MEMORIES OF CHRISTMAS PAST: Old-timers' recall much different holiday celebration By CHERYL BELLER

USA,Dec. 24, 2002-Once upon a time, there were no video games, digital cameras, or cell phones under anyone's Christmas tree.

In days of old, children were thrilled to get a few pieces of hard candy and an orange, or maybe a pair of knitted mittens in a stocking hung by the fireplace.

"Oranges were a real treat," recalls Blanche Coryell, who at age 105 has celebrated more Christmas holidays than most of us will ever see.

Born in 1897 in her parent's Ada Township home, Coryell's childhood included riding a horse-drawn sleigh to Ada Congregational Church on Christmas Eve. "We had soapstones warmed in the oven, and we'd wrap them in flannel and put them at our feet in the sleigh," she recalled. "We always got clothes for Christmas, mittens and scarves. Everything was very practical."

Sharing a single gift with six siblings was typical when Sally Hough, of Wyoming, was a child. "Christmas was really special to us. We didn't have a lot of money, and my mother never went shopping until the day before Christmas," she recalled. "One year, we got a sled for all seven of us to share."

Christmas generosity will likely always be an important part of tradition, whether helping out the needy or the neighbor down the street. And it may be that more appreciation follows selfless altruism.

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http://www.thestate.com/mld/thestate/news/nation/4806812.htm

Posted on Tue, Dec. 24, 2002
Put off by public schools, more Muslims home-teach BY DEBORAH HORAN, Chicago Tribune CHICAGO, USA - KRT NEWSFEATURES- Ibrahim Imam, 9, starts his school day at 8:30 a.m. sharp. Like other fourth graders, he studies math, science, reading and cursive writing. He also practices Arabic and recites the Koran. And, like a small but growing number of Muslim pupils nationwide, he learns each subject in his living room seated across a desk from his mother. Seema Imam started home-schooling her son two years ago, after she decided that Ibrahim was doomed to the margins of public school life in Hickory Hills, Ill., and in danger of internalizing negative ideas about his religion.

"Though they try to understand our kids, they just don't," said Imam, a devout convert to Islam who wears the head-to-toe hijab. "Our kids are involved in other people's holidays, then our holiday is misunderstood or left out."

Seema Imam said she doesn't worry about keeping her child away from his peers. And she doubts that his attending public school would give non-Muslims a chance to get to know Muslim culture.

"If that were the case, then all the schools would include (greetings of) `Happy Ramadan' by now," she said.

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http://www.cnn.com/2002/SHOWBIZ/books/12/24/review.hiassen.hoot/index.html

Review: Charming Hiassen children's book

By L.D. Meagher
(CNN) --Kids and crime -- it's a combination that often leads to tragedy. And, occasionally, to comedy.

"Hoot," a new Carl Hiassen book for children, takes a look at the direction lawbreaking can take a child in a distinctly Hiassen way.

Besides being intended for a younger audience, all the vintage Hiaasen elements are on display -- the quirky characters, the cock-eyed scheme that leads them to the nervous edge of disaster, and everything culminating at last in a measure of justice.

In this case, the protagonist, a fish-out-of-water middle schooler named Roy, gets dragged into a bizarre plot for a good cause -- saving some endangered birds at a construction site.

The kid behind the plan, known mostly as Mullet Fingers, is something of a wild child, living in the Florida swamps, coming and going as he pleases. His stepsister, the oversized Beatrice, is Roy's classmate.

They are a mismatched, thoroughly unlikely trio, locked in a struggle with a huge corporation. The results are delightful.

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http://www.mlive.com/news/bctimes/index.ssf?/xml/story.ssf/html_standard.xsl?/base/news-1/1040658310140171.xml

Bus driver ends 34 years of caring for kids

By Patti Brandt- Times writer © 2002 Bay City Times.

USA, Dec 23, 2002-For 34 years, children on Sylvia Barber's bus got candy treats on the holidays, stopped to observe wild animals and were greeted each day with a cheery "Good morning."

And now "Miss Sylvia," as she is known by her charges, has hung up the keys to her lucky bus No. 13.

During her tenure, Barber has had children cry, throw up and even fight on her bus, but none of that ever fazed her.

Giving hugs, having a bucket on hand and playing referee was just part of her job description. Barber lists the top qualities needed to be a good bus driver as having good driving skills, caring about children and knowing how to talk to them.

But ask Barber what she will miss the most about her job, and those eyes get misty.

"The children," she said. "They've been an integral part of my life."

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http://www.philstar.com/philstar/Business200212235602.htm

The way to a child’s heart

The Philippine STAR

Philippines, 12/23/2002 -If a toy will always find a way to a child’s simple heart, so will a good idea. Last Dec., as Muslims all over the world celebrated Eid’l Fit’r (the end of Ramadan and its strict fasting), Jollibee Food Corp. officials, their guests and Social Welfare and Development Secretary Dinky Soliman distributed toys to children in depressed Muslim communities in Zamboanga City and Basilan. The burger giant had an objective that was as simple as it was noble: It wanted young children to experience the joy of sharing during Christmas. It is estimated that over half a million poor children all over the country have received a toy from the campaign. "This was an unusual opportunity for Jollibee to help bridge, in a modest way, the barrier between Muslims and Christians," said Jollibee vice president for corporate affairs Claro Certeza. "It is no coincidence that the main movers of MaAga Ang Pasko are children, who give the toys to be shared with other children. In their simplicity they let no obstacles, religious or cultural, to get in the way of playing and sharing." He added, "This attitude, if cultivated, can help bring about peace and prosperity in our country." -------------------------------- http://news.scotsman.com/leaders.cfm?id=1432902002 Smart idea for schools UK, 26 Dec 2002-CHILDREN in Edinburgh, East Lothian and Midlothian are about to be issued with smart cards to pay for their school dinners. The initiative, part of a £9.5 million package announced by Finance Minister Andy Kerr, is intended to remove the stigma of free school meals - if everyone uses a swipe card to pay, no-one can tell who qualifies for a free lunch and who does not. And it should therefore be welcomed as a sensible use of modern technology to help tackle an age-old problem of discrimination. The stigma of free school meals is too often still present, with stories of pupils having to form separate queues depending on whether they are paying customers or getting their dinner free because of their family’s low income. Putting youngsters through such humiliation and offering bullies an opportunity for victimisation is quite unacceptable and out of tune with the enlightened ethos which prevails in the rest of the education system. ------------------------------------------ http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/cms.dll/xml/comp/articleshow?artid=32392005 Chacha Naidu to write to children on New Year BY K SREEDHAR RAO TIMES NEWS NETWORK INDIA, HYDERABAD, DEC 26, 2002: Over 75 lakh students of the state are in for a pleasant surprise this New Year's Eve - a personal letter from chief minister Chandrababu Naidu. Naidu will pen a letter to the students of primary and upper primary schools across the state. He will educate the 75 lakh students about their rights and duties and highlight the commitment of the government to make them healthy and responsible citizens.This is being done to coincide with the launch of the ambitious mid-day meals programme from January 2. Naidu, in the letter, says the children have the right to good health, in addition to the right to play, laugh and be educated. The letter states it is the duty of the government and parents to provide them the right atmosphere for grooming them into responsible citizens. Naidu also talks about the steps being taken by the government to create a literate society and eradicate child labour in the state. He reminds the children that the government had brought in an enactment prohibiting physically punishing students, which will come into effect in March. Naidu asks the children to imbibe discipline to establish a knowledge-based society and wishes them golden and bright futures. The administration is designing the letter in such a manner that the school children will be able to preserve it for ever. ------------------------------- http://www.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/getarticle.pl5?fl20021224aj.htm Kids' Art Classes Japan-The workshop is called the Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain, to develop drawing and perceptual skills. The other class will be Expressive Art for Kids, to develop creativity and means of expression using paint and other materials. Counselor and physical therapist Birgitta Dallwig-Yajima, in Tokyo, told us she values the way the Right Side regimen holds the interest of children she counsels for attention-deficit disorder. "One child who took the workshop changed quite a lot," she says. "He really started to look (at the world around him)." And after his own children completed a workshop, David wrote: "Thank you so much for what you taught my kids. They will benefit from this for the rest of their lives. I want my wife to take the class also. When is the next one?" ----------------------

http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2002/12/28/1040511217564.html

Now the parched country kids head for the ocean

By Kate Cox: The Sun-Herald

AUSTRALIA-December 29 2002-Residents of the drought-stricken town of Boggabri in the state's north-west received an extra Christmas surprise last week.

The children of the town are set to take a trip to the beaches of Narooma on the NSW South Coast.Already, Narooma residents have donated hundreds of toys, hampers and cash to Boggabri in an innovative adopt-a-town scheme.

But when they were asked where they thought Narooma was, no one had anyidea.

Only one child of the 50 assembled had ever seen the ocean. Some had never left their town.

Tony Casu, general manager of the Narooma club, said they already had organised to charter a boat to the island, home to penguins, seabirds, seals, dolphins and turtles.

"At that time of year they might be lucky enough to see some whales," hesaid.

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http://www.allforchildren.org/mystories.php?id=23

A Little Good News
By Joan Stuart Yenawine

Sometimes, against all odds, things just work out. Take the case of Lisa Battaglino and her husband, Dennis Rodrigues, of Bridgewater. From an outsider's point of view, the last thing they needed was a new baby. They were already raising two teenagers who were less than excited at the prospect of a new sibling. They also had challenging, time-consuming jobs, and a limited amount of money. Despite all the reasons not to, they embarked on the expensive and emotionally trying process of international adoption.

As they began the adoption process, she asked herself all the questions that her friends and family eventually would: Why a baby? Why from Russia? Why now?

"Maybe it was naiveté, or maybe, in the back of our minds, we'd known it was right for us," muses Lisa. She had a romantic vision of her family's future. She pictured her daughter going through her stormy adolescent years with a little brother she could love, unconditionally. as he would love her.

However, like most adoptive parents, she has also had a few encounters with people who felt compelled to tell her all the horror stories they knew about Russian adoptions gone wrong. Thankfully, Lisa and Dennis' experience bore no similarities. Their adoption agency, The Alliance for Children in Wellesley, smoothed the process in Russia by arranging for an interpreter to assist them. They describe their experience as very emotional, but essentially problem-free. When they finally held Andrew for the first time in the orphanage, they knew their decision was the right one.

"Everything I had hoped for and fantasized about has happened," says Lisa. The volume on the stereo is lower, and both of her older children have embraced their new roles within the family. Her advice to others considering adoption is, "Don't be afraid. Everything you gain from it is a hundred times greater than everything you are afraid of."

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News for Kids Editorial Team
http://www.angelfire.com/realm2/newsforkids/index.html