Category Archives: Education

Education

NATURAL HEALTH SITES BLAME GOOGLE ‘CENSORSHIP’ FOR PLUMMETING WEB TRAFFIC

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Natural Products - By Jim Manson -July 16, 2019

THE OWNERS OF A NUMBER OF LEADING NATURAL HEALTH WEBSITES ARE BLAMING A NEW GOOGLE ALGORITHM FOR PLUMMETING SITE TRAFFIC. 

In June, Google announced that it was implementing an update to its Broad Core Algorithm. The tech giant said the update would improve its search results and was “nothing big”. 

However, some websites have witnessed dramatic reductions in visitor traffic since the change, with natural health sites being particularly affected. 

Site owners fear that alt-med websites are being increasingly targeted by social media companies and search engine operators, as tech companies seek to deflect criticism that they are promoting fake news and misinformation – including misinformation on health issues. 

One website, owned by leading US alternative medicine advocate Dr Joesph Mercola, has seen google traffic to the site crash by “about 99%”. 

Mercola notes that, “now, any time you enter a health-related search word into Google, such as ‘heart disease’ or ‘Type 2 diabetes’, you will not find Mercola.com articles in the search results.”

He adds: “Big Tech has joined the movement bringing in a global concentration of wealth to eliminate competition and critical voices…all disguised as a means to protect you from ‘misinformation’.”

Mercola says all this has happened in spite of the fact that the articles on his site are “fully referenced…to studies published in the peer-reviewed scientific literature”. He adds: “ …none of this now matters, as the very fact that the information I present typically contradicts industry propaganda places me in the lowest possible rating category.”

New York-based holistic health specialist Kelly Brogan wrote on Twitter that her “writing and teachings are largely unsearchable online as of 6/3 (the date of the Google algorithm update)”. She urged her followers to “stay with me through this wild time on our newsletter”. She shared an image with followers of the analytics for her website, showing the sudden drop-off in traffic. 

“GOOGLE IS MORPHING FROM AN ‘ORGANIC’ SEARCH ENGINE TO A TOOL OF CENSORSHIP – OTHER WEB PLATFORMS MAY FOLLOW AND WE SHOULD ALL BE CONCERNED”

Responding to the development, editors at the UK-based website Natural Health Newswrote that “Google is morphing from an ‘organic’ search engine to a tool of censorship – other web platforms may follow and we should all be concerned”. 

They add: “…most of our traffic comes from searches – from people…looking to manage uncomplicated health problems in a less invasive, more holistic and more natural way. Those people can no longer find us.” 

Also taking to Twitter, the UK-based journalist and activist Pat Thomas, wrote: “The latest Google ‘algorithm change’ wiped traffic off of the worlds natural #health websites. Maybe you don’t care about natural health. But what happens when Google next removes something you do care about from its search results? #censorship is censorship.” 

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Education, Garden / Classroom

KIDS GARDENING; BEST VEGETABLES TO GROW WITH KIDS

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The Educator’s Spin On It - By Amanda Boyarshinov Posted March 24, 2019

Now is the time to learn about what are the BEST Vegetables to Grow with Kids this year in your garden. We are excited to share with you the our top picks of vegetables for gardening with kids.

Becky of Kid World citizen, master teacher, talented writer and expert in Global Education is our guest writer today. She has a fabulous backyard garden and her kids are willing to try new vegetables for dinner because of it.

BEST VEGETABLES TO GROW WITH KIDS

By Becky, author of Kids World Citizen

It’s just about that time of year to end this miserable cold (finally) and start enjoying spring weather and thinking about  what vegetables to grow with kids in our gardens! Gardening is the ideal outdoor learning experience: playing in the mud, learning about underground ecosystems, watching our plants grow with sunlight and rain and some tender care, and getting the gratification of growing a food that we can eat at the end of the process (and maybe even trying something new!). If you’d like to get your kids more involved this year, here are our best veggies to grow with kids.

VEGETABLES TO GROW WITH KIDS: FASTEST GROWING FOR (ALMOST) INSTANT GRATIFICATION

1. Radishes

2. Baby Carrots

3. Lettuce

Kids want it, and want it NOW! All of these choices will germinate from seed in just days when you add water and sunlight, giving kids a chance to see how crooked or straight their seed lines were! What about spreading the seeds in the form of their initial? What’s great about these three choices is that you can pick and eat them while they are still young, shortening growing time even more.

VEGETABLES TO GROW WITH KIDS: MOST PROLIFIC VEGGIE FOR RAW MUNCHERS

1. Cherry tomatoes

2. Snap Peas

3. Herbs (try mint, lemon balm, parsley, or chives)

One of the best part of gardening is being able to eat raw veggies straight from the plant. To be honest, I don’t remember ever being able to pick enough snap peas to actually make them because my kids eat the entire harvest from the vine before I even get to snap a picture. Cherry tomatoes are a given, because varieties nowadays produce fruit the entire growing season (65-85 F during the day, and nights should be above 55). As for herbs, mint grows, and grows, and if you’re not careful it can take over your herb garden! That being said my kids think it’s cool that they can walk by and grab a leaf to eat. If your kids don’t like mint, try parsley or chives, or even lemon balm for a sensory blast every time you walk past it.

VEGETABLES TO GROW WITH KIDS: BEST CHOICE FOR THOSE WITHOUT A GREEN THUMB

1. Potatoes

2. Asparagus

3. Green beans

If you are looking for the absolute easiest to grow- meaning you forget that you even have a garden- look no further. My green beans have been re-seeding themselves for years and grow like a jungle with little care. Asparagus sounds challenging, but it is incredibly simple. From the snowy Midwest to tropical Houston, plant it once, and it will grow in the same spot every growing season for 20 years! Potatoes are so easy it is almost a joke. I once sent my 5 year old out to the garden with a container of forgotten purple potatoes from Whole Foods that had gone bad, forgotten in the back of our pantry. I told Ricky to plant them and I honestly forgot he had done so for a couple of months. We went out to prepare our garden in the spring and found the ground peppered with TONS of purple potatoes that had grown during our mild winter!

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Education

GERMINATION SCIENCE EXPERIMENT

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The Educator’s Spin On It - By Amanda Boyarshinov Posted Mar 24, 2019

In this twist on the classic germination science experiment, children will test the germination rate of 10 green bean seeds. From making predictions to collecting data, your little scientists will learn all about seeds and how plants grow.

Let’s get started with this germination of seeds activity! 

MATERIALS NEEDED FOR GERMINATION SCIENCE EXPERIMENT

DIRECTIONS FOR GERMINATION SCIENCE EXPERIMENT

Prior to the germination science experiment read seed books and talk about seeds.


Introduce the word GERMINATION.  Germination is when the seed begins to grow a root and a shoot. This experiment will allow children to see how and how many seeds germinate.  The plastic bag acts as a window into the world of plant growth!

  1. Fold the paper towel so it will fit neatly inside the plastic bag.
  2. Using a black permanent marker, draw a 10 frame on the bag.
  3. Fill the spray bottle with water and let children mist the paper towel until it is completely moist.
  4. Place the wet paper towel in the bag.
  5. Have the children place one been seed in each compartment in the 10 frame.
  6. Close the bag and set flat near window or other sunny area. (the bag can be taped to a window, but the seeds do not stay in the 10 frame well!)

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS FOR GERMINATION SCIENCE EXPERIMENT

Do you think that all 10 bean seeds will germinate? Explain your answer.

MATH CONNECTIONS:

  • Write a prediction on how many bean seeds you believe will germinate.  You many guess numbers between 0 and 10. After plants have germinated check your predictions.  Discuss the results.
  • Can you figure out the percentage or germination rate of your bean seeds?  Take the number of bean seeds in your bag that germinated.  Use a calculator and times that number by 10.  If 8 seeds germinated, you would take 8 x 10 = 80.  Your seeds would have an 80% germination rate.

Why do you think knowing a seeds germination rate would be helpful to a farmer?

NOTE: Bean seeds germinated in this way “may” grow if you place them in a soil garden area shortly after germination begins. Often teachers will allow the bean plants to continue growing until leaves form so that students can see the plants growing.

GERMINATION SCIENCE EXPERIMENT VOCABULARY

Germination:  when the seed begins to grow a root and a shoot.

Root:  Part of the plant beneath the soil that absorbs water and nutrients.

Sprout: the beginning growth of a plant

Sprouting: the practice of germinating seeds

We all know that plants need water, sun, and soil to grow. In this science experiment, kids will grow a bean maze to truly “see” how plants will seek out what they need.

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Co-ops, Education

Farming While Black: An Interview with Soul Fire Farm’s Leah Penniman

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Garden Therapy - Nov 18, 2018 - INTERVIEW· SOUL FIRE FARM

Gardening is therapy to so many of us and yet there is ecology and politics behind growing food that limits that opportunity for far too many people. Leah Penniman, co-founder of Soul Fire Farm and author of the just released book Farming While Black: Soul Fire Farm’s Practical Guide to Liberation on the Land is working to change that. Soul Fire Farm is an organization designed to uplift and empower farmers of color through practical skills and fostering a connection to the earth.

We have been fans of Soul Fire Farm on social media where they share snippets of stories, politics, and culture like this fascinating video about the Afro-Indigenous roots of many common vegetables that we normally think of as having European origins. When Farming While Black was announced, we immediately approached them to ask for an interview. Just a brief conversation with Leah Penniman covered a lot of complex issues including race, an oppressive food system, and the writing process.

Farming While Black is the first comprehensive “how to” guide for aspiring African-heritage growers to reclaim their dignity as agriculturists and for all farmers to understand the distinct, technical contributions of African-heritage people to sustainable agriculture. But you will quickly see that it is also so much more. A practical farming guide, a memoir, and history book intertwined on the pages, Farming While Black is a must read for everyone who loves plants and the healing benefits of working in the soil.

In Conversation with Leah Penniman

Garden Therapy: First, for our readers who don’t know, can you tell me a little about Soul Fire Farm and its mission?

Leah Penniman: Soul Fire Farm is a people-of-color-led community farm in Grafton, New York. We are committed to ending racism and injustice in the food system and we do that in three ways.

Read on…

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Biomimicry, Education

Why Farming Is Broken (And Always Has Been) (4 min)

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MinuteEarth - Sep 27, 2017 - 4 min

Thanks to the Land Institute for sponsoring this video!

VIDEO LINK (4 MIN)

To learn more about their work, visit https://landinstitute.org/ To feed everyone in the future, we may need to disrupt 10,000 years of farming practices and turn agriculture into a closed system. Thanks also to our supporters on https://www.patreon.com/MinuteEarth

To learn more, start your googling with these keywords: Annual plant: living for a year or less, perpetuating itself by seed Perennial plant: living for several years Polyculture: the simultaneous cultivation or exploitation of several crops or kinds of animals Natural systems agriculture: cropping systems based on processes found in nature Agroforestry: land use management that combines the cultivation of trees/shrubs with crops/pasture to create more productive and sustainable land-use systems Alley cropping: planting agricultural crops between rows of trees or shrubs.

If you liked this week’s video, you might also like: Alley cropping: https://nac.unl.edu/documents/agrofor… Agroforestry: http://www.fao.org/forestry/agrofores…

Education

Regenerative Agriculture Podcast

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The Regenerative Agriculture Podcast, hosted by John Kempf, is a great show to start with. Here are some of the show’s episode titles to whet your appetite:

  • Preventing nitrogen and phosphorus leaching.
  • Things to do when plants don’t respond to nutrient applications.
  • Why should we care about soil health?
  • Symbiotic relationships in ecology.
  • How insect pests identify unhealthy plants.

You might be wondering, do I need to be tech-savvy to listen to a podcast? Absolutely not! Here’s an easy guide on how to access podcasts:

  1. Install the “Stitcher” app from iTunes App Store or Google Play (Android).
  2. Register on the Stitcher app.
  3. Browse shows and “star” your favorites to automatically download new episodes.
  4. Listen to shows through the Stitcher app on headphones, or even better, via Bluetooth over your car’s audio system.

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