Group items tagged

As is evident, pre-K and control children started the pre-K year at virtually identical levels. The TNVPK children were substantially ahead of the control group children at the end of the pre-K year (age 5 in the graph). By the end of kindergarten (age 6 in the graph), the control children had caught up to the TNVPK children, and there were no longer significant differences between them on any achievement measures. The same result was obtained at the end of first grade using two composite achievement measures (the second created with the addition of two more WJIII subtests appropriate for the later grades). In second grade, however, the groups began to diverge with the TNVPK children scoring lower than the control children on most of the measures. The differences were significant on both achievement composite measures and on the math subtests. Differences favoring the control persisted through the end of third grade.

"The first and foremost explanation is the low pension age for urban women. The biggest public pension schemes set the formal retirement age at 50 for female workers and 55 for female "cadres" or managers, and 60 for men. However, there are different rules for people with special circumstances like disabilities and compliance is not perfect, so the age at which a woman becomes eligible for a public pension can be as early as 45 or as late as 60. According to the China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study 2011, 90% of current female pensioners completed the retirement process by 55. … The second explanation of low employment rate among older females is their adult children. First, (expected) financial transfers from children when one is old and frail reduce the need to accumulate a large stock of assets through working. About 60% of women in their 50s live with their children, and about 70% receive financial support from their non-coresident children in the last year. There is some evidence that the financial transfers from children respond to parental incomes. Thus, transfers from children have a wealth effect as well as an insurance effect, both of which have implications for parents' decisions on labour supply and saving."

"Primary school admission policies come in different phases. The highest priority is given to applicants with blood ties to a school (Phases 1 and 2A). The remaining places go to other applicants in Phases 2B and 2C, with priority given to those who live closest to the school. Without alumni or blood tie connections, the only way to get into an elite school is by moving close to the school. Liang and Warrier found that in order to move within one kilometer of a school ranked 50 places higher, a typical family has to pay a premium of 131,000 Singapore Dollars. This premium costs about 30% more than the average household income, massively pricing out households hoping to send their children to higher-ranked schools. Not only does one have to pay more to get into a 'good' school, Liang and Warrier also discover massive inequalities in Phase 1 and 2A admissions. Grouping housing prices by Clusters, they find that these better schools in more expensive neighborhoods already have a higher Take-Up Rate (TUR, which is the spaces taken up by the end of 2A). In schools like Nanyang Primary School, children of alumni, management, and staff take up 90% of available seats, severely reducing the enrollment chances of people with no connections to the school. This accentuates the privilege of elites in propping up the futures of their children, undermining meritocracy while marching steadily towards 'parentocracy'."

. In a recent interview for Vice magazine, Jan Guillou, one of Sweden's most well-known authors, referred to proponents of hen as "feminist activists who want to destroy our language." Other critics believe it can be psychologically and socially damaging, especially for children. Elise Claeson, a columnist and a former equality expert at the Swedish Confederation of Professions, has said that young children can become confused by the suggestion that there is a third, "in-between" gender at a time when their brains and bodies are developing. Adults should not interrupt children's discovery of their gender and sexuality, argues Claeson. She told the Swedish daily, Dagens Nyheter, that "gender ideologues" have managed to change the curriculum to establish that schools should actively counter gender roles.

What accounts for this unusual degree of independence? Not self-sufficiency, in fact, but "group reliance," according to Dwayne Dixon, a cultural anthropologist who wrote his doctoral dissertation on Japanese youth. "[Japanese] kids learn early on that, ideally, any member of the community can be called on to serve or help others," he says. This assumption is reinforced at school, where children take turns cleaning and serving lunch instead of relying on staff to perform such duties. This "distributes labor across various shoulders and rotates expectations, while also teaching everyone what it takes to clean a toilet, for instance," Dixon says. Taking responsibility for shared spaces means that children have pride of ownership and understand in a concrete way the consequences of making a mess, since they'll have to clean it up themselves. This ethic extends to public space more broadly (one reason Japanese streets are generally so clean). A child out in public knows he can rely on the group to help in an emergency.

This idea that we are powerless against a cultural tsunami - come on! Once late teenage hits, many parents learn the hard way about powerlessness, but not in the age range under discussion here. As the mother of an eight-year-old, I'm finding it easy to keep her away from padded bikinis, Nuts, internet porn, violent video games and sexy music videos. I did think The X Factor routines were too much for "little eyes", but it wasn't difficult to flick the channel over for a few minutes. It wasn't as if I was trapped, Dr Who-style, in a child-sexualised force field, unable to reach the TV remote. Indeed, as much as David Cameron seems to be enjoying waltzing around, looking all gung ho and "concerned father-ish", he must know that, without hands-on parental involvement, there is only so much the coalition can achieve. Popular culture does not exist to babysit our children. As always, parents have to step in where appropriate, too. So let's stop the sub-McCarthyist hysteria about child sexualisation and get some perspective - no one is going to steal your child's childhood, unless you let them. "Porn star" knickers for children are creepy, but they can't jump into underwear drawers all by themselves.

Of course, likening these situations to the birth of a child is an imperfect comparison. I don't pretend to have a bulletproof answer, nor would I arrogantly endeavor to suggest that a single solution could even come close to being applicable and realistic for all businesses and industries. What I'm asking, however, is that we start talking about parental leave as an issue we can solve together in a way that involves celebrating other employees' life choices as part of the solution. Let's make those who don't want children, have already had children or may not have children for many years feel like their lives outside the office matter, too.

"The solution is to focus less on women and more on elevating the value of care and expanding the roles and choices open to men. Electing and appointing more women to powerful roles remains essential. But focusing on women's advancement is biased toward tracking how many are rising to the top: the overall percentage at work, their average salaries, and how many become CEOs, senior managers, tenured professors, bankers, surgeons, law partners, parliamentarians, presidents, and ministers. A focus on care, by contrast, opens the door to the dual problem of too few women at the top and far too many at the bottom. American women hold less than 15% of executive-level positions in Fortune 500 companies and 62% of minimum-wage jobs. As a result, one in three adult women are living in or on the edge of poverty, with the picture especially bleak for single mothers, almost two-thirds of whom are working in dead-end, poorly compensated jobs without flexibility or benefits. What is common to both sets of women, and all the women in between, is that they are still charged with primary responsibility for caregiving - for children, parents, and other family members - in a system that devalues and provides little support for the care work they do. Although wealthy women can and do buy the care work of poorer women, many also choose to work part-time or flexibly to provide the stimulation and education their children need."

introducing your children to additional role models and sources of inspiration - your friends and co-workers, or so one should hope - is one of the best things you can do for them.  Most wealthy, famous, and well-educated parents under-invest in this activity.  The bottom line is that after some margin you stop influencing them, but they don't stop looking around for sources of influence.

The law recognises you as the father as far as making you pay is concerned but doesn't grant you the right to see and love that child.

The decision to fine the Christian B&B owners for refusing to let a gay couple stay represents "a tyrannous new morality which is every bit as oppressive as the old". Children "should be raised by a man and a woman." "Being a campaigning, ardent gay is no longer necessary." And, "Imagine the demons that could plague Elton John's little boy with his unconventional parentage." Who do you think said these things? The BNP? A bishop? Muslim fundamentalists? No. You're way off. These quotes come from some of Britain's most prominent gay commentators. There were uttered or written by, respectively, historian and TV presenter David Starkey, political blogger and radio host Iain Dale, Minister for International Development Alan Duncan MP and Daily Mail columnist Andrew Pierce.

"In the US, Project Prevention has been compared to the Nazis' eugenics programme, but Harris isn't bothered by her critics. "They are willing to call me Hitler, but what are they doing to help? Are they willing to adopt any of these children that they think should continue to be born? If they're not part of the solution, they're part of the problem. Everybody talks about the right of the woman - what about the rights of the children? They are the victims.""

"naturalism is a philosophy, not an objective truth. Badinter describes how ethological studies (such as those conducted by primatologist Sarah Hrdy) have been driven by an ideological conviction that females, across species, possess an innate "maternal instinct". The naturalist psychologist John Bowlby has tried to show that attachment behaviours in human mothers and children are instinctive and uniquely female. The field of ecology has provided the backdrop for widespread mistrust of infantile exposure to "unnatural" substances, such as epidurals in childbirth, immunisations and chemicals in baby bottles. But there are problems. First, this research has failed to produce a clear, incontrovertible picture of what, if anything, constitutes innate or "natural" mothering behaviour. Second, it is not a given that, because something is "natural", we should submit to or encourage it (the Enlightenment's achievements were founded on attempts to control and supersede nature). And, third, there is not much evidence that the behaviours celebrated by naturalists create healthier, happier children or parents. Even claims that breastfeeding boosts immunity in industrial nations or raises IQ are not on solid ground."

"Being a mother is not the most important job in the world. There, I said it. Nor is it the toughest job, despite what the 92% of people polled in Parents Magazine reckon. For any woman who uses that line, consider this: if this is meant to exalt motherhood, then why is the line always used to sell toilet cleaner? And if being a mother is that important, why aren't all the highly paid men with stellar careers not devoting their lives to raising children? After all, I never hear "being a father is the most important job in the world". The deification of mothers not only delegitimises the relationship fathers, neighbours, friends, grandparents, teachers and carers have with children, it also diminishes the immense worth and value of these relationships. How do gay dads feel about this line, I wonder? Or the single dads, stepdads or granddads? No matter how devoted and hard working you are, fellas, you'll always be second best."

"The biggest and most direct lesson of the Quebec initiative is that creating high-quality education programs at a large scale is difficult. Over the first 10 years of the program, the number of places for kids in high-standards preschools did increase dramatically. But even so, only half of Quebec children were served by such institutions. At the same time, it turns out that low-quality child care isn't just worse than high-quality child care. It's worse than no child care"

The authors also wanted to look at issues of morality by examining children's punitive nature when confronted with mean actions. The authors clearly interpret more mercy for the guilty as a higher level of morality. But that is an ethical, and not a scientific, question. Is it really more moral to avoid punishment no matter what the circumstances? Indeed, there is a balance between punishment and mercy that all of us must consider. Some tend to err on the side of punishment and some on the side of mercy, but almost all of us will punish and almost all of us will have mercy under the right conditions. Is it moral to punish a mass murderer with a $100 fine? Most of us would consider that an injustice. Is it moral to punish a traffic ticket with a ten-year jail sentence? Most of us would consider that unmerciful. We all draw that line between mercy and justice somewhere. It seems that the authors have determined that the proper place to draw the line is closer to the mercy side. They judge the kids closest to where they will draw the line as more moral. Since at least the lead author has identified himself as secular, it is not surprising that secular children are closer to that line than religious children.