Interesting facts about New Year’s Day!

January 1^st was established as the start of the new year by Julius Caesar in 46 b.c., but most of western Europe would not adopt January 1^st until Pope Gregory XIII reestablished it in 1582. England, a Protestant country, and her colonies in America would not officially recognize the date until 1752.

The ancient Babylonians began the practice of celebrating a new year. For them, it occurred on the first full moon after the spring equinox. For them, New Year’s was also coronation day, as they would crown a new king during this time. They also started the practice of New Year’s resolutions.

Many countries choose to celebrate New Year’s with symbolic food. Legumes, like the black-eyed peas popular in the southern US, symbolize coins and good fortune. Pork is considered lucky in countries like Cuba, Austria, Hungary, Portugal and other countries. Sweden and Norway eats rice pudding with an almond hidden inside. Whoever finds the almond is supposed to have a lucky year.

The crystal ball that is dropped in Times Square in New York City weighs over 12,000 pounds and is made up of 2,688 crystals and more than 32,000 LED lights. It’s grown from the 700-pound iron and wood ball used at the first celebration in 1907.

Other cities and towns drop items to celebrate the New Year. Dillsburg, Pennsylvania drops a pickle. Tallapoosa, Georgia drops a possum. Key West, Florida drops a giant conch shell.

“Auld Lang Syne” means “times gone by”. It was written by Scottish poet Robert Burns in 1788.

There are 49 million bubbles in a bottle of champagne. A quarter of the champagne consumed in the US is purchased between Christmas Day and New Year’s. The cork leaves the bottle at 50 mph.

The Tournament of Roses parade in Pasadena, California uses an estimated 18 million flowers to decorate more than 40 floats. It’s enough flowers to reach back and forth from New York to LA three times, if they were laid next to each other.

45 percent of Americans make New Year’s resolutions. More than half of those resolutions do not survive halfway through the year, with a quarter of them being abandoned in the first two weeks. 60% of those resolutions is to lose weight.

Teachers believe students who aren’t readers simply haven’t found the right thing to read yet.

There is one cliché that is particularly useful when describing students’ brains during Winter Break: use it or lose it. Most of them choose the latter.

Just like muscles, the brain atrophies if it’s only used to change the channel and text with friends. Here are some ideas to keep your child’s mind from draining away during the long winter holidays.

Take them to the library

For some parents, getting their kids to read is no trouble at all. For others, it’s a struggle. It’s also the best exercise a brain can get outside of school. So take them to the library and tell them that you aren’t leaving until they’ve picked something to read over break. Loosen the reins and see what they come up with. Veto only the most extreme cases (50 Shades of Grey, etc.). Teachers believe students who aren’t readers simply haven’t found the right thing to read yet.

Go exploring

Even busy working parents usually get a day off here and there during the holidays. Instead of sitting around the house on Christmas Eve or New Year’s Eve, organize a family exploration. Visit some unexplored tourist attractions nearby. Go for a walk in a park you haven’t been to before. If you need some help finding a trip, consult your local newspaper or travel sites, if your area is big enough.

Let them be creative

This works great in conjunction with the previous idea. Even kids that are not artistic love playing with cameras (or their cameraphones) these days. Set them up with a Flickr or Shutterfly account and let them run wild in a place they haven’t been before. Even if what they come up with isn’t what you would consider art, they will have fun trying to recreate what they think artists and photographers do. And books or prints of their work make great presents for family members (or the kids themselves).

Give them a project

Do you have a project around the house that you’ve been meaning to get to, but haven’t been able? You would be amazed at what kids are capable of if someone just shows a little faith and patience in them. We’re looking for something just outside their comfort zone, because inside their comfort zone will probably be labeled a chore. It can be as simple as a project from Pinterest or as complex as repainting a room. Let them make all of the relevant decisions to generate buy-in, but supervise to make sure everyone is being safe.

It’s not enough for your child to know what happens in a book. They need to answer critical questions about the book.

Few can argue against the Common Core State Standards being one of the most disruptive changes to the American educational system in modern times. They are reshaping nearly every facet of how our students learn, and in a relatively short period of time.

But how does that reshaping look on the ground level? If you walk into a classroom today that is operating in the spirit of the Common Core, what would be different from the classrooms in which you were taught?

The pacing

The first thing that strikes outsiders about the Common Core is that children are learning certain skills much earlier than we did as students, particularly in math. For example, kindergarteners are now touching on subtraction, a skill that traditionally came late in the 1st students to be prepared to take more advanced subjects in high school, making them more marketable on the global stage.

The collaboration

Although so-called “group work” has been popular in classrooms since the 80’s, the Common Core calls for more varied forms of collaboration that better mimic the work students will be asked to do in the world of college and career. There is a lot of “Think-Pair-Share” and project-based units where students are working toward a common goal, trying to circumvent the classic downfall of traditional group work—one person getting stuck with all the work. In today’s classroom, students are working together just as much, sometimes more, than they work individually.

The higher-order thinking

Perhaps the key goal in writing the Common Core standards was the elimination of rote memorization as a sign of education success. Knowing your multiplication facts faster than anyone else in class is a great trick, but can you use those facts to solve real-world problems? In today’s classroom, students are asked to fill in the blanks more often, to apply their knowledge in creative and critical ways. In English, for example, knowing what happens in chapter 4 of Tom Sawyer isn’t good enough. A question more likely to be discussed is “What would Tom have done if one of his friends died on the river raft?”

The real-world application

Along with the elimination of rote memorization comes less reliance on non-interactive learning content. To be fair, there are still the teachers that bind themselves to the grade year. The architects of the standards say that faster pacing leads textbook and perhaps there always will be, but a teacher operating under the true spirit of the Common Core will provide many opportunities for their students to interact with the skills and knowledge they are acquiring in class. The call is for students to get real-world, hands-on practice while they are still in school. In units and subjects where that isnot possible, digital content is seeking to fill the gap.

 The Next Level

Is this picture truly becoming part of the norm in the classroom or, at your school, is it more of an ideal? Educate us in the comments below. If you thought this article brought up some valuable points, please share it among your social networks using the buttons.

And if you feel a child you know needs a little more help preparing for this rigorous new curriculum, please find out more about Athena’s services and how they can help you using this link.

We are excited to be having a holiday giveaway for an iPad Mini. You can follow the link below to enter. This contest is open to all Monmouth County, NJ residents 18 years and older. Good Luck!

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