THE TASTE OF SUMMER

Summer,

The season that is perfectly balanced,

Between spring and autumn,

A salvation from the cold and misery,

Like spring,

But better, longer, and infinitely more wonderful.

Summer isn't just one feeling,

It's several different sensations,

The bright sun rays that pour from the sun,

Hanging in the magnificent, blue canopy,

That stretches above us for ever,

The warm sunshine that kisses my cheeks,

The long, orange grass and sweet wild flowers,

That brush around my knees,

In the gentle, smooth breeze,

Casting pollen into the air.

BRINGER OF JOY

Lucy Pittaway 'The Joy Of Spring'

This morning,

I stepped out of the house,

And my mind was shrouded

In a cloud of misery.

I was alone.

Stranded,

In a never-ending cycle,

Of gloom and despair.

Nothing mattered.

Nothing could improve.

And then,

Out of the blue,

Through the barrier of woe,

Broke a tiny glimmer of light,

Radiating knowledge,

Truth and joy,

In the form of your smile.

CIRCLES

Vassily Kandinsky 'Squares with Concentric Rings'

For centuries people have been fascinated about circles. Many scientists, philosophers, mathematicians, artists, and religious people have been working with the symbol of the circle and giving it different meaning according to the applications of the circle in real life. And there is one great reason for that interest. Above us in the sky every day we can see the big and magical solar ring. People depend on the sun in so many ways. It gives us warm, light, it is always up there as a loyal friend. People from the whole human world have the solar ring as a very important symbol in their cultures. In mythology the sun is usually a symbol of the divine and superior God. It is full of mysterious power. The shape of the sun is a circular one. There has been a great respect and fear about the sun for centuries. Even people from ancient cultures were realising that the sun is something that they cannot control and has a behaviour they cannot predict, so they cannot ignore the giant circle. It is like a big ball that could bring either life or destruction. All the changes happening with that giant circle were affecting human lives in so many ways. The solar eclipses for examples were seen as a very bad sign which was a warning before God's punishment. So the sun represented the God Himself in many cultures.

The circle is a universal symbol with extensive meaning. It represents the totality, the wholeness, the original perfection, the Self, the infinite, the eternity, the timelessness, all cyclic movement. Being a symbol of God, the circle doesn’t have a circumference. Or it is not in the human power to find and to calculate the circumference of the circle as a symbol of God. Its circumference is everywhere, there are no limits. From a spiritual point of view God is the centre as well. The symbol of the circle also implies in the idea of movement, and symbolizes the cycle of time, the motion of everything that moves, the planets' journey around the sun (the circle of the zodiac), the great rhythm of the universe. The circle is also zero in our system of numbering, and symbolizes potential, or the embryo. It has a magical value.

EVERY STUDENT DESERVES A GOOD TEACHER

In this short reflection of ours we are not going to write about the characteristics of the good teacher, we will do this separately. Here will try only to defend the student's right to have a good teacher.

Every student deserves a good teacher who will make him to want to fly.

Education is a two-sided process – teaching and learning. There should be an equal effort and an equal honest attitude to the process in depth to achieve something.

Teachers are the most important people in the schools. Together with the students they create the image of education. But if the students still have a more dependent role, the teachers' role is leading. The quality of teaching and learning depends on the teachers. And although there are plenty of brilliant professionals in schools and they create maybe 90% of the teachers, there is still some percentage of teachers who are just not fit for the role. The role of the teacher is extremely demanding and challenging but on the other hand extremely rewarding. The teacher should not only be a brilliant expert on their subject but also a great communicator and a big fan of the students. To be a teacher means that you have a passion and love in your heart for the students. To be a good teacher means that you will always do what is right for the students, doesn't matter how hard this is for you. It means that you have almost angelic patience. You will need a lot of patience.

The teachers create the students' memories and the care about the students' well being and learning should always come first. All that means that you have to embrace in your heart the philosophy of the Humane pedagogy not the philosophy of the Authoritarian pedagogy. 

TIME

Time and space are the two main features to describe our existence. Every second of our lives we are located somewhere. We can’t describe our activities separately from time and space. After the question ‘When’ comes straight away the question ‘Where’. Time remains one of the most mysterious aspects of the world in which we live. Time connects our existence in a process with the past, present and the future. Many philosophers and scientists are still trying to define the concept of time. It is so characteristic for our lives that we cannot imagine our everyday existence without it being measured with time, like just one continuous process. The human brain is designed in a way that it feels more comfortable and secure if everything is structured and in order. Without time there would be a great chaos. We need time to plan our lives and to make them more organised. Time management is important for our daily lives. We tend to think that we can manage time. Time goes only forwards, not backwards. In many fictional stories the plot includes the invention of a time machine. The time machine enables people to relive past periods of time and change the events of the future ones, eventually. The time machine gives people the illusion that we can control time. This is quite a great illusion because the time we measure and the way we control it is not the same time that is in the vast space. Any definition of ours will not be able to describe in depth what the nature of time is. But scientists believe memory formation is the basis for human perception of time.

WORDS OF ADVICE FOR ADULTS

Don't lie to children so they can learn how to be honest.

Love children so they can learn to love.

Talk to the children so that they can learn to talk.

Listen to the children so that they can learn to listen.

Be patient with the children so that they can learn about patience.

Trust the children so that they can learn to trust each other.

Accept them as equals so that they can learn to be accepted as equals.

Love children unconditionally so that they too can learn about unconditional love.

Accept children as they are so that they can learn to be accepted as they are.

Believe in the boundless potential of children so they can learn to believe in their potential.

MEMORIES

Ramona Matei Art

All that we have ever known,

Every moment of our existence,

All that we have loved,

All that we have hated,

All the tears,

All the despair,

All the laughs,

And all the hope,

Is stacked up in our minds,

Like a giant library of memories,

So we can borrow and read them,

Learn our lessons,

To help us with the present and future.

MONEY

Money has a long journey in human societies. It has gone through barter deals and exchange of goods, metal coins, copper coins, golden and silver coins, paper notes, debit and credit cards to transform themselves to something we call ‘electronic money’. Today we live in societies in which money is almost invisible. They have a discrete but powerful electronic presence. But what is money? I am sure we all know the answer to this question and even more that we all have some kind of connection with money itself or with the idea of money. And writing about money could take different directions. In this text we will try to look at the historical development of money, about how money is used in mathematics and about the money’s influence in our lives.

Money is best described as a medium of exchange. The concept of money has been around since the dawn of human civilization. Money allows an individual to trade what they have for what they need or want. What is considered to be money has varied over the ages and has included diverse items. Currently, there are over 150 currencies used worldwide. 70% of the monetary value in the world is denoted in the U.S. dollar, Euro, U.K. pound, Japanese Yen, and Chinese Yuan.

Resources for GCSE Maths Foundation

Lessons presentations for non-profit educational purposes only!! The content of the presentations is from various sources.

1. PLACE VALUE
2. ROUNDING
3. ADDING AND SUBTRACTING
4. MULTIPLYING and DIVIDING
5. TERMS AND EXPRESSIONS
6. SIMPLIFYING EXPRESSIONS
7. INDICES
8. EXPANDING AND FACTORISING
9. ANGLES AND LINES
10.  TRIANGLES AND QUADRILATERALS
    

PROBABILITY

People are always interested in their future, and what will happen tomorrow is sometimes more important to us than what is happening now. Tomorrow is like compensation and a nice revenge for us. Most people are fascinated by tomorrow - What would our life look like? Am I going to be richer and prettier? It is like an escape from today. Because today is always guilty for something. That’s why we often try to predict the future. Sometimes our predictions are based on what we know and we have some choices to choose between. In this case we just use some techniques and methods to give more chances to some possible events to others. This kind of predictability is an object of Mathematics. When our predictions are not based on real fact it is hard to decide which event has more chances to occur in the future. In this case it is like playing blind game with no certain rules.

In this short text it won’t be possible to describe everything that relates somehow to probability. We will try to open the door so as to allow the curiosity to come in.

There are many situations in real life where we have to take a chance or risk. Based on certain situations, the chance of occurrence of a certain event can be easily predicted. In simple words, the chance of occurrence of a particular event is what we study in probability. 

Приказка на врабчето Рошко за Средната английска земя

Здравей, мой малки приятелю!

Отново ти пиша аз, врабчето Рошко! Надявам се, че си бил послушно дете, докато очакваше следващото ми писмо! Много е важно да слушаш родителите си, защото те знаят кое е най-добре за теб и много те обичат! Надявам се, че си се настанил удобно вече, защото имам да ти разказвам разни неща за големи приключения.

Пиша ти в момента от Средната английска земя. Правилно си се досетил, че тя се намира по средата на страната Англия. Тук е родното място на един голям английски поет – Уилям Шекспир. Ще научиш повече за него, като станеш голям и тръгнеш на училище.

В градчето Уорик пък се намира един от най-старите средновековни замъци на Англия – той така и се нарича „Замъкът Уорик”. Потрепервам само при споменаването му, защото тук ми се случи нещо, което бих искал по-скоро да забравя. Но ще побързам да ти го разкажа, защото ако първо аз го забравя и не го разкажа на никого, то няма да има и кой да помни доброто, което дойде след ужасното приключение.

И така, ще започна своя разказ за една страховита история, от която обаче аз, малкото врабче Рошко, показах на всички, че когато имаш смело сърце и се бориш за доброто, винаги побеждаваш.

Ти помниш вече, че в предното си писмо ти разказвах за топлото слънце на Аржентина. Хубаво е, когато има слънце, защото то ни кара да се усмихваме по-често и да сме добри. Аз лично не обичам студа, не обичам много и дъжда, защото хората са постоянно затворени в себе си, никой не се усмихва, на всички ужасно много им е студено и малките врабчета не могат да играят навън. А трябва постоянно да мисля да си сложа шала, ръкавиците и шапката, защото без тях ще се разболея и мама ще е тъжна. Аз не обичам да гледам моята мама тъжна и затова винаги я слушам за всичко.

Докато се препичах на топлото аржентийско слънце, получих писмо, че съм поканен на рожден ден в Средната английска земя. Един мой стар приятел, патокът Джак, навършваше цели четири годинки и ме канеше да отида заедно да отпразнуваме това голямо събитие. Ти представяш ли си какво е да си на цели четири години? Велика работа е това! И понеже обичам приятелите си, облякох най-новото си синьо палто, сложих си розово шалче, обух си зелените ботушки, нагласих си човката в жълт цвят, прибрах всичките си останали неща в един шарен куфар и се приготвих да потеглям. Обаче трябваше да се върна, защото забравих най-важното нещо за един рожден ден – подаръка. Всички се радваме, когато получаваме подарък на рождения си ден, нали? Сигурен съм, че и Джак щеше да се зарадва.

И понеже бях сигурен, че изглеждам добре, се огледах в огледалото за последно да си се порадвам просто. В първия момент малко се стъписах от това, че като че ли бях попрекалил с цветовете в облеклото си – от огледалото ме гледаше една усмихната дъга и всичките цветове на дъгата ми махаха отсреща. Може би все пак трябваше да си облека нещо по-скромно и да не прекалявам с цветовете? Вие как мислите?