News

Kids News

How Reading The News Helped Craig Kielburger Change The World

by

One morning when I was 12, I was munching on cereal and flipping through the newspaper in search of the comics.

I couldn’t get past the front-page story. It was about a young boy in Pakistan, a child labourer named Iqbal Masih.

When he was just four years old, Iqbal went to work in a cramped, dusty room for 12 hours a day, six days a week, weaving carpets in a factory.

Iqbal was 12. I was 12.

I knew I had to do something for him. But what?

I hadn’t been looking to make a big difference in the world. I was looking for Calvin and Hobbes!

Still, I tore out Iqbal’s story and brought it to school.

Continue Reading →
Breaking News News Sports

Can Tiger Woods Win This Year’s Masters?

by

The unofficial start of the golfing season begins on Thursday in Augusta, Georgia, with one of the most prestigious events in golf, the Masters Tournament.

The Masters golf tournament goes all the way back to 1934.

However, it is a recent win by Tiger Woods—perhaps the greatest player in the history of golf—that has everyone talking. They want to know: will Woods win his fifth Masters?

Even though he is a great player, if Woods wins the Masters this year it will be a big surprise.

That’s because until last month, Woods hadn’t won a tournament in nearly three years. It was the longest drought of his career.

About three years ago, Tiger Woods’s career—and his personal life—had a melt-down. He had a very public divorce with many problems. He also had issues with his golf form (in other words, the way he swung the club) as well as injuries.

He stopped winning. And many people wrote him off entirely.

Continue Reading →
Kids Lighter News

Banning “Best Friends” At School?

by

Some kids in London, England are being discouraged from having a best friend at school.

Psychologist Gaynor Sbuttoni, a specialist in children’s behaviour, told a London newspaper that some elementary teachers aren’t letting students have a best friend. Instead, they are urging children to play together in groups.

The Sun newspaper reported that Russell Hobby, of the UK’s National Association of Head Teachers, said some schools there have best-friend bans.

Teachers say the reason they do this is so kids don’t get hurt if they split up with their friend.

Continue Reading →
Health News Science

Canadian Awards Predict Nobel Prize Winners

by

The Gairdner Foundation recently announced the winners of its 2012 awards.

The Canada Gairdner Awards are given to people who have made a new scientific discovery to combat disease or ease human suffering. It is one of the most important medical awards in the world.

As the Gairdner website puts it, “we’re dedicated to recognizing the world’s most creative and accomplished biomedical scientists.” Biomedical scientists work in medicine and biology (the study of living organisms).

The late James A. Gairdner established the Gairdner Foundation in 1957. Since then, 300 awards have been given. Seventy-three of those award winners have gone on to win a Nobel Prize in either medicine or chemistry.

The awards are selected by Canadians, but they are given to scientists throughout the world.

This year’s seven award winners include three people who broke through mysteries of the human circadian clock, the internal mechanism that controls our sleep and wakefulness, body temperature, and many other functions.

Continue Reading →
Breaking News News Politics

Canada’s Plan To Balance Its Budget By 2015

by

Last week Canada’s Finance Minister, Jim Flaherty, spent $138.98 on a new pair of black dress shoes.

Why? Because he was announcing a new budget.

Flaherty is in charge of presenting Canada’s budget, which is why he bought the new shoes.

It’s a tradition in Canada that the Finance Minister wears new shoes to present the budget.

According to Wikipedia no one really knows why, but it’s something most Canadian Finance Ministers have done since the 1960s. It’s a tradition.

This year, the federal government structured its budget to reduce Canada’s annual deficit to zero by 2015.

A deficit happens when a government spends more than it collects in a year.

Continue Reading →
News

Candy, Coins Scattered Across Highway After Truck Accident

by

Millions of dollars worth of coins, and a load of candy, were scattered along the Trans-Canada Highway and in the bush in northeastern Ontario on Wednesday.

A Brink’s tractor-trailer truck was driving along Highway 11 north of Kirkland Lake, when it hit a rock cut.

In this case, rock cuts are steep, rocky cliffs on either side of the highway created when a highway is carved through a hill.

They are common in northern Ontario.

Continue Reading →
Environment News Science

Does Ancient Antarctic Lake Hold Secrets To Life In Outer Space?

by

A team of Russian scientists in Antarctica has found an ancient lake buried under more than three kilometres of ice.

The lake – Lake Vostok – has been sealed off from the rest of the world for at least 15 million years.

Scientists think the lake may contain tiny organisms, like bacteria, which are not found anywhere else on earth.

If the organisms exist in the lake, it would be because they have been able to adapt to living in the darkness, saltiness and extreme cold of the hidden lake. In that case, they would likely have developed special features that no other organisms on earth have.

Continue Reading →
News Politics

Mulcair Elected As Leader Of NDP, Official Opposition

by

Thomas Mulcair is the new leader of the New Democratic Party of Canada (NDP).

Mulcair was elected, after a gruelling 12 hours of voting, at the NDP’s convention on the weekend.

The NDP is the political party that is Canada’s “official opposition” to the country’s governing party, the Conservatives.

As leader of the federal NDP, Mulcair will also become the leader of the Official Opposition.

The NDP had to elect a new leader after their last leader, Jack Layton, passed away from cancer in August 2011.

Continue Reading →
Breaking News Kids News

High Park Residents Unite To Rebuild “Castle”

by

People in the community of High Park in Toronto have come together to rebuild a special playground there.

On March 17, an early-morning blaze destroyed a section of the castle-like wooden playground in the park.

Police and fire officials are investigating to find out the cause of the fire.

In the meantime, local residents and business owners are already actively planning and raising funds to rebuild the one-of-a-kind structure.

The Jamie Bell Adventure Playground, where the “castle” was, is in High Park, just north of Lake Ontario in Toronto.

It opened in 1999 and is named after a Toronto resident whose idea it was to build the unique playground.

Members of the community are pulling together again to rebuild the portions damaged by the fire.

And it’s not just local residents who have offered to assist; Canadian Tire has pledged a significant donation towards the project.

Continue Reading →
1 … 68 69 70 71 72 … 87