectives and should enable the student to relate to his/her immediate surroundings.John Dewey’s philosophy of education thus envisioned a dream of education leading to an enhancement of social consciousness for the betterment of society.
Nutrition and Education – Three Secrets for a Lifetime of Success!
I’d like to begin by sharing with you a very interesting and inspiring fact about my children. One is twenty; the other is twenty one, and if you were to ask them right now what their favorite foods are you’d get the same answer they’ve given since they were in high school. Can you guess? They’d say their favorite foods are salads! Pretty impressive don’t you think? Interesting and unusual because that’s sure not the answer you’d get from most of their friends. They love fresh, organic and local fruits and veggies. They thrive on the eggs we get from a local farm. They’ve always eaten close to the earth and almost no boxed, canned or packaged foods. You might be thinking it’s much more expensive to eat this way and who but the wealthy can afford this way of eating especially in these times of recession. We’ll get to that, and you’ll be surprised at how your perception might shift when you hear some very cool facts.Our kids were home schooled for many years because we believed little kids naturally want to move, play, learn all day from the time they wake up till the time their little heads hit the pillow in a heap of joyful exhaustion. This felt more normal than having them ‘need’ to sit still, stop squirming, pay attention with their minds only, and learn academics only one way ~ at a desk, in a stuffy classroom where no fresh air was allowed in, and for hours and hours every day. There’s no judgment, just observation and opinion. They later chose to enter the public school system and there they stayed until high school graduation. They observed a change in their study habits, mid afternoon energy levels, and love of learning based on foods and drinks offered in the vending machines and cafeteria, and the way they were made to learn. Who better to understand the co relation between nutrition and education than our kids themselves! Listen and learn. It’s simple and easy if you allow your kids to guide you in these very important areas, especially from a very early age once you’ve chosen to introduce them to healthy choices and they don’t know any different. If you’re reading this and your kids are older, middle school or high school age, changes are still able to be made, and need to be made if they’re not feeling their best, operating on a full tank of energy, or calm and alert in their minds. It’ll just be a little trickier and you and they need to be more patient while the body adjusts slowly to healthier choices. Also for the mind to accept a better way is a more consistent way of perceiving food as medicine and medicine as food.You’ve heard all the data and evidence about healthy eating and the relationship between good nutrition and a focused mind. You’ve read articles, books and magazines about how our schools are feeding your kids nutrient deficient foods laden with hidden fats, sugars and chemicals. You know it’s not their fault that they may be overweight, more sedentary than ever before because of the time spent in front of electronics rather than playing outdoors. So let’s get to these secrets! They all have one thing in common: they appeal to the senses which makes it easy to eat right pretty much all the time!Secret Number 1: only stock your fridge and cupboards with healthy stuff!Keep the fridge full of color, so when everyone in your home opens the door their sense of sight is delighted! To see a bowl of apples, one of oranges, lemons, and berries is enticing. A small bowl you’ve filled with water and have cut up carrot and celery sticks is available for an immediate hunger burst. Healthy little baby bell and laughing cow cheeses, fun to unwrap and a low calorie nibble of protein satisfies quickly. Some other form of lean protein like chicken fingers you’ve made yourself from an easy recipe using a lean organic chicken breast cut into stirps, dipped in an egg wash, a whole wheat flour/parmesean cheese and panko breadcrumb mixture and lightly fried in canola oil offers another quick and easy nutritious gift for you and your family. (I’ve got many recipes coming soon on my website to help you with quick and simple healthy meals you can make once a week to have on hand).Fill a platter that has separate compartments or areas with various nuts and dried fruit ~keep it on the counter, again for a quick healthy snack, because in our society everything is wanted now and needs to be quick to satisfy ~ these suggestions pack a great nutritional punch for sustained energy releases and forget the bagged chips, creamy dips, frozen boxes of stuff with pink dipping sauces, and go for the good stuff that regulates emotions and keeps you and your loved ones in perfect health.As for drinks, considering the majority of the world is in water crises, we’re so fortunate and blessed to be able to turn on our taps and drink pure water ~ water is the most thirst quenching liquid you can drink, and is by far our family’s best choice. Sometimes a little juice we mix one quarter orange, grapefruit, pommegranete or other dark juice with three quarters water. Usually that’s with a salad, or on it’s own. Get an eco friendly cool looking little re usable water bottle for each member of the family and keep it filled with cool water in the fridge ~ kids love something of their very own and will find it an easy and fun responsibility to keep their bottle full of water! I plan on writing an article specifically on the amazing benefits of water so trust me, it’s the most wonderful choice you can offer your kids for bathing all their trillions of cells in a hydrated powerful way!This secret alone has the potential to create a lifelong love of preventative health through nutrition, and costs much less than lack of ease that develops in the body through poor food and drink choices; and resulting in sicknesses, illnesses and discomforts of all sorts.Lastly on secret number one is that you can go to a store like Trader Joes and pick up a bag or two of all these foods for an incredibly low price. Much less so than you’d think! Organic meats, chickens, and fish; fruits, berries, nuts, seeds, grains, legumes, tasty little treats like frozen mocha balls which kids find fun to eat and have far less sugar than other typical ice cream treats.Secret Number 2: Instill in your kids a love of learning! Education isn’t just experienced in a classroom, and home work a necessary addition to that. Encourage them to question everything. To ask after all the things they’re curious about, and to keep on being curious about anything and everything. It’s not always a popular way to be because most kids just follow what they’re told, and get along just fine. For a lifetime of success, defining success as a happy wholesome balanced self referred way to live through the ebbs and flow of life with grace, dignity and kindness, get your kids use to the love of learning about their inner and outer worlds. Do this by talking about their dreams together; by encouraging them to try things they’re interested in without forcing a commitment for lengthy periods of time; by adjusting and tweeking schedules to make room for the unusual; allow them to be kids and no matter what they’re living situations let them ask you about it, and answer simply, rather than saying something like, ‘because I said so’… watch and witness the joy in their eyes and let that inspire and inform your own life! Listen actively to them.Secret number 3: Go with the flow. Truly, let your life speak to you and follow your own passions either as a vocation or an avocation, because rather than following the crowd, or settling for less than, be brave and shift directions even slightly in order to allow for a life of more peace for yourself. Many circumstances are not in our control; life is tough sometimes, disappointing, rough to the emotional stability of our balanced personality; and sometimes the best made plans are thwarted through no fault of our own; sometimes we gain everything we desire; and sometimes we lose everything that makes us comfortable and secure. If you can be like the mighty oak, sturdy in your inner foundation and flow, bend and bow like the gentle willow tree you’ll be teaching your kids through action, to choose well. Eat healthily, and exercise even 20 minutes of dancing round the living room a day; keep on expanding and exploring your thoughts so you remain youthful and alive to life. What a great gift for your kids to witness and for them to emulate. Be a colorful shining example of what it’s like to creatively keep your home full of health giving foods. Continue to educate yourself on whatever pleases you, and even if you’re in a job you aren’t thrilled about, find the gifts in your daily grind ~ so you lift your vibration to draw a more pleasing better fitting job to you. The only constant in life is change, and if you can go with the flow you’ll create a lifetime of success within the hearts and minds of your kids!
Learning About Cash Loans
What are cash loans?Cash loan is another term used for pay day loans. These loans are short term and thus have a high interest rate. These loans are offered for those who seem to find themselves out of cash in the last days of the month due to unforeseen expenditures that they had to incur. The cash loan or the pay day loan allows the borrower to avail cash against the applied loan within twenty four hours of the approval of the loan which spares them from long waits. Also, when an applicant applies for a cash loan, the notification of approval is sent to them within a few hours of their application. This allows these applicants to make timely alternative arrangements.Cash loans are the perfect financial answer that allows borrowers to manage their money needs in a confidential and independent manner. Furthermore, all the money transactions through the pay day loans are managed online, which offers security and ease to the borrowers. However, people who use cash loans or pay day loans must keep in mind that these loans can end up in a debt trap and therefore, they should only borrow the amount that can be paid on time and without defaulting. In some of cases the late payment penalty fee can amount to three times the amount of the principal.What are the selection criteria for the candidates of cash advance loans?The selection criteria of pay day loans lending institutes may differ from one institution to another. This is the reason the applicants should make sure to read through the terms and conditions and the selection criterion information provided by these institutes. The main reason for this difference is that different cash loans offering institutes might be targeting a different market segment. However, some of the common cash loans selection criteria include:
Applicants/borrowers must be legal citizens
Applicants/borrowers must be equal to or more than eighteen years of age
Applicants/borrowers must be employed and/or have a regular source of income
Applicants/borrowers must have a bank account
Applicants/borrowers must not have a history of being ignorant to the repayment of such loans
Applicants/borrowers must have solid documents
It is important that applicants are completely honest when they are filling out the application forms for the cash loans. Every pay day loans offering company verifies the information provided by their applicants through their network of agencies. In cases where the provided information cannot be verified or is false, the applicants might have to face serious consequences.Can applicants with weak credit history apply?Even those individuals who who cannot borrow traditional loans because of their weak credit history can apply for pay day or cash loans without any hesitation. These individuals are offered bad credit loans against an additional fee.Benefits of cash advance loansPay day loans applicants who are vigilant when borrowing money from the pay day institutes can benefit in more than one way from these loans.1. No obligation of visiting the premises of the lending instituteSince the application forms for prepayments are uploaded on the websites of all reputable pay day loan companies, applicants do not have to visit the offices of these companies and can submit their requests online. Also once notified and approved, the money is transferred directly into the borrower’s account so they can directly withdraw the funds rather than having to collect the money from the company.2. No collateral requiredThe applicants of pay day loans are not required to provide collateral to these companies as their employment proof is the only collateral the cash loans companies seek.
Do Car Finance Companies Know That Buyers Want a Reliable Car?
Are you planning to buy a decent and a reliable car? Many of US are searching to buy a new or used car but need car credit loan, most of them would find two different options, 1. Nationalize Bank and 2. Car Finance Company. Before you begin, you need to make sure that auto loan lender or a finance company that you choose is professional and experienced; and understands your car requirements. In the present economic scenario, owning a car loan isn’t a difficult task, and moreover with lots of auto loan providers and multiplicity of options, low interest auto loan rates aren’t something which seems far from reality. Further, there’s intense competition among the auto loan providers, and this automatically adds to the advantage of borrower. But amidst all the positive environment that is available to auto loan borrower, it becomes quite necessary to mention here that auto loan lenders will not provide low interest auto or car loans, until they are not satisfied with your credit score.If you have a credit score of less than 640, then the conditions becomes sensitive for you, and in such a situation and lenders will think twice before passing your auto loan application for further processing. The most significant fact to know out here before the lender offers an auto loan is to check for credit score and also the past credit score rating. If you have impressive credit score, there’s nothing that needs to be done from your side, except filling the application and providing the proof of your credit report that will be attached with the loan application.Car finance rates are variable, and this variability depends upon the kind of auto loan that you are going to apply. Again the question of low interest rates comes into the picture if you are searching for the lenders who can offer you the desired interest rates. This will help you to make a choice from the line of luxury cars rather than unwillingly settle for the basic car models. In general, the loan term for the auto loan can be settled between 6-months to 5-years. If you are going for used car loan, the loan term will be automatically reduced. Last, make sure that the new car loan that you hire is easy to repay.Today due to many lenders in finance business the market of online car financing is highly viable. Individual will find wide range of financing options, but before you begin, consider all the auto financing options available to you. The most efficient way to avail the best auto financing options is to match the loan quote from multiple lenders. While comparing car loan quote be sure to look at the annual percentage rate (APR) and over-all cost of the entire loan. The whole cost includes amount borrowed, added to the deposit, interest paid and other charges.Before you jump on to any deal it is suggested that you approach toward professional and experienced auto finance company that will understands your requirements and desire to own a decent car, and also help you with find low interest auto finance. A specialized auto finance company will compare your credit history report and offer you the affordable interest rates for the new or used vehicle financing you needs. This will make you a car owner, without you actually worrying about financial scruples.
Networking Basics
A network is a group of computers, printers, and other devices that are connected together with cables. The sharing of data and resources. Information travels over the cables, allowing network users to exchange documents & data with each other, print to the same printers, and generally share any hardware or software that is connected to the network. Each computer, printer, or other peripheral device that is connected to the network is called a node. Networks can have tens, thousands, or even millions of nodes.Cabling:The two most popular types of network cabling are twisted-pair (also known as 10BaseT) and thin coax (also known as 10Base2). 10BaseT cabling looks like ordinary telephone wire, except that it has 8 wires inside instead of 4. Thin coax looks like the copper coaxial cabling that’s often used to connect a VCR to a TV set.Network Adapter:A network computer is connected to the network cabling with a network interface card, (also called a “NIC”, “nick”, or network adapter). Some NICs are installed inside of a computer: the PC is opened up and a network card is plugged directly into one of the computer’s internal expansion slots. 286, 386, and many 486 computers have 16-bit slots, so a 16-bit NIC is needed. Faster computers, like high-speed 486s and Pentiums, , often have 32-bit, or PCI slots. These PCs require 32-bit NICs to achieve the fastest networking speeds possible for speed-critical applications like desktop video, multimedia, publishing, and databases. And if a computer is going to be used with a Fast Ethernet network, it will need a network adapter that supports 100Mbps data speeds as well.HubsThe last piece of the networking puzzle is called a hub. A hub is a box that is used to gather groups of PCs together at a central location with 10BaseT cabling. If you’re networking a small group of computers together, you may be able to get by with a hub, some 10BaseT cables, and a handful of network adapters. Larger networks often use a thin coax “backbone” that connects a row of 10BaseT hubs together. Each hub, in turn, may connect a handful of computer together using 10BaseT cabling, which allows you to build networks of tens, hundreds, or thousands of nodes.
Like network cards, hubs are available in both standard (10Mbps) and Fast Ethernet (100Mbps) versions.LANs (Local Area Networks)A network is any collection of independent computers that communicate with one another over a shared network medium. LANs are networks usually confined to a geographic area, such as a single building or a college campus. LANs can be small, linking as few as three computers, but often link hundreds of computers used by thousands of people. The development of standard networking protocols and media has resulted in worldwide proliferation of LANs throughout business and educational organizations.WANs (Wide Area Networks)Often a network is located in multiple physical places. Wide area networking combines multiple LANs that are geographically separate. This is accomplished by connecting the different LANs using services such as dedicated leased phone lines, dial-up phone lines (both synchronous and asynchronous), satellite links, and data packet carrier services. Wide area networking can be as simple as a modem and remote access server for employees to dial into, or it can be as complex as hundreds of branch offices globally linked using special routing protocols and filters to minimize the expense of sending data sent over vast distances.InternetThe Internet is a system of linked networks that are worldwide in scope and facilitate data communication services such as remote login, file transfer, electronic mail, the World Wide Web and newsgroups.
With the meteoric rise in demand for connectivity, the Internet has become a communications highway for millions of users. The Internet was initially restricted to military and academic institutions, but now it is a full-fledged conduit for any and all forms of information and commerce. Internet websites now provide personal, educational, political and economic resources to every corner of the planet.IntranetWith the advancements made in browser-based software for the Internet, many private organizations are implementing intranets. An intranet is a private network utilizing Internet-type tools, but available only within that organization. For large organizations, an intranet provides an easy access mode to corporate information for employees.EthernetEthernet is the most popular physical layer LAN technology in use today. Other LAN types include Token Ring, Fast Ethernet, Fiber Distributed Data Interface (FDDI), Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM) and LocalTalk. Ethernet is popular because it strikes a good balance between speed, cost and ease of installation. These benefits, combined with wide acceptance in the computer marketplace and the ability to support virtually all popular network protocols, make Ethernet an ideal networking technology for most computer users today. The Institute for Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE) defines the Ethernet standard as IEEE Standard 802.3. This standard defines rules for configuring an Ethernet network as well as specifying how elements in an Ethernet network interact with one another. By adhering to the IEEE standard, network equipment and network protocols can communicate efficiently.ProtocolsNetwork protocols are standards that allow computers to communicate. A protocol defines how computers identify one another on a network, the form that the data should take in transit, and how this information is processed once it reaches its final destination. Protocols also define procedures for handling lost or damaged transmissions or “packets.” TCP/IP (for UNIX, Windows NT, Windows 95 and other platforms), IPX (for Novell NetWare), DECnet (for networking Digital Equipment Corp. computers), AppleTalk (for Macintosh computers), and NetBIOS/NetBEUI (for LAN Manager and Windows NT networks) are the main types of network protocols in use today.
Although each network protocol is different, they all share the same physical cabling. This common method of accessing the physical network allows multiple protocols to peacefully coexist over the network media, and allows the builder of a network to use common hardware for a variety of protocols. This concept is known as “protocol independence,” which means that devices that are compatible at the physical and data link layers allow the user to run many different protocols over the same medium.TopologiesA network topology is the geometric arrangement of nodes and cable links in a LAN, and is used in two general configurations: bus and star. These two topologies define how nodes are connected to one another. A node is an active device connected to the network, such as a computer or a printer. A node can also be a piece of networking equipment such as a hub, switch or a router. A bus topology consists of nodes linked together in a series with each node connected to a long cable or bus. Many nodes can tap into the bus and begin communication with all other nodes on that cable segment. A break anywhere in the cable will usually cause the entire segment to be inoperable until the break is repaired. Examples of bus topology include 10BASE2 and 10BASE5.
10BASE-T Ethernet and Fast Ethernet use a star topology, in which access is controlled by a central computer. Generally a computer is located at one end of the segment, and the other end is terminated in central location with a hub. Because UTP is often run in conjunction with telephone cabling, this central location can be a telephone closet or other area where it is convenient to connect the UTP segment to a backbone. The primary advantage of this type of network is reliability, for if one of these ‘point-to-point’ segments has a break, it will only affect the two nodes on that link. Other computer users on the network continue to operate as if that segment were nonexistent.Peer-to-Peer NetworksA peer-to-peer network allows two or more PCs to pool their resources together. Individual resources like disk drives, CD-ROM drives, and even printers are transformed into shared, collective resources that are accessible from every PC.Unlike client-server networks, where network information is stored on a centralized file server PC and made available to tens, hundreds, or thousands client PCs, the information stored across peer-to-peer networks is uniquely decentralized. Because peer-to-peer PCs have their own hard disk drives that are accessible by all computers, each PC acts as both a client (information requestor) and a server (information provider). A peer-to-peer network can be built with either 10BaseT cabling and a hub or with a thin coax backbone. 10BaseT is best for small workgroups of 16 or fewer users that don’t span long distances, or for workgroups that have one or more portable computers that may be disconnected from the network from time to time.After the networking hardware has been installed, a peer-to-peer network software package must be installed onto all of the PCs. Such a package allows information to be transferred back and forth between the PCs, hard disks, and other devices when users request it. Popular peer-to-peer NOS software includes
Most NOSs allow each peer-to-peer user to determine which resources will be available for use by other users. Specific hard & floppy disk drives, directories or files, printers, and other resources can be attached or detached from the network via software. When one user’s disk has been configured so that it is “sharable”, it will usually appear as a new drive to the other users. In other words, if user A has an A and C drive on his computer, and user B configures his entire C drive as sharable, user A will suddenly have an A, C, and D drive (user A’s D drive is actually user B’s C drive). Directories work in a similar fashion. If user A has an A & C drive, and user B configures his “C:WINDOWS” and “C:DOS” directories as sharable, user A may suddenly have an A, C, D, and E
drive (user A’s D is user B’s C:WINDOWS, and E is user B’s C:DOS). Did you get all of that?Because drives can be easily shared between peer-to-peer PCs, applications only need to be installed on one computer–not two or three. If users have one copy of Microsoft Word, for example, it can be installed on user A’s computer–and still used by user B.The advantages of peer-to-peer over client-server NOSs include:
· No need for a network administrator
· Network is fast/inexpensive to setup & maintain
· Each PC can make backup copies of its data to other PCs for security. By far the easiest type of network to build, peer-to-peer is perfect for both home and office use.Client-Server NetworksIn a client-server environment like Windows NT or Novell NetWare, files are stored on a centralized, high speed file server PC that is made available to client PCs. Network access speeds are usually faster than those found on peer-to-peer networks, which is reasonable given the vast numbers of clients that this architecture can support. Nearly all network services like printing and electronic mail are routed through the file server, which allows networking tasks to be tracked. Inefficient network segments can be reworked to make them faster, and users’ activities can be closely monitored. Public data and applications are stored on the file server, where they are run from client PCs’ locations, which makes upgrading software a simple task–network administrators can simply upgrade the applications stored on the file server, rather than having to physically upgrade each client PC.In the client-server diagram below, the client PCs are shown to be separate and subordinate to the file server. The clients’ primary applications and files are stored in a common location. File servers are often set up so that each user on the network has access to his or her “own” directory, along with a range of “public” directories where applications are stored. If the two clients below want to communicate with each other, they must go through the file server to do it. A message from one client to another is first sent to the file server, where it is then routed to its destination. With tens or hundreds of client PCs, a file server is the only way to manage the often complex and simultaneous operations that large networks require.Computer Networking is the very important and the crucial part of the Information Technology. Millions of the computers are networked together to form the Internet. Networking plays a important role in every kind of organization from small to medium sized, in Banks, Multinataional Companies, Stock Exchanges, Air Ports, Hospitals, Police Stations, Post Offices, Colleges, Universities, and even in home, in short networking plays an important role everywhere where computers are used. This article will be interesting for the students, network professionals and for the people who are interested in the computer networking