Readable, teachable news.
Tuesday, March 19, 2024
What is the largest volcano on Earth? You may be surprised at the answer.
That’s because the world’s largest volcano has just been discovered–and it’s underwater.
The volcano Mauna Loa, in Hawaii, used to be thought of as the largest volcano in the world.
But scientists have discovered one that’s bigger. Much, much bigger.
Tamu Massif is a massive volcano about the size of the British Isles–or more than three times the size of New Brunswick.
Diana Nyad stumbled out of the surf at Smathers Beach in Key West, Florida, on Monday, having completed an incredible 177-kilometre swim.
She had begun the swim 53 hours earlier, in Cuba.
Nyad is the only person ever to have made the treacherous swim without using a shark net, swim fins or a wetsuit. It was her fifth try in 35 years.
She told the waiting and excited crowd that she had three things to say.
“One is we should never, ever give up. Two is you never are too old to chase your dreams. Three is it looks like a solitary sport but it takes a team.”
A dome-headed dinosaur skull found in southern Alberta is helping scientists rethink some of their ideas about dinosaurs.
The skull was found in 2008 by a team of scientists led by Dr. David Evans of the Royal Ontario Museum.
The skull is about 85 million years old.
The top of the skull is made of a dome-shaped mass of solid bone about 10 centimetres thick.
This means the dinosaur belonged to a group of dinosaurs called pachycephalosaurs (“thick-headed lizards”).
The scientists compared the skull to all of the known pachycephalosaur specimens in the world – about 600 of them.
They learned that there are 16 different species within that group, and the skull discovered in Alberta belongs to a species that has never been seen before.
It’s well known that in the 1840s, Ireland suffered from a disaster known as the Irish potato famine.
“Famine” means a “shortage of food.”
More than a quarter of the population of Ireland died or left the country from 1845 to 1852 because of the famine.
For much of the country at the time, potatoes were the main source of food.
The famine had a big effect on Ireland; for one thing, its population is not yet back to pre-famine levels.
The famine happened because the country’s potatoes caught a disease.
At the time, no one knew what the disease was or how to cure it.
Only a quarter of Canadian kids walk or bike to school and that’s not enough, according to a new “report card on physical activity for children and youth.”
Active Healthy Kids Canada (AHKC) is a Canadian charity that encourages children and their parents to get more exercise.
Their report found that only 24 per cent of five to 17-year-olds in Canada use “active transportation” to get to school.
“Active transportation” means not using cars, trains or buses.
On the other hand, their parents were twice as likely to walk to school when they were children.
Every year in its report card, AHKC focuses on one aspect of healthy living.
This year’s theme, “driving,” looked at how much exercise kids are getting when they travel to and from different places near their homes.
A four-year-old boy named Robert Tufts is the mayor of the small town of Dorset in Minnesota.
He was given the job last August – when he was only three – and will continue to be mayor until this August.
The boy was awarded the position after his name was pulled out of a hat.
Once a year, people who live in or nearby Dorset can pay $1 to have their name written on piece of paper and put into a hat.
Then a name is randomly drawn out of the hat, and the person whose name it is becomes the mayor.
Last year, Robert Tufts’ name was pulled out.
I’m watching history happen, right in front of my eyes.
It’s 12:30 Eastern Time on Monday, May 6.
On my computer screen, I’m watching a live satellite feed from space.
An astronaut is singing and playing guitar. He’s singing a song he wrote (with Canadian songwriter Ed Robertson from the band the Barenaked Ladies) called I.S.S. (Is Somebody Singing)?
But the really exciting part is something I can’t see. Hundreds of thousands of children in Canada and throughout the world are also singing, right at this moment, singing the very same song.
It’s part of Music Monday, which is an annual event in Canada that began in 2005. Each year, a song is chosen and school children across the country learn it so they can sing it at the same time on the same day.
The Bank of Canada is ready to show people what its new polymer $5 and $10 bills will look like.
But according to a report, some people say the new bills look too cartoonish or outdated.
The report was obtained by a news service called Canadian Press under the Access to Information Act.
The report says that the Bank asked focus groups what they thought about the look of newly designed $5 and $10 bills.
The people in the focus groups said they thought the space images on the bill looked too childish.
Yesterday was Earth Day.
The annual celebration of the environment was first held in 1970.
But it wasn’t until 1990 that 141 countries put on special events at the same time to make people aware of environmental issues.
Now Earth Day is celebrated every April 22 in more than 150 countries.
In Canada, because there are so many events happening to commemorate Earth Day, the country now celebrates Earth Week and even Earth Month in some places.
When the new pitcher for the Toronto Blue Jays baseball team – R. A. Dickey – throws a pitch, it goes up and down like a rollercoaster.
A rollercoaster: just like his childhood, his career and his life. Although it’s been a bumpy ride, he’s now in a good place as one of the best pitchers in the major leagues.
This year, he signed a contract for three years, for more than $25-million.
That’s a long way from the $11,000 a year he used to make as pitcher in the minor leagues.
At that time, around 2005, Dickey was a struggling pitcher throwing fastballs. But the batters were able to hit them, and sometimes knock them out of the park.
