We should be concerning ourselves with problems like drought, wildfires, floods, melting glaciers and polar icecaps, looking for a way to work together effectively to save the planet for generations to come. Instead we seem to be finding new and interesting ways of killing people - exploding pagers and communication devices and even possibly solar panels, regardless of who might be around when these things explode - and diverting attention away from other major problems.
Here’s Michael Rosen’s King and his Tutor:
'I've thought of a secret weapon, sir,' said the King's tutor to the KIng.
'O yes?' said the King, 'that sounds good. What is it?'
'We put poison in the bread,' said the tutor, 'and the enemy soldiers will eat it.'
'Sounds good,' said the King, 'though I've got a little bit of concern.'
'Really?' said the tutor, 'what's that?'
'How do we know that the bread will only get eaten by soldiers?' said the King.
'I don't think that matters,' said the tutor.
'Doesn't it?' said the King.
'Well, put it this way,' said the tutor, 'it will be eaten by soldiers because the bread goes to where the soldiers live.'
'Yes, I know that,' said the King, 'but there are other people living where the soldiers live.'
'Yes,' said the tutor, 'these things do happen.'
'Well what do we do then?' said the King.
'First of all we say these other people didn't die,' said the tutor, 'then we say, that if these other people died, we're sorry, but we're fighting for our survival here, and then we say, that it's the enemy soldiers' fault.'
'That seems to deal with most of the criticism we're likely to get,' said the King.
'Yes,' said the tutor, 'it's important that we know how to handle these things.'
We should be seeking ways work together to provide safe places for everyone to live without persecution. Instead we have politicians stirring up hatred against immigrants. It seems it was vice-presidential candidate J.D. Vance who started the story on social media about Haitian immigrants in Springfield, Ohio, eating pets. When it was fact checked he could have deleted the post but did not do so. And, lo and behold, his presidential candidate quoted it as gospel truth.
Here’s an interesting fact:
“As the Wall Street Journal reporters explored the original rumor about pets in Springfield, a Vance spokesperson came up with a police report in which a resident had claimed her pet might have been taken by her Haitian neighbors.
But when a reporter checked it out by going to Anna Kilgore’s house, she told him that her cat, Miss Sassy, had returned a few days after having gone missing.
Imagine that: not stolen, not eaten, Miss Sassy was found safe – in Kilgore’s own basement.
Afterwards, with the help of a translation app, Kilgore did the right thing: she apologized to her Haitian neighbor. That apology was a touch of human decency amid the ugliness.”
Meanwhile, Nigel Farage, the Reform UK leader, has said that Donald Trump’s claim about immigrants in Ohio eating pet cats and dogs – widely seen as one of the ex-president’s more ludicrous falsehoods – will turn out to be true.
That’s the difference between ordinary folk and attention seeking politicians.
A friend and I were arranging to meet for lunch and at the same time exchanging congratulatory messages about how our grandchildren are fortunate to have their birthdays in the early weeks of the school year. This has given them more time to learn through play before starting more formal schooling. Then I read something this morning about education in Sweden, a place where I had heard that children start formal schooling later than they do here.
“Children in Sweden are to start school at six years old from 2028, a year earlier than at present, in an overhaul of the country’s education system that signals a switch from play-based teaching for younger children.
The government has announced plans to replace a compulsory preschool year for six-year-olds known as förskoleklass with an additional year in grundskola (primary school).
The centre-right coalition government, led by the Moderates and backed by the far-right Sweden Democrats, announced the plan before the presentation of the 2025 budget, due on Thursday. The plan dates back to the previous government and is also backed by the left-leaning Social Democrats.
The education minister, Johan Pehrson, said “school must go back to the basics” and added that there would be a stronger focus on early learning to read and write, as well as mathematics. “This should lead to students having a better opportunity to develop basic skills such as reading, writing and counting and to reach the goals in school,” he said.”
That sounds rather familiar. Here’s some more Michael Rosen:
“As teachers know, a crazed and obsessive meteorite-like thing hit schools in around 2010 and schools have never been the same since. It was called Gove. One thing that Gove did was switch the idea of writing from being something that is 'about' something, to being 'how you write'. However, the 'how you write' was a paraphernalia of old-style grammar, much of it altered and refined by people over the years. This part of the Gove hit Year 6 children in schools in England.”
And so we get his comment of SATs story writing:
“This very long and exciting expanded noun phrase is placed at the beginning of a main clause using a passive verb. Yesterday it was done in the past. Tomorrow it will be done in the future showing that verb tenses are being used correctly. Full of hope for a good mark, I am finishing my story with a fronted adverbial and a present progressive verb.
Mark 100%”
We seem to be getting our priorities a little mixed up.
However, here is something to cheer us up: the collective noun for ladybirds is apparently a loveliness of ladybirds.
Life goes on, stay safe and well, everyone!
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