Clipmarks | JohnWaterman's Positive collection

Tomorrow I start the best job in the world.

Sun, 02 Nov 2008 11:54:13 GMT

clipped by: JohnWaterman
clipper's remarks: I worked as a teacher for 14 years at Grangewood School (a wonderful little special school) until alcohol started ruining my life. Now eight years on and six months sober I am returning in a different capacity; as an intervenor for a lovely six year old lad who is deaf-blind and mentally impaired. I can't wait to get started.

Clip Source: www.georgebrown.ca

Intervenors are the eyes and ears for people who are both deaf and blind

Watch this video to learn more about intervention, intervenors and deafblindness:

Watch the video file about Intervenor for Deaf-Blind Persons Program (long version - 10 min).

Watch the video file about Intervenor for Deaf-Blind Persons Program (short version - 2 min).

Clip Source: www.notbysightfund.org

Why Intervenors

Here is an example:

A deafblind child holds a vase. Would it have any meaning at all?

never seen one to know it can hold water or flowers

what will happen if she drops it

never heard the sound of breaking glass

Now the same experience with an intervenor teaching this child.

moving the small fingers over it's textured sides

Together, they move to the sink and fill the vase with water

they laugh at the surprising feeling of the cold water

smell the fragrance

Clip Source: www.grangewoodschool.co.uk

Welcome to Grangewood School

Grangewood is a primary school for children with severe learning difficulties in the London Borough of Hillingdon.

Clip Source: www.grangewoodschool.co.uk

Golden Rules

Clip Source: www.grangewoodschool.co.uk

Major advance in MS treatment

Thu, 23 Oct 2008 12:52:13 GMT

clipped by: JohnWaterman

Clip Source: www.guardian.co.uk

Doctors yesterday hailed a major success in the treatment of multiple sclerosis, after trials revealed that a drug had halted and reversed the debilitating effects of the disease for the first time.

a three-year trial of the drug, alemtuzumab, to compare its effectiveness against the market-leading beta interferon treatment. They recruited 334 patients with MS in their 20s and 30s, all of whom had experienced their first symptoms no more than three years ago.

Patients who were given the new drug were 74% less likely to relapse and had a 71% lower risk of being disabled within three years. But most remarkably, those on the new treatment showed fewer signs of disability at the end of the trial than they began with.

patients who take beta interferon have slowly shrinking brains

patients who have alemtuzumab have enlarging brains as the lost tissue is restored. Somehow the drug is promoting brain repair

Clip Source: www.guardian.co.uk

Drug reboots immune system

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Triathlete? Ball Girl? Amputee? All of the Above.

Fri, 29 Aug 2008 01:10:02 GMT

clipped by: JohnWaterman

Clip Source: www.nytimes.com

After every few dashes across Court 14, Kelly Bruno reached down to her right leg and flicked at something. It was a gesture so slight and so fleeting, she could have been swatting away a bug. It was also the only thing she did that was not in the protocol for a United States Open ball girl — nowhere does it mention popping the pressure valve on a prosthetic leg.

Bruno was born with several defects in her left leg and has been an amputee since she was 6 months old. By 18, she had turned herself into a track star among disabled athletes, with her own sponsorship deals. And as a world-class triathlete and Ironman competitor, she has raced in some of the most grueling events on the planet.

Now, at age 24, Bruno has scaled back her training for three weeks to shuttle back and forth across courts at the Billie Jean King National Tennis Center to scoop up balls at the net. In a job done correctly only by those who are barely noticed, Bruno has stood out by blending in.

A story without words

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 21:08:28 GMT

clipped by: JohnWaterman
clipper's remarks: Heartwarming

Clip Source: www.frogview.com

Coral reefs coming back from the dead

Tue, 08 Apr 2008 13:27:18 GMT

clipped by: JohnWaterman

Clip Source: www.boingboing.net

efforts to re-seed dying coral reefs are performing better than anyone dared hope

On land, EcoReefs look attractive but artificial, like contemporary sculpture. Nearly two years later, they're something else entirely: a hybrid of technology and organic life

Their antler-shaped arms are covered with baby corals and sponges, more varieties than I can count

One of the techniques used to jump-start growth on the EcoReefs was "coral tranplants." Chunks of loose coral were physically attached to the EcoReefs with little plastic ties. Oddly, those modules have done no better than the ones left to their own devices. No one knows why; perhaps corals, like delicate houseplants, favor a specific angle to the sun. When that orientation is lost, the polyps wallow in confusion...

Clip Source: www.perceptivetravel.com

Clip Source: www.boingboing.net

It's mind-boggling to see how fast these corals are returning

Gratitude

Tue, 25 Mar 2008 18:46:58 GMT

clipped by: JohnWaterman
clipper's remarks: Thanks all.

Clip Source: www.wisdomquotes.com

At times our own light goes out and is rekindled by a spark from another person.
Each of us has cause to think with deep gratitude of those who have lighted the flame within us.

Buddha:

Let us rise up and be thankful, for if we didn't learn a lot today, at least we learned a little, and if we didn't learn a little, at least we didn't get sick, and if we got sick, at least we didn't die; so, let us all be thankful.

Ralph Waldo Emerson:

I awoke this morning with devout thanksgiving for my friends, the old and the new.

Uzbekistan abolishes the death penalty

Wed, 23 Jan 2008 14:02:17 GMT

clipped by: JohnWaterman

Clip Source: www.amnesty.org

The trend towards total abolition of the death penalty has continued with Uzbekistan becoming the latest country to put an end to executions.

From 1 January 2008, it becomes the 135th country in the world to abolish the death penalty in law or practice. Capital punishment has now been replaced with life or long-term imprisonment. Amnesty International welcomes this move towards ending this cruel and inhumane practice.

Amnesty International calls on the few remaining territories in the former Soviet Union which retain the death penalty to fully abolish it, thus making the whole region a death penalty-free zone. The only remaining executioner in Europe is Belarus, where the last reported execution took place in December 2007

Ballet dancer, 88, makes debut

Wed, 23 Jan 2008 13:46:50 GMT

clipped by: JohnWaterman

Clip Source: www.ananova.com

An 88-year-old Cambridgeshire man has starred in his first ballet after taking up dance at the age of 79.

John Lowe, of Witchford, took up dancing after his daughter Alison become a professional dancer

The retired teacher said: "It's a wonderful thing to do and I can't understand why more men don't do it."

Mr Lowe appeared in the Lantern Dance Theatre Company's performance of Prokofiev's The Stone Flower at The Maltings in Ely on Sunday.

"I went to a dance school in the high street in Ely and asked if I could do tap and ballet and they said 'well of course you can' and I've been doing it ever since," said the grandfather of 11.

"I've got a rope at home that I use to pull my leg up higher. I'm lucky that I don't have any problem with the routines but that's because I exercise.

"There's nothing effeminate about it - you have to be incredibly fit to dance. I see these people crawling around , hunched over smoking a cigarette - they should be doing ballet."