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In just a few years, well-mannered self-driving robotaxis will share the roads with reckless, lawbreaking human drivers. That prospect is causing headaches for the people developing the robotaxis. A self-driving car would be programmed to drive at the speed limit — which humans frequently exceed by 10 to 15 miles per hour. Self-driving cars wouldn’t dare cross a double yellow line. But humans do it all the time. And then there are those odd local traffic customs to which humans quickly adapt. In Los Angeles, and other places, for instance, there’s the “California stop,” where drivers roll through stop signs if no traffic is crossing. In Southwestern Pennsylvania, courteous drivers practice the “Pittsburgh left,” where it’s customary to let one oncoming car turn left in front of them when a traffic light turns green. The same thing happens in Boston, Massachusetts. “There’s an endless list of these cases where we as humans know the context, we know when to bend the rules and when to break the rules,” said Raj Rajkumar, a computer engineering professor at Carnegie Mellon University who leads the school’s self-driving car research. Although driverless cars are likely to carry passengers or cargo in limited areas during the next three to five years, experts say it will take many years before robotaxis can coexist with human-piloted vehicles on most side streets, boulevards and freeways. That’s because programmers have to figure out human behavior and local traffic customs. And teaching a car to use that knowledge will require massive amounts of data and big computing power that is super expensive at the moment. “Driverless cars are very rule-based, and they don’t understand social graces,” said Missy Cummings, a Duke University professor who studies interactions between humans and self-driving cars. Driving customs and road conditions are dramatically different across the globe. There are narrow, busy streets in European cities, and a near free-for-all exists in the giant traffic jams of Beijing, China. In India’s capital, New Delhi, luxury cars share poorly marked lanes with bicycles, scooters, trucks and even an occasional cow or elephant. Then there is the problem of aggressive humans who make dangerous moves such as cutting cars off on freeways or turning left in front of oncoming traffic. Already there have been cases of human drivers pulling into the path of cars such as Teslas, knowing they will stop because they’re equipped with automatic emergency braking. “It’s hard to program-in human stupidity or someone who really tries to game the technology,” says John Hanson, spokesman for Toyota’s self-driving car unit. Kathy Winter, vice president of automated driving solutions for Intel, is optimistic that the cars will be able to see and think like humans before 2030. Cars with sensors designed to assist drivers are already gathering data about road signs, lane lines and human driver behavior. Winter hopes companies developing driverless systems and cars will contribute this information to a giant database. Artificial intelligence developed by Intel and other companies eventually could access the data and make quick decisions similar to humans, Winter says. Someday self-driving cars will have common sense programmed in, so that they will cross a double-yellow line when needed or speed up and find a gap to enter a freeway. Carnegie Mellon has taught its cars to handle the “Pittsburgh left” by waiting a full second or longer for an intersection to clear before proceeding at a green light. Still, some people involved in public safety say computerized cars will never be able to think exactly like humans. “You’ll never be able to make up a person’s ability to perceive what’s the right move at the time, I don’t think,” said New Jersey State Police Sergeant Ed Long.

Washington basketball fans have two reasons to be excited. The Wizards are still alive in the National Basketball Association (NBA) playoffs, and the Mystics should be very good this WNBA season. The Mystics made a blockbuster trade to acquire Elena Delle Donne over the offseason. Delle Donne is one of the best female players in the world. She is a three-time WNBA all-star and was voted the league’s most valuable player (MVP) for the 2015 season. Listed at 6 feet 5 inches tall, Delle Donne is not just big, she is also a terrific all-around player. She has averaged more than 20 points per game the past two seasons. She connected on 42.6 percent of her three-point attempts and 93.5 percent of her free throws last year. The Mystics added more than just Delle Donne. General manager and head coach Mike Thibault signed Kristi Toliver, a savvy point guard who helped the Los Angeles Sparks win the WNBA title in 2016. Finally, the Mystics added size with 6-5 center Krystal Thomas and energy with forward Asia Taylor. Put all these newcomers together with returning forward Emma Meesseman and guard Tayler Hill, who each scored more than 15 points a game last season, and the Mystics should have enough talent to challenge the WNBA’s top teams. They should definitely improve on last season’s sorry record of 13 wins and 21 losses. While Washington should be excited about the Mystics, basketball fans don’t seem excited about the WNBA. The league has been around for more than 20 years but still hasn’t attracted a big following. Despite a slight bump in attendance last season, the average WNBA game gets a little more than 7,500 fans. That’s a steady decline from the league’s second season, when it drew an average of 10,864 fans per game. By comparison, the NBA set a record for attendance this past season, averaging 17,884 fans a game. And the NBA has more teams and plays more games. Another problem for the women’s league is that very few fans watch the games on television. The WNBA games hardly make a bump in the TV ratings. A lot of fans — including kids — are missing out. The WNBA has the best women’s basketball players in the world. The games are fun, and tickets are a lot less expensive than most professional sports. So go see the Mystics. They open their 2017 season Sunday afternoon at Verizon Center against the San Antonio Stars. A team with that much talent won’t disappoint. Bowen is the author of 22 sports books for young readers. He will lead a sportswriting workshop for kids at the Gaithersburg Book Festival on May 20 at 1 p.m.

While fidget spinners keep on spinning, a new trend is oozing through middle schools nationwide: slime, a sticky homemade version of Silly Putty. Made from simple household ingredients (including glue, contact-lens solution and shaving cream), slime has become such a hit that some stores are running out of glue and offering slimemaking demonstrations. Slime-related accounts on Instagram, where some kids sell bags of the stuff for $1 to $5, have upward of 700,000 followers. The hashtag #slime has more than 2.8 million posts. Annabell Sorensen, a 12-year-old from Edina, Minnesota, describes the ideal slime as “stretchy, fun to play with and a little sticky.” Depending on the ingredients and amounts used, slime can end up too sticky, too stringy or too dry, she explained. Like many girls, she has personalized her favorite slime recipe, using food coloring, glitter and even little foam balls. Gigi Shapiro, a middle-schooler at Breck School in nearby Golden Valley, has been in the slime game for about three months. She sells her slime at school and lets classmates use her slime free for a class period to see if they might like to buy it. According to Gigi, slime is strictly a girl thing. “Boys aren’t as crafty in our grade,” she said. “Boys don’t have good luck with slime.” They tend to just poke at it or wrap it around their hands, when really they should stretch it or twist it. “They just can’t do it,” she said. “They have to have someone lead them.”. Annabell said she uses slime to help relax in class. “It kind of relieves stress when you’re overwhelmed at school,” she said. “Teachers think it’s a huge distraction, but it helps us.”. Some teachers at Breck and other schools have banished it from their classrooms. “Our priority is that our kids are learning, and we found that slime was more of a distraction,” said Stacy Glaus, the director of communications for Breck. “There are other ways for our kids to stay focused.”. Teachers aren’t the only ones struggling with slime. Rebecca Sorensen, Annabell’s mom, at first embraced the craze. “I was on board because I thought, ‘Yay, social interaction!’ ” Sorensen said. “I was so encouraging in the beginning because I was so happy to have them off their phones and doing something kidlike.”. When her family took a trip to California on spring break, slime helped Annabell bond with the kids she met. “It’s a conversation-starter,” Sorensen said. “It’s an icebreaker; it gets them talking.”. But then she started finding little plastic bags of slime stashed around the house — lots of little plastic bags of slime. “It started to take over our house,” she said. “We spent a weekend scrubbing the cabinets because everything had a film over it.”. There also have been some concerns about the safety of slime, because recipes can include borax, a cleaning product. But Liz Heinecke, an Edina-based kids’ science expert known as the Kitchen Pantry Scientist, said the danger is overblown. “I think it’s safe enough that I let my own kids make slime and play with it,” she said, “although I wouldn’t recommend eating it.”. — Minneapolis Star Tribune.

Diego Rosales was so terrified during his dental appointments when he was 4 that he kept biting his dentist. Today, the 9-year-old is far calmer, soothed by the presence of “Zucca,” a black Labrador that helps children like him with autism face one of their worst fears. A visit to the dentist can be daunting for any child, but it’s especially so for many with autism. They can be upset by the lights in their faces or frightened by the noises of the instruments. Some have to be sedated. Therapy dogs have been used in many countries to calm autistic children and aid people with many other conditions. Raul Varela began the practice in Chile after noticing that his autistic child’s interactions with other people improved after spending time with the family’s black Labrador. Varela quit his job and got certified by Spain-based Bocalan as a therapy dog trainer for children with autism. He started a nonprofit organization called Junto a Ti (“Next to You”) that specializes in visits to the dentist for autistic children. It uses six dogs, all female, because the organizers say they are more calm. And the dogs get specialized training. “Zucca had already been trained to be around children with autism, but taking her to the dentist was different,” Varela said. “She needed to be able to resist the screaming, the noise from the drill and to stay still in the lap of the children, even when they pull their hair or their ears.”. So far, the dogs have aided about 50 children visiting a single university-run dental clinic on the southern edge of Chile’s capital, Santiago. The clinic pays the equivalent of $67 for a session with a dog, though its charge for a child’s visit varies, depending on the family’s income. On a recent day, Diego sat in the dentist’s chair with Zucca on his lap. There was no biting and no screaming this time. Instead, Diego continued to pet Zucca long after the dentist had pulled out one of his teeth, and he smiled when he got to take the tooth home inside a tiny box for the tooth fairy.

If there’s a big-screen character you liked a few years ago, chances are that person is back for this summer of sequels. “Wimpy Kid” Greg Heffley can’t escape embarrassment in “The Long Haul.” The web-slinging superhero returns — but younger this time — for “Spider-Man: Homecoming.” And Jack Sparrow is still alive for the fifth “Pirates of the Caribbean” film, “Dead Men Tell No Tales.”. With so many sequels — and a few new kids movies — we had to narrow our list of recommendations. We’ve picked a half-dozen that offer action, laughs and maybe a bit of drama. We also have a suggestion on how to see lots of movies this summer without breaking the bank. Head to National Harbor, Rosslyn’s Gateway Park or Capitol Riverfront for free outdoor screenings of “Moana,” “The Secret Life of Pets,” “The Lego Batman Movie” and many more titles. You may have seen them before, but why not keep them fresh in your mind . “Diary of a Wimpy Kid: The Long Haul”. There’s more summer adventures for Greg, the awkward middle-schooler with the cringe-worthy family. The Heffleys are on a road trip to Grandma’s 90th birthday, but Greg and big brother Rodrick are plotting to go to a nearby video-game conference. Not all goes as planned. “Captain Underpants: The First Epic Movie”. Twenty years after Dav Pilkey published the first in his series of hugely popular books, the captain stars in an animated movie. In it, comics-loving pranksters Harold Hutchins and George Beard hypnotize their mean principal and make him think he’s a superhero they invented. Unfortunately, he doesn’t have superpowers to go with his super (strange) get-up. Score one for girl power: DC Comics’ warrior princess finally gets a title role. The story has an American pilot crash-landing near the isolated island where Diana is part of a tribe of Amazon women. The pilot tells her that the outside world is fighting “the war to end all wars.” She heads to London to put an end to World War I. “Spider-Man: Homecoming”. Comics action continues with the return of Spider-Man, who has to balance web-slinging with the challenging classes at his STEM high school. (That’s science, technology, engineering and math, of course.) Will he be able to defeat the evil Vulture and still ace his finals? Imagine “The Secret Life of Pets,” but with the tiny digital images. The little guys are leading busy lives in the city of Textopolis. One, named Gene, isn’t like the others, who express just one emotion. Gene wants a single facial expression, so he and two emoji friends travel through phone apps to find the code to fix him. Félicie, a French orphan, hopes to be a ballerina one day. She teams up with a fellow orphan, Victor, and escapes their small town for Paris. Félicie gets into the famous Paris Opera Ballet School by pretending to be someone else. But her dreams and talent take her only so far. Victor, who has his own dreams, and an unlikely mentor encourage her not to give up.

Ten students who shared their time and talents to serve others were honored Monday at the national Spirit of Community Awards in Washington. The volunteers, who are ages 11 to 18, aided the homeless, raised money for cancer research and provided underprivileged kids with school supplies, among other projects. They were chosen as state winners in February from among 31,000 middle school and high school volunteers nationwide based partly on their efforts and what kind of impact they made. The 102 state winners came to Washington over the weekend for the national awards, which included an appearance by Olympic gold medalist Michael Phelps. The awards are sponsored by Prudential Financial and come with a $5,000 scholarship and $5,000 for the winners’ charity of choice. State winners each receive $1,000. The winners are: ●Amal Bhatnagar, 18, of Duluth, Georgia, for starting a club to provide first-aid kits to people who lack health care access. ●Riley Callen, 14, of Pawlet, Vermont, for founding an annual “hike-a-thon” to raise money for brain-tumor research. ●Ariana DeMattei, 16, of Center Moriches, New York, for founding a program to raise money to provide new backpacks filled with school supplies for elementary students. ●Sarah (Katie) Eder, 17, of Shorewood, Wisconsin, for developing a creative-writing workshop for children in need where teens are the teachers. ●Bradley Ferguson, 16, of Northfield, New Jersey, for starting a service club that refurbished an American Legion post, collected and prepared food for homeless people, and grew produce at community gardens. ●Harmonie Frederick, 11, of Columbia, South Carolina, for raising money to fight cancer, conducting a coat drive and volunteering at a nursing home. ●Lorelei McIntyre-Brewer, 11, of Duncannon, Pennsylvania, for building a volunteer network that has provided special pillows for children undergoing heart surgery. ●Kelsey Norris, 13, of Bonaire, Georgia, for giving more than 1,000 volunteer hours and raising money for a wide variety of charities. ●Kenan Pala, 13, of San Diego, California, for raising money for local shelters and coordinating meals at shelter kitchens. ●Meghana Reddy, 18, of La Mesa, California, for using 3-D printers to produce artificial hands for those who cannot afford them. The state honorees from the Washington, D.C., area were: D.C.: Debora Abera and Ayomide Okuleye. Virginia: Lucia Hoerr of Charlottesville and Shishir Sriramoju of Ashburn.

French President-elect Emmanuel Macron began his transition to power Monday, a day after he handily defeated Marine Le Pen, the candidate for the ultraconservative National Front party, in a runoff election. Macron, who appeared with current President François Hollande at a World War II remembrance ceremony, announced a visit to Germany and a name change for his centrist political movement, which when translated into English was called Forward but will be called Republic on the Move. He must pull together a majority of lawmakers for the party to run in the mid-June legislative election. Macron has promised that half of those candidates will be new to elected politics. Macron won the presidency with 66 percent of votes cast for a candidate, but the vote saw a high number of blank or spoiled votes and unusually low turnout. Le Pen says she will lead the opposition to Macron. Monday was the first time Macron and Hollande had appeared in public together since Macron resigned in August 2016 as Hollande’s economy minister to run for president — a decision that was received coldly by the French leader at the time. On Monday, though, Hollande gripped Macron’s arm before the two men walked side by side and then announced the transfer of power would take place Sunday. Monday also marked decades of peace in Western Europe, something Macron highlighted in his campaign against Le Pen. Le Pen had called for France to leave the 28-nation European Union and drop the shared euro currency in favor of bringing back the French franc. Sylvie Goulard, a French deputy to the European Parliament, said Macron would make Berlin, Germany, his first official visit, with perhaps a stop to see French troops stationed abroad as well. Macron, who is 39, will be the youngest leader of France since Napoleon ruled in the country around the start of the 19th century.

After I returned from a long walk, I noticed what looked like bees flying around a small hole in the ground. Without thinking, I picked up a small rock and tossed it at the hole to see if I could make a “basket.” Two seconds later, the buzzing insects came after me like a squadron of jets attacking Godzilla. By the time I got into my house, I’d been stung three times and confessed to my wife that she married a knucklehead! Bees and wasps usually don’t go out of their way to sting you. In most cases, they sting humans because we’ve threatened them. What I encountered were probably yellow jackets, which are wasps and are very protective of their nests. One of my patients went outside without shoes and got stung when she accidentally stepped on a bee. Another one got stung at a picnic when he reached into his back pocket for a napkin and found a bee (or possibly a wasp) instead. Bees are attracted to bright colors and certain smells. In most cases, they set their sights on flowers. However, they will investigate a human if you resemble a flower. Brightly colored clothing and sticky hands are perfect triggers for busy bees. Yellow jackets are attracted to human food and sugary drinks. The best way to avoid getting stung is to keep your hands and face clean when you’re outside and to be watchful if there are any bees or wasps nearby. But it’s generally not a good idea to swat at them, because they may sting you in self-defense. (I suggest not throwing rocks at them as well!). A sting can be much worse for the bee than for you. In honeybees, the stinger is torn from the insect’s body when it pulls away from you, killing the bee. (Wasps and bumblebees, however, keep their stingers.) It’s important to see whether the stinger is still in your skin. You shouldn’t remove the stinger with your fingers or a pair of tweezers because you could end up pushing more venom into your body. The best way to remove a stinger involves using a credit card or similar object. First, place the card against your skin at an angle. Next, push the card toward the stinger to gently detach it from your skin. (The movement is similar to the way you shovel snow from a sidewalk.) Because it’s upsetting to be stung, it’s best if an adult removes the stinger for you. Once the stinger has been removed, or if it wasn’t there in the first place, wash the area with soap and water and apply ice to reduce the swelling. You can also take pain medicine if needed, with a parent or caretaker’s help. It’s common for bee stings to become swollen. The swelling can last for a few days. If the area becomes redder and more painful, call the doctor to make sure it hasn’t become infected. Some people are allergic to bee stings. They may get hives, a rash that is treated with antihistamines such as Benadryl. If someone develops signs of a more severe allergic reaction (swollen lips, difficulty breathing, chest tightness, etc. ), an adult should call 911 for urgent medical attention. Bees are wonderful creatures that are essential for the ecosystem, because they pollinate plants. They also produce honey and beeswax that enrich our lives. Wasps pollinate and help get rid of other insects. In most cases, if you don’t bother them, they won’t bother you.

Marbled paper coverings for fancy books and journals have been around for centuries. The paper features colors swirling around each other unevenly to make a unique pattern. But it’s not just paper that can be turned into something beautiful through marbling. We’d bet that a certain someone would love a bouquet of flowers in a custom-made marbled vase. (Hint: Mother’s Day is Sunday, May 14.) You may think this project looks difficult and expensive. It’s not. You can find the materials at your local craft store for about $10. The only trick to marbling is thinning the paint: It shouldn’t be too thick or too runny. And remember, you need a few days to let the paint dry. Great artwork, after all, can’t be rushed. Adult’s help: Yes. Total time: About 3 days. • Newspaper or craft paper. • Glass vase, clean and dry. • Acrylic paints (at least two colors). • Small paper cups (Dixie cup or other brand). • Plastic spoon or other stirrer. • Plastic wrap. • Clear spray sealant, glossy. Spread newspaper or craft paper on your workspace. Add a small amount of water (start with 1⁄2 teaspoon for every 2 tablespoons of paint) to thin the paint. Stir the paint and water until mixed. Tilt the cup gently to make sure the paint moves around the bottom of the cup. Pour a small amount of each thinned paint into the bottom of the vase. Slowly turn the vase sideways and roll back and forth to cover the lower part of the vase. (Be sure to do this over newspapers.) Add more paint and continue to turn until the inside of the entire vase is covered. Place vase upside down either in a plastic cup, if the cup will not fall over, or on a paper plate covered with plastic wrap. (The wrap makes it easier to remove the vase.) If paint has gotten on the outside of the vase, wipe it off with a damp sponge. Let dry overnight, then change plastic wrap or cup to remove built-up paint. Continue drying for 24 hours, then turn right side up and dry for 24 to 48 hours. Touch the inside of the vase gently to make sure the paint has dried. Shake the can of spray sealant. Have an adult help spray the sealant into the vase to protect the paint from water damage. Allow to dry for 2 to 3 hours. More craft ideas: Create your own photo blocks. Try these chalkboard flower pots.

Crayola’s new crayon color will be based on a blue pigment discovered in 2009. Scientists at Oregon State University accidentally discovered the brilliant blue color when they were experimenting with materials that could be used in electronics. Crayola said Friday that it’s partnering on the new crayon with Oregon State and the Shepherd Color Company, which licenses the pigment known as YInMn (pronounced yin-min) blue. The crayon maker recently retired the color dandelion. Crayola is leaving it to fans to come up with a name for the replacement crayon, which will make its debut this year.

The call of the wild is getting harder to hear. Peaceful, natural sounds — bird songs, rushing rivers and rustling grass — are sometimes being drowned out by noise from people in many of America’s protected parks and wilderness areas, a new study finds. Scientists measured sound levels at 492 places, from city parks to remote federal wilderness. They calculated that in nearly two-thirds of the parks in the Lower 48 states, everywhere but Alaska and Hawaii, the noise can at times be twice the natural background level. That’s because of airplanes, cars, logging, mining, and oil and gas drilling. The noise increase can harm wildlife, making it harder for them to find food or mates, and make it harder for people to hear those natural sounds, the researchers said. Colorado State University biologist George Wittemyer said people hear only half the sounds that they would in natural silence. “They’re being drowned out,” said Wittemyer, a co-author of the study in Thursday’s journal Science. In about one in five public lands, there’s a tenfold increase in noise pollution, the study found. “It’s something that’s sort of happening slowly,” Wittemyer said. Except for city parks, though, the researchers are not talking about sound levels that people would consider unusually loud. Even the tenfold increases they write about are often the equivalent of changing from the quiet of a rural area to a pretty silent library. But that difference masks a lot of sounds that are crucial, especially to birds seeking mates and animals trying to hunt or avoid being hunted, Wittemyer said. And it does make a difference for people’s peace of mind, he said. “Being able to hear the birds, the waterfalls, the animals running through the grasslands ... the wind going through the grass,” Wittemyer said. “Those are really valuable and important sounds for humans to hear and help in their rejuvenation and their self-reflection.”. The research team, which includes a special unit of the National Park Service, not only measured sounds across the United States, but it also used elaborate computer programs and artificial learning systems to determine what sounds were natural and what sounds were made by people. For Rachel Buxton, the study’s lead author, researching noise pollution is personal. She points to a Thanksgiving-weekend hike last year with her husband in the La Garita Wilderness in southern Colorado. “We went to escape the crowds. We went to be totally isolated and have a real wilderness experience,” Buxton recalled. “As we’re hiking, aircraft goes overhead. You’re walking along and you can hear the jet coming for ages.”. But there are still places where you can get away from it all, Buxton said, highlighting Great Sand Dunes National Park in Colorado. Read more KidsPost: As Junior Rangers, kids can help protect our national parks. How did the National Park Service get started?

“Star Wars” fans with deep pockets might consider it a golden opportunity. A jewelry store in Tokyo, Japan, is offering life-size Darth Vader masks made of 24-karat gold at a hefty price of $1.4 million to mark the 40th anniversary of the release of the first “Star Wars” movie. The creation measures roughly 10 inches wide by 12 inches tall. The Ginza Tanaka store says the masks are not designed for wearing — at about 33 pounds, they would be too heavy, and they have no opening for a head. While the masks are its most expensive “Star Wars” memorabilia, the jeweler has made pricier products. In 2013, a gold Disney-themed Christmas tree was priced at $4.5 million. Marketing manager Hirotsugu Tsuchiya said it took 10 goldsmiths three months to mold and assemble the prototype. “The most difficult aspect was that each section of the mask was created by a different gold craftsman and then assembled to make one Darth Vader mask,” Tsuchiya said. Orders for the mask can be made at its main store in the glitzy Ginza shopping area, where the prototype is on display. Customers will have to wait three months after ordering. For those looking for less expensive options, gold coins engraved with Yoda or Luke Skywalker will also be available starting at $1,200. They will go on sale Thursday, which is May 4, celebrated by some fans as Star Wars Day because “May the fourth” sounds like the film’s often-repeated line, “May the force be with you.”.

“The best-laid plans of mice and men often go awry.” Robert Burns, a Scottish poet, wrote those words more than 200 years ago. He meant that even if you try your best to make a plan, things may still not turn out as you expected. I have been thinking of that famous Burns quote this past week. Here’s why. Adam Eaton: The Washington Nationals traded three top pitching prospects for center fielder Adam Eaton this past winter. The trade looked brilliant for the first month of the season. Eaton scored 24 runs in 23 games as the Nats’ leadoff hitter. Listed at just 5 feet 8 inches tall, Eaton was also a kids favorite because he was always hustling and had a cool nickname: “Mighty Mouse.”. Bad luck struck last week, when Eaton landed poorly on first base and injured his knee. He will be out for the rest of the season. Michael A. Taylor will take Eaton’s spot in center field. The Nats should still be good, but this is not the lineup they were planning on. The Capitals: The Washington Capitals have been working and planning to get to the Stanley Cup Finals for years. This season, everything seemed to be going right. The Caps had a powerful offense led by veteran stars such as Alex Ovechkin and Nicklas Backstrom. Late in the season, they picked up defenseman Kevin Shattenkirk to solidify the back line for the playoffs. So what happened? They beat the Toronto Maple Leafs in the first round, but fell behind the Pittsburgh Penguins two games to one going into Wednesday night’s game. The Caps still have a chance. But things are not turning out as they had planned. (Pittsburgh star Sidney Crosby was out Wednesday with a concussion, so the Penguins may need a new plan, too.). NFL draft: National Football League teams scout players for months, study film, interview, weigh, measure and test everyone before they make their choices in the NFL draft. After the draft, teams declare they are pleased with their picks. Coaches often say they were “shocked” that some quarterback, tackle or wide receiver was still available when their team selected him. An analysis of the 32 NFL teams’ picks in The Washington Post sports section on Sunday gave 24 teams a grade of B, B-plus or B-minus (meaning good) and four teams A or A-minus (excellent). Only one team (the Chicago Bears) received a poor grade. Really? My guess is that in a few years the teams will look back and be less than pleased with their draft choices. Players get injured, and others disappoint. Teams will have to come up with another plan. Because Robert Burns was right. In sports, “the best-laid plans of mice and men often go awry.”. And Burns wasn’t even a sportswriter. Bowen writes the sports opinion column for KidsPost. He is the author of 22 sports books for kids. His latest book — “Outside Shot” — was published in March.

Workers in Nepal have put the finishing touches on a 48-foot-tall wooden chariot, the centerpiece of a centuries-old festival that is meant to bring a generous rainfall and successful harvest for the mountainous nation in South Asia. “We have to build it strong so that it does not collapse. If anything happens to the chariot, there will be bad luck for the country,” said Krishna Dangol, 63. Dangol’s family has built the chariot, a vehicle used in ancient times, for generations. It carries a statue of a Hindu and Buddhist rain god, Rato Machindranath, during a festival near Nepal’s capital of Kathmandu (pronounced cat-man-dew). Pulled by thick ropes, the chariot began rolling through narrow city streets Sunday. The festival continues for a month. This is believed to be the 1,350th year for the chariot. Craftsmen paint eyes on its wheels and cover its wooden beams with leaves. “We are working for the gods to bring good fortune for the people of the country,” Dangol said. — Associated Press.

You might think that the United States is a pretty safe place to be a journalist. In nations such as China and Syria, independent journalists are often jailed and sometimes killed for doing their jobs. In the United States, such danger is not typical. But a recent report shows that the country is not a shining example of press freedom. Reporters Without Borders, which monitors press freedom around the world, has been ranking at least 139 countries since 2002 on how well they protect journalists and allow them to do their jobs. The United States ranked 43rd of 180 nations this year. Two years ago its ranking was 49th, and in 2007 it was 48th. Only once in the past 15 years has the country ranked higher than 20th. Why doesn’t the United States get top marks? The organization mentions several reasons. The Trump administration has blocked some journalists’ White House access. Reporters have been arrested while covering protests. The Obama administration pressured journalists to reveal sources of government “leaks,” or information that wasn’t intended to be made public. In 2013, government lawyers secretly took two months’ worth of phone records from Associated Press journalists. And the government has been slow or has sometimes refused to provide public information to reporters. So as we mark World Press Freedom Day on Wednesday, we wanted to share your thoughts on whether the free-press guarantees in the Constitution were still important. We asked readers in grades four through eight to share their ideas. Jahnavi said she has studied freedom of the press in her civics class at Lake Braddock Secondary School. She reads the newspaper and watches world news on TV with her parents. The 14-year-old wants to be an aerospace engineer when she grows up. In her essay, Jahnavi ties her interest in science and technology to freedom of the press. “I read a lot about new technology,” Jahnavi said. “I always want to know if that’s true. I don’t want to think something is true and later find out that it’s not true. I feel that free press and technology go hand in hand.”. Jahnavi makes a compelling case for why we still need the protection for a free press that James Madison included in the First Amendment. For her winning essay, she will receive four tickets to the Newseum, along with a KidsPost T-shirt and other goodies. Here is her essay: — Arihan Dixit, sixth grade, Ashburn, Virginia. — Tawj Tymus, sixth grade, Washington, D.C.

Ten eastern black rhinos have been relocated from South Africa to Rwanda’s Akagera National Park, 10 years after the poaching-threatened animal was last seen in the park, authorities said Tuesday. The relocation is the result of Rwanda’s collaboration with African Parks, which manages protected areas for governments across the continent. “Rhinos are one of the great symbols of Africa, yet they are severely threatened and are on the decline in many places across the continent due to the . . . illegal rhino horn trade,” African Parks chief Peter Fearnhead said in a statement. “The rhino’s return to this country, however, is a testament to Rwanda’s extraordinary commitment to conservation.”. Up to 20 eastern black rhinos will be transferred to Rwanda this month. The Rwanda Development Board called the relocation “a historic move for the nation and the species.”. About 1,000 eastern black rhinos remain in the wild. The last sighting of a rhino in Akagera was in 2007. In the 1970s, more than 50 black rhinos thrived there, but their numbers declined under pressure from poachers, African Parks said. Akagera is now safe for the rhinos because there are security measures, including a rhino tracking and protection team, African Parks said. — Associated Press.

Schools won’t have to cut more salt from meals just yet, and some will be able to serve kids fewer whole grains, under changes to federal nutrition standards announced Monday. The move by the Trump administration partially rolls back rules championed by former first lady Michelle Obama as part of her healthful eating initiative. As his first major action in office, Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue said the department will delay an upcoming requirement to lower the amount of sodium, or salt, in meals while continuing to allow some schools to avoid rules that all grains on the lunch line must be 50 percent whole grain. Schools could also serve 1 percent flavored milk instead of the nonfat now required. “If kids aren’t eating the food, and it’s ending up in the trash, they aren’t getting any nutrition — thus undermining the intent of the program,” said Perdue, who traveled to a school in Leesburg, Virginia, to make the announcement. Before he signed the proclamation, Perdue and Senate Agriculture Chairman Pat Roberts ate chicken nuggets, fruit and salad with children at Catoctin Elementary. Perdue said he doesn’t see the changes as a rollback, but “we’re just slowing down the process.” He praised Obama’s nutrition efforts as first lady but said he wants the healthier meals to be more palatable. He said the department will work on long-term solutions to further tweak the rules. The changes reflect suggestions from the School Nutrition Association, which represents school nutrition directors and companies that sell food to schools. The group often battled with the Obama administration, which phased in the healthier school meal rules starting in 2012. The Obama administration rules set fat, sugar and salt limits on foods in the lunch line and beyond. Schools have long been required to follow government nutrition rules if they accept federal money for free and reduced-price meals for low-income students, but these standards were stricter. Obama pushed the changes as part of her “Let’s Move” campaign to fight childhood obesity. The Trump administration changes leave most of the Obama administration rules in place, including rules that students must take fruits and vegetables on the lunch line. Some schools have asked for changes to that policy, saying students often throw them away. But health advocates who have championed the rules are concerned about the freeze in sodium levels, in particular. School lunches for elementary school students are now required to have less than 1,230 milligrams of sodium. The changes would keep the meals at that level, delaying until at least 2020 a requirement to lower sodium to 935 milligrams. That requirement was scheduled to begin in the 2017-2018 school year. “By forgoing the next phase of sodium reduction, the Trump Administration will be locking in dangerously high sodium levels in school lunch,” said Margo Wootan of the Center for Science in the Public Interest. Becky Domokos-Bays, the nutrition director for Loudoun County, including Catoctin Elementary, said she has had a hard time adjusting sodium in popular foods she serves. Kids like her chicken noodle soup, she says, but rejected it when she lowered the sodium content because it was thinner and had less taste. About 20 people, including Leesburg Mayor Kelly Burk, showed up at the school to support the healthier meals. One sign read: “Sonny — Our children do not want big business soda, chips and fries!”.

Each year, 1,500 babies are born in the United States without part or all of their arm, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Many more children lose fingers or hands in accidents. Often, they overcome their limitations thanks to medical replacements. But kids quickly outgrow these devices, which cost thousands of dollars. Now, sixth-grade science students at Alexandria Country Day School (ACDS) in Virginia are joining thousands of volunteers around the world in adding new meaning to the phrase “Let me give you a hand.” The students are using 3-D printers to create free prosthetics, or artificial limbs, for kids. There are no motors or electronics in these robotic-looking, plastic hands. The model ACDS. chose, the Raptor Reloaded, requires a bendable wrist to work. Flex the wrist downward, and the fingers and thumb can grip things such as bottles, balls, books or bicycle handles. Raise the wrist to release its grip. The students partnered with the nonprofit group Enabling the Future (also known as e-Nable), which matches completed hands to kids in need around the world. With access to a 3-D printer, a hand can be produced for less than $50. Taylor Grace Peterson, 12, seemed in awe as she said, “It’s pretty cool how you can make a hand for a kid who needs one, and it doesn’t cost a lot of money.”. The prostheses are created from common materials: plastic filament, nylon cord, fishing line, Velcro and screws. Depending on the hand’s size and the speed of the 3-D printer, melting the filament to build Raptor’s 36 parts usually takes 10 to 18 hours. Rough edges are smoothed, then the pieces are hooked together. Screws and fishing line adjust the fingers’ grip — like adjusting tension on guitar strings. Nylon cord helps control the grip’s release. Velcro secures the prosthetic to the recipient’s wrist. The class, working in teams, followed written and video instructions to assemble the prosthetics. “Let’s try this,” “These are really cheerful looking,” “It really takes patience to get the line through these small. holes” were some of the comments heard as the students practiced problem-solving. Within 90 minutes, nine prosthetics neared completion. “We can’t rush these,” science teacher Scott Lieberman said. “They have to work properly.”. The first recipient will be a 10-year-old boy in New Mexico who was born without a left hand. He is a huge Denver Broncos fan. So the prosthesis, built to his measurements, is orange and blue — the team’s colors. “The beautiful part of it being so cheap to build,” Lieberman said, “is if the prototype we send next week isn’t perfect, we can adjust it and send him another one.”. Kids needing hands can even learn how to make their own prosthetics. E-Nable’s volunteers will walk them and their families through the process. As the child grows, hands can be re-sized or repaired. These devices increase a child’s independence. But as 12-year-old Alban Erdle pointed out, there’s also a social benefit. “Having a second hand that looks cool helps them fit in better.”. Those who have experience with and access to a 3-D printer might want to try making a simple prosthetic hand. Designs and directions are free from e-Nable. Check out the Prosthetic Kids Hand Challenge at handchallenge.com.

Simone Biles has been busy. There was the tour with Kellogg’s in the fall, a victory lap through 36 cities where she performed with her gymnastics teammates from the Summer Games in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Then she published a best-selling memoir, “Courage to Soar,” went on her first date, attended the Golden Globe Awards and celebrated her 20th birthday. And, yes, she’s started showing her moves on the ABC television show “Dancing With the Stars,” dancing the Brazilian samba to the Destiny’s Child song “Survivor” — “I’m not gon’ give up, I’m not gon’ stop, I’m gon’ work harder” — to avoid elimination last Monday. Three days later, she was high-fiving students in the halls of Arlington Science Focus Elementary School in Virginia in her first appearance as a spokeswoman for the Foundation for Advancing Alcohol Responsibility. She took time off from her six-hours-a-day dance training to talk with kids about Rio, peer pressure and the dangers of underage drinking. “I just realized I’m really short,” she said, laughing while greeting kids who nearly reached her height (about 4 feet 9 inches). “Yes,” Biles said, walking across the gym floor with a mic in hand, wearing a white tank top and maroon leggings. “You just have to have confidence in yourself.”. Did she have to give anything up to become such a great athlete? “Late nights with friends,” of course. Was it hard to dance on television? “I’ve been barefoot my whole life,” she said, “so I call my shoes the devil.”. When Biles was a baby, her birth mother struggled with drug and alcohol addictions. Biles and her younger sister lived in foster care for a time before being adopted by their grandfather and his wife and growing up near Houston, Texas. She’s now working with an organization that helps foster children (kids who don’t have parents who can care for them), in addition to speaking out against underage drinking. “You don’t need to drink like all the other kids just to feel cool,” Biles told KidsPost. “You’ll be a lot healthier if you don’t do it” — scientists have found that alcohol can cause brain damage, especially in teenagers — “and 21 is not an old age to wait to, you know?”. Biles said she joined “Dancing With the Stars” to try something new but also to show that she’s “normal.” People “always see me in the gym,” she said, “but they only ever see me at my best, not whenever I’m frustrated, crying, trying to learn something. So they think I’m perfect, but no one is.”. Despite setting a U.S. women’s gymnastics record with four gold medals at the 2016 Olympics, Biles insists that she’s pretty much a normal person. She likes oatmeal for breakfast and sometimes treats herself to pizza and ice cream for dinner. Her favorite subject is social studies (she’s planning to attend college eventually, maybe at the University of California at Los Angeles), and she says she has struggled at times with doubts about her abilities. Oatmeal, social studies and occasional self-doubt — these are all pretty normal things. But Biles does say she has an unusual way of relaxing: bowling. “I’m not the best,” she said, in part because she’s missed many years of potential practice to focus on gymnastics. “But I try.”.

The London Marathon started five days ago, and Tom Harrison is nearly done. It’s not that he’s a slow runner. It’s that he’s a slow crawler, particularly wearing his gorilla suit. The man dubbed Mr. Gorilla is raising money for the Gorilla Organization — so far more than $29,000 has been pledged — by traveling 26.2 miles on hands and feet (or sometimes hands and knees). He’s hopeful of finishing the race Saturday, with his two sons awaiting him at the finish line. They will, naturally, be wearing gorilla suits. Harrison ran the marathon last year in a gorilla suit to raise money for the endangered species but decided this year to try something harder, something that would possibly raise more money. Kneepads brought little relief and were ditched on the first day. “It’s shoulders, hamstrings, glutes, quads, from the constant crouching,” he says. “We’re not really designed to do that.”. Harrison has taken breaks, including overnight stops, according to the Mr. Gorilla Twitter account. Harrison, who works as a police officer, says the money will be used to protect endangered gorillas in Africa by sponsoring ranger services and helping people living near gorilla habitats to be more self-sufficient. He was inspired by a trip he took to Uganda and Rwanda in November and decided to do more to help protect them. The gorilla crawl has proved popular with people along the route. He’s been serenaded by children, high-fived by pedestrians and even received a banana or two from thoughtful strangers.

A startling new report asserts that the first known Americans arrived much, much earlier than scientists thought — more than 100,000 years ago — and maybe they were Neanderthals. If true, the finding would drastically change the widely accepted date of about 15,000 years ago. Researchers say a site in Southern California shows evidence of humanlike behavior from about 130,000 years ago, when bones and teeth of an elephant-like mastodon were evidently smashed with rocks. The earlier date means the bone-smashers were not necessarily members of our own species, Homo sapiens. The researchers speculate that these early Californians could have instead been species known only from fossils in Europe, Africa and Asia: Neanderthals, a little-known group called Denisovans, or another human forerunner named Homo erectus. “The very honest answer is, we don’t know,” said Steven Holen, lead author of the paper and director of the nonprofit Center for American Paleolithic Research in Hot Springs, South Dakota. No remains of any individuals were found. Whoever they were, they could have arrived by land or sea. They might have come from Asia via the Beringea land bridge that used to connect Siberia to Alaska, or maybe come across by watercraft along the Beringea coast or across open water to North America, before turning south to California, Holen said in a telephone interview. Holen and others present their evidence in a paper released Wednesday by the journal Nature. Not surprisingly, many experts don’t think there is enough proof to back up the report. The research dates back to the winter of 1992-1993. The site was unearthed during a routine dig by researchers during a freeway expansion project in San Diego. Analysis of the find was delayed to find the right expertise, said Tom Demere, curator of paleontology at the San Diego Natural History Museum, another author of the paper. The Nature analysis focuses on remains from a single mastodon and five stones found nearby. The mastodon’s bones and teeth were evidently placed on two stones used as anvils and smashed with three stone hammers, to get at nutritious marrow and create raw material for tools. Patterns of damage on the limb bones looked like what happened in experiments when elephant bones were smashed with rocks. And the bones and stones were found in two areas, each roughly centered on what’s thought to be an anvil. The stones measured about eight inches to 12 inches long and weighed up to 32 pounds. They weren’t handcrafted tools, Demere said. The users evidently found them and brought them to the site. The excavation also found a mastodon tusk in a vertical position, extending down into older layers, which may indicate it had been jammed into the ground as a marker or to create a platform, Demere said. The fate of the visitors is not clear. Maybe they died out without leaving any descendants, he said. Experts not connected with the study provided a range of reactions. “If the results stand up to further [examination], this does indeed change everything we thought we knew,” said Chris Stringer of the Natural History Museum in London. Neanderthals and Denisovans are the most likely identities of the visitors, he said. Denisovans, more closely related to Neanderthals than to us, are known from fossils found in a Siberian cave. But “many of us will want to see supporting evidence of this ancient occupation from other sites, before we abandon the conventional model of a first arrival by modern humans within the last 15,000 years,” he wrote in an email. Erella Hovers of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and the Institute of Human Origins at Arizona State University in Tempe, who wrote a commentary accompanying the work, said in an email that the archaeological interpretation seemed convincing. Some other experts said the age estimate appears sound. But some were skeptical that the rocks were really used as tools. Vance Holliday of the University of Arizona in Tucson said the paper shows the bones could have been broken the way the authors assert, but they haven’t demonstrated that’s the only way. Richard Potts of the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of Natural History, said he doesn’t reject the paper’s claims outright, but he finds the evidence “not yet solid.” For one thing, the dig turned up no basic stone cutting tools or evidence of butchery or the use of fire, as one might expect from Homo sapiens or our close relatives. The lead author, Holen, told reporters Tuesday that he and co-authors were ready for such criticism. “We expected skepticism because of the extremely old age of this site,” he said.

The first round of the National Football League draft will take place Thursday night in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. In the draft, the NFL’s 32 teams pick from among the best college. players to play on their teams next season. Six more rounds of picks will follow on Friday and Saturday. The NFL draft is a big event. Thousands of football fans watch it in person and millions more watch on television. NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell announces the picks. The players selected celebrate with their families and friends. (Early picks sign contracts that are worth millions of dollars.) And there is endless analysis of the players picked by people who are called draft experts. The first NFL draft also was held in Philadelphia, but it was nothing like today’s draft. The NFL did not have a player draft in the early years following the founding of the league in 1920. Teams recruited any players they could, and the players signed contracts with whatever team they wanted. Most of the best players signed with the best teams, such as the Chicago Bears, New York Giants and Green Bay Packers. Bert Bell, the owner of the Philadelphia Eagles and later the commissioner of the NFL, came up with the idea of a player draft. Under Bell’s plan, the team with the worst record the year before would select the first player. The remaining teams would follow, with the team with the best record picking last. Guess which team had the worst record. That’s right, Bell’s Philadelphia Eagles. The owners of the then nine NFL teams gathered at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel in Philadelphia on February 8, 1936. There was no television, radio or even newspaper coverage of the draft. Baseball, boxing and horse racing were. much more popular sports than professional football in the 1930s. There also were no scouts or much information about the players selected. The owners simply posted a list of 90 graduating college players on the wall. The owners picked from the list. The Eagles picked Jay Berwanger, a running back from the University of Chicago, as the first pick in the draft. Berwanger had been named the outstanding college player in 1935. Berwanger, however, did not sign a contract to play with the Eagles. Instead he became a sportswriter and later a successful businessman. Fewer than 30 of the 81 players selected in the first NFL draft ever played in the league. One player who was drafted but did not play in the NFL became a famous college football coach. Paul “Bear” Bryant won more than 300 games at Maryland, Kentucky, Texas A&M and Alabama. As I said, the first NFL player draft was very different from today’s draft. I doubt any of the draft picks will pass up an NFL contract to become a sportswriter! Bowen writes the sports opinion column for KidsPost. He’s the author of 22 kids sports books, including three about football.

A stadium-size balloon began collecting data in the upper reaches of Earth’s atmosphere Wednesday, a crucial step in a NASA mission to study mysterious particles from deep space. The balloon was launched Tuesday from Wanaka, New Zealand, after seven planned launches were canceled because of bad weather. The unmanned balloon is nearly 19 million cubic feet large when fully inflated and is designed to circle the planet two or three times at an altitude of 110,000 feet. You can track its progress online at the project’s website. The instrument it carries should help scientists such as Angela Olinto, the mission’s lead investigator, learn more about particles of ultra-high energy that reach the atmosphere after traveling from beyond the galaxy. “The origin of these particles is a great mystery that we’d like to solve,” she said in a statement. “Do they come from massive black holes at the center of galaxies?

Jeff Kinney remembers when his goal was to write a book, one big book, for grown-ups. “I thought I’d write about a year in the life of a typical kid,” says the children’s author known to millions for his “Diary of a Wimpy Kid” series. “I’d write one book that was between 700 and 1,000 pages long, and I’d look at every aspect of childhood within that time frame ... I was writing for the humor section of the bookstore, not the middle-grade section.”. Kinney spoke to the Associated Press recently as he looked back at the decade since “Diary of a Wimpy Kid” made him one of the world’s most popular writers. The first 11 novels have sold more than 180 million copies, and the series has been the basis for four movies, with the latest, “Diary of a Wimpy Kid: The Long Haul,” scheduled to be in theaters May 19. Abrams Books said the 12th book, coming November 7, will be called “Diary of a Wimpy Kid: The Getaway.”. The misadventures of middle-schooler Greg Heffley, sketched in readers’ minds as a skinny boy with a round head and precious few strands of hair, have stood out in two ways in the book world — they appeal equally to girls and boys (sometimes known euphemistically as “reluctant readers”), and they have consistently sold more than 1 million copies in hardcover, an achievement few books attain anymore thanks in part to the rise of e-books and the fall of the Borders superstore chain. “The books are funny and appeal to all levels of readers,” says Judy Bulow, lead buyer for the children’s section of the Tattered Cover bookstore in Denver, Colorado. “If there’s not a new ‘Wimpy Kid’ book, they want something like it.”. Kinney, 46, is a Fort Washington, Maryland, native who studied at the University of Maryland, College Park, and while in school created a comic strip that ran in the campus newspaper. Kinney, speaking by phone near the bookstore that he and his wife, Julie, own in Plainville, Massachusetts, recalls how Heffley had been on his mind for years before he got a book deal. He liked the idea of a kid defined not by heroics, but by “flaws and imperfections,” like what the author saw in himself. Heffley was introduced to many in 2004 through a Funbrain.com Web series that Kinney published for free that attracted millions of visitors. Two years later, Kinney attended the first New York Comic-Con. He stopped by the Abrams booth and spoke to Abrams editorial director Charles Kochman, who recalls Kinney asking him if he would look at his work. “At these shows you’re constantly getting pitched stuff, and most of it is forgettable,” says Kochman, who still edits Kinney. “As he handed it to me, he said, ‘I have this Web comic called ‘Diary of a Wimpy Kid,’ and the image he showed me was the image we used for Book One. I remember thinking, ‘I wish something like this had been around when I was a kid.’”. The series debuted in April 2007 with a first printing of 25,000 copies and early praise from Publishers Weekly, which cited Kinney’s “gift for believable preteen dialogue and narration.” The book was on the New York Times’ bestseller list by May and remained there long after. Kinney, meanwhile, learned that his work had caught on with an unexpected audience. “Once the book came out, I started getting emails from teachers thanking me, saying almost 95 percent of the time, ‘You got my reluctant reader to read,’” Kinney says. “I had never heard that phrase before. And I found out that it was a big deal, that ‘reluctant readers’ was code for boys. The letters I got from kids would simply say they thought the books were funny.”. According to Abrams, Kinney’s next “Wimpy Kid” novel will find Greg on a holiday trip, although “what’s billed as a stress-free vacation becomes a holiday nightmare.” The author hopes to complete at least 20 in the series and likes that Heffley, unlike Harry Potter, can always stay the same age. Kinney still thinks about writing books for nonfiction adults, but for fiction he is sticking with kids. “I’ve learned that I’m a children’s writer,” he says. “I didn’t know it when I was starting off, but I know it now.”.

The poems he studied at school, most of them written hundreds of years ago by British men who used words such as “thine” and “thou,” didn’t seem interesting or related to his own life. He was climbing trees and running around the suburbs of Chicago, Illinois, on nice summer days. The old poets he was reading were just spouting fancy talk about pretty roses or sad women. Raczka (RASS-kuh), 53, has since warmed to poetry, in part because he realized that poetry could be much more than serious and stuffy. His first book of poems for kids, “Guyku” (2010), was written to show boys (and other young readers) “how much cool poetry there is,” he told KidsPost recently. “That whole book is based on stuff I was doing when I was a kid,” Raczka said. It’s written in the Japanese style of haiku — three lines that typically contain five, seven and five syllables each: The poems are short, but they can pack a lot of emotion. “The wind and I play / tug-of-war with my new kite,” one haiku begins. “The wind is winning.”. Raczka says that part of the pleasure of writing and reading poetry is getting to slow down and “pay attention to something a little bit closer.”. “When you read a book, you read to find out what happens,” he says. “You’re reading fast. . . . You want to find out how the plot progresses. When you read a poem, you don’t read like that. It’s not an opportunity to find out what happens, it’s an opportunity to take a break, to think and contemplate.”. Raczka studied art and graphic design while he was in college. When he’s not writing poems and other books — he began writing about 15 years ago with a series on famous works of art — he works in advertising. Some of his poetry is as much about images as it is about words: His 2016 book “Wet Cement” is written in a style known as concrete poetry, where the words form a shape and not just a block of text. “Hopscotch,” for example, is written in the shape of a hopscotch game. The poem has to be read from the bottom of the page to the top, requiring the reader to move from line to line the same way a hopscotch player jumps between chalk squares on the playground. The poems in his book “Lemonade” (2011) are similarly playful. Each is composed of the letters of a single word, such as “friends,” that is the title of the poem: “fred / finds / ed.”. “It’s fun to play with words,” says Raczka, who is trying to figure out what poem he’ll carry around for Poem in Your Pocket Day on Thursday. The event, part of National Poetry Month, has kids and adults pick a poem and carry it in their pocket all day, taking it out to share with family or friends. Raczka might pick a poem by Mary Oliver, who writes a lot about nature, but there’s no reason you couldn’t pick a poem you have written just for the occasion. It could be a haiku or a concrete poem or a poem taken from a single word — anything that fits on a scrap of paper and, Raczka says, “makes you think about something,” whether it’s a game of baseball or a crush at school.

When it comes to music and visual arts, American students could use help. The National Center for Education Statistics reported Tuesday that in 2016, U.S. eighth-graders scored an average of 147 in music and 149 in visual arts on a scale of 300. Some 8,800 eighth-graders from public and private schools across the country took part in the test, which was part of the National Assessment of Educational Progress, often called the Nation’s Report Card. Peggy Carr, the center’s acting commissioner, said the test shows that students have a lot to learn in art and music. No progress has been made since the same test was administered in 2008. When asked to listen to George Gershwin’s “Rhapsody in Blue,” for example, only about half of the students were able to identify that the opening solo is played on a clarinet. The arts are important not just to those interested in music or art as a career, said Ayanna Hudson of the National Endowment for the Arts. “Every student should have access to arts education to develop the creativity and problem-solving skills that lead to higher success both in and out of school,” Hudson said. — Associated Press.

Toy shops are thriving in eastern Mosul, with Iraqi children once again able to buy dolls, teddy bears or action figures after Islamic State was driven out of the area. The militant group banned toys with faces or eyes during the three years they controlled Iraq’s second largest city, including some animal toys. But when U.S.-trained security forces drove the group from eastern Mosul in January, two toy stores sprang up and there are now 15, toy wholesaler Abu Mohammed said. “Under Islamic State, any toys with faces we would have to make them veiled [if it is female] or only show eyes. Now this is no longer required, and there is no ban on imports,” he said at his shop, Alaad for Toys. Abu Mohammed imports toys from China and says that most of the large toy stores actually lie in the western side of the city, which is still the site of fighting between Islamic State fighters and Iraqi security forces. “Most of the large toy stores are in the west, so as soon as [it is] liberated there will be an even bigger boom,” he said. “Everything a child might want is available. Before there was a lot of things banned like images and faces, now a child can come choose whatever toys they want,” he said. Parents say buying these toys for their children will help them move on after three years of war and terror. “Everyone was oppressed young and old,” said Hassan, a father who was browsing for toys. “The toys are back, life is back, we are free.”.

Creating a recipe “from scratch” can be hard to do — or a piece of cake, as a team of six students at Washington Irving Middle School in Springfield, Virginia, found out recently. They had to come up with an original after-school or breakfast “smart snack” that was healthful yet tasty enough that their friends would want to eat it. We think they deserve an A-plus for their Fruit Salsa, which didn’t take them long to get just right. Chopped strawberries, mandarin oranges, kiwi and crushed pineapple go into the mix, plus a couple of surprises: chia seeds and yellow bell pepper. It’s refreshing and easy to make. They sprinkled cinnamon and sugar on wedges of flour tortillas and toasted them in the oven, for scooping. A tip of the chef’s hat to seventh-graders Abigail Geletaw, Lily Jones, Rachel Mitchen, Lucas Parker and Julie Readnour and eighth-grader Steven Smith. The crew, assisted by family and consumer sciences teachers Christie Barnes and Susan Curley, was one of several middle school teams that participated in the Real Food for Kids expo held in March at Lake Braddock Secondary School in Burke. Kitchen gear: Cutting board, measuring cups and spoons, mixing bowl, sharp knife, spoon (plus a baking sheet for the tortillas). MAKE AHEAD: The salsa can be refrigerated or frozen for up to 1 day; if you plan to make it more than 6 hours in advance, do not stir in the strawberries until just before serving. 1⁄3 cup peeled and finely chopped mandarin oranges. 1 large or 2 medium kiwi fruits, peeled and finely chopped. 1⁄2 cup drained crushed pineapple (not in syrup). 1 cup finely chopped hulled strawberries (see MAKE AHEAD, above). 1⁄4 cup seeded, finely chopped yellow bell pepper. 1⁄2 ounce (1 tablespoon) chia seeds. Cinnamon Tortilla Crisps, for serving (see NOTE). Combine the mandarin oranges, kiwi fruit, pineapple, strawberries, bell pepper, chia seeds and lemon juice in a mixing bowl, stirring until well incorporated. Cover and refrigerate until ready to serve. NOTE: To make the tortilla crisps, cut 2 8-inch flour tortillas into a total of 16 wedges. Arrange on a baking sheet, then use 1 tablespoon melted, unsalted butter to brush their top sides. Sprinkle with a mixture of 2 tablespoons sugar and 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon. Bake in a 350-degree oven for 5 to 10 minutes, until the tortillas are crisp and lightly browned. Nutrition | Per serving (based on 5): 60 calories, 1 g protein, 12 g carbohydrates, 1 g fat, 0 g saturated fat, 0 mg cholesterol, 0 mg sodium, 3 g dietary fiber, 8 g sugar Recipe tested by Bonnie S. Benwick; email questions to [email protected]. Nutrition | Per serving (based on 5): 60 calories, 1 g protein, 12 g carbohydrates, 1 g fat, 0 g saturated fat, 0 mg cholesterol, 0 mg sodium, 3 g dietary fiber, 8 g sugar. Recipe tested by Bonnie S. Benwick; email questions to [email protected].

Astronaut Peggy Whitson broke the U.S. record Monday for most time in space and talked up Mars during a congratulatory call from President Trump. The International Space Station’s commander surpassed the record of 534 days, two hours and 48 minutes for most accumulated time in space by an American. “This is a very special day in the glorious history of American spaceflight,” Trump said. His daughter Ivanka also offered congratulations to Whitson from the Oval Office. Whitson said it’s “a huge honor” to break such a record. “It’s an exciting time” as NASA prepares for human expeditions to Mars in the 2030s, included in new legislation signed by Trump last month. She called the space station “a key bridge” between living on Earth and traveling into deep space, and she singled out the station’s recycling system that transforms astronauts’ urine into drinking water. “It’s really not as bad as it sounds,” she assured the president. “Well, that’s good, I’m glad to hear that,” he replied. “Better you than me.”. Whitson already was the world’s most experienced spacewoman and female spacewalker and, at 57, the oldest woman in space. By the time she returns to Earth in September, she’ll have logged 666 days in orbit over three flights. The world record — 879 days — is held by Russian Gennady Padalka. Whitson is also the first woman to command the space station twice and the only woman to have led NASA’s astronaut corps. Behind her was a banner that read: “Congrats Peggy!! New U.S. High-Time Space Ninja.” The sign arrived Saturday on the commercial cargo ship, the S.S. John Glenn — barely in time for Monday’s celebration. NASA astronaut Jack Fischer, who arrived at the space station last week and took part in Monday’s call, said the space station is “by far the best example of international cooperation.”. Whitson told the president that spaceflight takes a lot of time and money, so getting to Mars will require collaboration from other countries to succeed. NASA is building the hardware right now to test a new rocket that will carry astronauts farther from Earth than ever before, she said. “Well, we want to try and do it during my first term or, at worst, during my second term, so we’ll have to speed that up a little bit, okay?” Trump replied. “We’ll do our best,” Whitson replied. The debut of the mega rocket is still more than a year away — at least. The date will depend on whether astronauts are on board for the test flight, which could hoist the new Orion capsule to the vicinity of the moon. Both Whitson and Fischer raised a hand when Trump asked which one of them was ready to go to Mars. Joining Trump in the Oval Office was astronaut Kate Rubins, who last summer became the first person in space to perform entire DNA decoding, or sequencing. She said she used a device the size of a cellphone for the job and noted that such sequencing can detect microbes aboard spacecraft and monitor astronaut health. “I’ve been dealing with politicians so much, I’m so much more impressed with these people.

A white oak tree that has watched over a New Jersey community and a church for hundreds of years began its final bow Monday as crews began its removal and residents fondly remembered the go-to spot for formal photos and the remarkable piece of natural history. Crews at the Basking Ridge Presbyterian Church in Bernards began taking down the 600-year-old tree that was declared dead after it began showing rot and weakness over the last couple of years. The two to three days of chopping and pulling will draw attention from residents of a bedroom community about 30 miles west of New York and other tree fans who see it as a chance to bid a final farewell to their close friend. “I know it seems funny to some to mourn a tree, but I’m really going to miss seeing it,” said Bernards resident Monica Evans, recalling family photos during weddings and first Communions. The tree has been an important part of the community since the town’s was founded in the 1700s. Officials say it was the site of a picnic General George Washington held with the Marquis de Lafayette, a friend who helped gain French support during the Revolutionary War. The Reverend George Whitefield, a noted evangelist, preached to more than 3,000 people beneath the tree in 1740. Arborists say the tree had stood for nearly 300 years before the church was built in 1717. It stands about 100 feet tall, has a trunk circumference of 18 feet and has a branch spread of roughly 150 feet. Officials say the crews plan to initially remove the large limb segments until there is a large trunk section still standing, then remove that section in one piece. Its death was probably due to its age. Arborists determined it wouldn’t be able to withstand many more harsh winters or spring storms. “It has been an integral part of the town, that’s for sure,” said Jon Klippel, a member of the church’s planning council. “It has always been there, even before there was a town, and over the years many people have met there, been photographed there, had a meal under the tree. But there is a silver lining for tree fans: Another white oak cultivated from the old tree’s acorns was recently planted at the church, so its legacy will continue. The old tree’s removal is a reminder of how older trees are starting to become less common across the nation. Experts say fewer trees are replicating the old oak’s 600-year life span. They note that several factors — including droughts, intensive wildfires and invasive insects — can greatly harm trees, which become more susceptible to damage as they age. Learn how to identify trees at play tree-related games at the kids site of the National Arbor Day Foundation: arborday.org/kids/carly. Want to plant a tree? The U.S. Geological Survey has instructions. education.usgs.gov/kids/plantatree.html.

The world saw brain power take a different form Saturday. In Washington and hundreds of other cities, scientists, students and research advocates rallied on an often soggy Earth Day, sending a global message about scientific freedom without political interference, the need for government spending for future breakthroughs and just the general value of scientific pursuits. They came in numbers that were mammoth if not quite astronomical. “We didn’t choose to be in this battle, but it has come to the point where we have to fight because the stakes are too great,” said Michael Mann, a Pennsylvania State University climate scientist. President Trump, in an Earth Day statement hours after the marches kicked off, said that “rigorous science depends not on ideology, but on a spirit of honest inquiry and robust debate.”. Denis Hayes, who co-organized the first Earth Day 47 years ago, said the crowd he saw from the speaker’s platform down the street from the White House was energized and “magical” in a rare way, similar to what he saw in the first Earth Day. “For this kind of weather this is an amazing crowd. You’re not out there today unless you really care. This is not a walk-in-the-park event,” Hayes said of the event. Mann said that like other scientists, he would rather be in his lab, the field or teaching students. But driving his advocacy are officials who deny his research that shows rising global temperatures. When he went onstage, he got the biggest applause for his simple opening: “I am a climate scientist.”. Many of the marchers carried signs, some political and some personal. Nine-year-old Sam Klimas of Parkersburg, West Virginia, held one that was red and handmade. It read, “Science saved my life.” He had a form of brain cancer and has been healthy for eight years. There was also a science fair feel, where lectures were given in tents and hands-on science tables for kids. University of Minnesota physicist James Kakalios explained the science behind Superman, Spider-Man and other superheroes. Rallies took place in some 600 other cities. In Gainesville, Florida, more than a thousand people stretched for miles through the streets. It was a peaceful demonstration, said Pati Vitt, a plant scientist at the Chicago Botanic Garden in town for work at the University of Florida. “We’re scientists, so we’re orderly,” she said with a laugh. “We let the signs do the talking.”. Lara Stephens-Brown, a graduate student studying veterinary medicine at the University of Minnesota, joined thousands marching in St. Paul. They chanted “hey hey, ho ho, we won’t let this planet go.”. There are cancer survivors and doctors with signs that say “science saves lives,” she said, and estimated that 90 percent of the signs are not political. “Science is not a partisan issue,” she said, meaning one related to a political party. “Science is for everyone and should be supported by everyone in our government.”.

The last orca has been born in captivity at a SeaWorld park in San Antonio, Texas, just over a year after the theme park decided to stop breeding orcas following protests for animal rights and declining ticket sales. The orca — the last in a generation of whales bred in confinement — was born Wednesday afternoon to 25-year-old Takara. SeaWorld did not immediately name the calf because the park’s veterinarians had not yet determined whether it was male or female. “Takara will continuously swim with her calf as it begins to nurse and learn,” said Julie Sigman, an assistant curator. “We take our lead from mom, Takara will let us know when she is ready for us to meet the calf and at that time we should be able to determine the gender.”. Takara was pregnant when SeaWorld announced in March 2016 that it would no longer breed its orcas. Orcas, also known as killer whales, are pregnant for about 18 months. Chris Dold, SeaWorld’s chief zoological officer, said he expected the birth to be both happy and sad, the last such event at any of the parks. But hours after Wednesday’s birth, Dold said the staff felt only celebratory. “These are extraordinary moments,” he said. SeaWorld decided to stop breeding orcas and phase out its world-famous killer whale performances by 2019, after public opinion turned against keeping orcas, dolphins and other animals in captivity for entertainment. The calf brings SeaWorld’s orca population in the United States to 23. All the orcas are expected to remain on display and be available for researchers in Orlando, Florida; San Antonio; and San Diego, California. SeaWorld has said it will introduce new “natural orca encounters” in place of traditional shows. Dold said veterinarians at the San Antonio park told him the calf was born normally — tail first — after about 11⁄2 hours of smooth labor. Both orcas were swimming calmly, and trainers were watching for the calf to begin nursing. “Mom generally will rest, but she can’t rest too much. . . . Mom’s not holding onto the calf, but it’s riding in her slipstream, and that’s how it gets around,” Dold said. “Our expectation is that all of this will go smoothly, but we take none of that for granted.”. Researchers have said they worry that SeaWorld’s decision to stop breeding orcas will slowly reduce their ability to study orca health, growth and behavior. Heather Hill, a St. Mary’s University comparative psychologist who plans to monitor the sleeping habits of Takara and the calf, said it was frustrating to see research opportunities at SeaWorld decline. “This will be one of the first times we’ll be able to see not just a mother with a newborn calf, but also a newborn calf with siblings,” Hill said. Tracy Reiman, executive vice president for People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, said in a statement that the mother and her calf should be retired to a seaside sanctuary. SeaWorld has no plans to move any of its orcas, Dold said. Dold said in March that SeaWorld remains committed to orca research and conservation, calling the last orca birth in captivity “a solemn reminder of how things can change and how things can be lost.”.

British officials say they’ve been unable to trace the rightful heirs to a trove of gold coins found stashed inside a piano and worth a “life-changing” amount of money. The school that owns the piano and the tuner who found the gold are now in line for a windfall after an official investigating the find declared it treasure. But a couple who owned the piano for three decades before donating it to their local school will probably miss out. British official John Ellery said Thursday that, despite a thorough investigation and a public appeal for information, “we simply do not know” who concealed the coins. The hoard was discovered last year when the piano was sent for tuning in Shropshire, central England. Under the keyboard — neatly stacked in hand-stitched packages and pouches — were 913 gold sovereigns and half-sovereigns minted in the 19th and early 20th centuries. Piano tuner Martin Backhouse said when he found the pouches and slit open the stitching, he thought: “Ooh, it looks like there’s rather a lot of gold in this.”. The hoard, which weighs 13 pounds, has not been formally valued. But Peter Reavill of the British Museum has said the trove is worth a “potentially life-changing” amount. Money received from items declared “treasure” is generally split between the owner — in this case, the Bishops Castle Community College — and the finder. The piano was owned for 33 years by Graham and Meg Hemmings, who donated it last year to the school near their home. But Meg Hemmings said she’s not bitter at missing out on treasure that was right under her nose. “The sadness is, it’s not a complete story,” she said. “They’ve looked and searched for the people, and they unfortunately haven’t come forward. “It’s an incomplete story — but it’s still an exciting story.”.

That’s what the Washington Capitals and the Washington Wizards are hoping for this playoff season. Teams in the National Hockey League (NHL) and National Basketball Association (NBA) have to win four, seven-game playoff series to win a championship. There’s the first round, then the conference semifinals and the conference finals. Finally, the conference champions play in the Stanley Cup and the NBA finals. The Caps and Wizards would have a long run if they played in (and, even better, won) three or four series. It’s been a long time since either team had a long run. The Wizards have not played in the NBA Finals since 1979, when the team was called the Washington Bullets. The Capitals have had strong regular-season teams in recent years but tough luck in the playoffs. They haven’t made it to the Stanley Cup Finals since 1998. So what are the chances of one or both of the Washington teams having a long run? The Capitals seem to have everything a team needs for a long run. Washington had the league’s best record during the regular season and outscored their opponents by more than 80 goals. The Caps have plenty of offensive depth — 11 players scored 12 or more goals — and a terrific goaltender (Braden Holtby). But the Caps are in a tough first-round series with the young and talented Toronto Maple Leafs. Washington was trailing two games to one going into Wednesday night’s game in Toronto. If the Caps beat the Leafs (and that’s a big if), things will get even tougher. Washington may have to face the defending Stanley Cup champion Pittsburgh Penguins in the conference semifinals. The NHL playoffs always have lots of close games. More than half of the 2016 playoff games (49 out of 93) were decided by one goal. Sometimes whether a team wins or loses a series depends on what hockey fans call “puck luck.” Let’s hope the Caps get some puck luck soon. The Wizards may have an even tougher road in the NBA playoffs. Washington — especially its all-star point guard, John Wall — looked terrific beating the Atlanta Hawks, 114-107, in the first game of their series. If the Wizards can get past the Hawks, they will have to beat the Boston Celtics or the Chicago Bulls and then probably the Cleveland Cavaliers to advance to the NBA Finals. The Wizards would be underdogs against either the Celtics or Cavaliers, but Wall appears to be on a mission and Washington is playing well. The Wizards have a chance at pulling an upset or two. Could both Washington teams have a long run? That’s a long shot. Bowen writes the sports opinion column for KidsPost. He is the author of 22 sports books for kids. The last time the Wizards played in the NBA Finals was 38 years ago. The last time the Capitals made it to the Stanley Cup Finals was 19 years ago.

American high school students are generally satisfied with their lives. But many of their peers in other countries are happier. Asked to rank their life satisfaction on a scale from 0 to 10, American 15-year-olds gave an average mark of 7.4, according to a study released Wednesday by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, an international research group. American students scored close to the average of 7.3 among OECD’s 35 member countries. But students in such countries as Iceland and Finland are doing much better. And an average Mexican high schooler rated life satisfaction at 8.2 out of 10. American students also reported higher levels of anxiety over tests, bullying or a feeling of not belonging at schools, compared with many of their peers. Teacher and parental support, spending time with friends and being physically active make it more likely that a student will be satisfied with life, according to the study. But feeling anxiety over grades and spending too much time online are signs a student may feel dissatisfied. “In happy schools, teacher support — as perceived by students — tends to be much greater,” said study co-author Andreas Schleicher. Studying hard does not necessarily mean being miserable. The authors highlight the cases of Finland, Switzerland and the Netherlands, where good grades and high spirits exist side by side. There are also some gender differences. Feeling very satisfied with one’s life is more widespread among boys, while feeling low life satisfaction is more common among girls across most countries and cultures. Why that was the case was unclear from the report. The study was conducted in 2015 with 540,000 randomly selected kids who completed written tests and questionnaires. Tom Loveless, who researches education policies with the Brookings Institution in Washington, was skeptical about the way the survey looked at U.S. high school students. He said that at the time of the study, most 15-year-old sophomores would have spent a little more than a year in their current high school, so their well-being could have been shaped by other factors. — Associated Press.

With only two wolves left to feast on them, the moose of Michigan’s Isle Royale National Park are undergoing a population explosion that could endanger the wilderness area’s fir trees and eventually cause many of the moose to starve, scientists said Tuesday. The unchecked growth of hulking moose at the Lake Superior island park shows the need to take more wolves there, restoring a predator-prey balance that has benefited both species and the park’s ecosystem, Michigan Technological University researchers said in a report. The National Park Service is considering options to restore the wolf population, but it hasn’t committed to doing so. Twenty-four gray wolves in several packs roamed the Michigan park as recently as 2009. But the severely inbred population has dropped steadily and is at its lowest point since biologists began observing the relationship between wolves and moose in the 1950s. During their annual winter trip to the island, scientists Rolf Peterson and John Vucetich conducted aerial surveys and estimated the moose population at 1,600. It could double over the next three to four years unless more wolves arrive soon, they said. A dip in wolf numbers during the 1990s allowed the moose to approach 2,500. About two-thirds of them died of hunger during a bitter winter in 1996. Peterson said the park’s balsam fir trees, the preferred food for moose during winter, are being overeaten. Most of the trees on Isle Royale are Balsam firs. “It’s a race between the slowly growing trees and the rapidly growing moose,” Peterson said. Northern Michigan University scientists reported in 2015 that moose browsing had gradually thinned the park’s forests and converted some areas to grassy plains. Isle Royale consists of one island 45 miles long and hundreds of smaller ones. Moose are believed to have arrived there around the turn of the 20th century, while wolves probably crossed ice bridges from the mainland in the late 1940s. The two surviving wolves, a male and a female, are aging and unlikely to reproduce. In another sign of the wolves’ decline, the island’s population of another prey species — beaver — has reached about 300, the highest total on record. A Park Service report in December listed four alternatives for dealing with the wolf shortage, including letting them die out. The agency said its preference was to relocate 20 to 30 wolves to the island over three to five years. The Park Service is expected to make a decision this fall.

If you are curious, love exploring and want to help protect our national parks’ cultural and natural resources, you would make a great Junior Ranger. Designed for kids from 5 to 13, free Junior Ranger programs help young visitors gain a deep understanding of each park and discover the wonders within it. Activity booklets and park programs offer fun ways to fulfill the Junior Ranger motto — “explore, learn and protect” — as you earn badges and certificates. Hundreds of Junior Ranger programs exist across the country, but you don’t have to travel far to participate. Start with programs close to home. Damon Davis, 9, of Upper Marlboro, Maryland, said he could spend hours exploring Kenilworth Aquatic Gardens. Known for its large ponds of colorful aquatic plants in the summer, this park also contains Washington’s last untouched tidal wetland, making it a haven for wildlife. Damon’s patience and quiet observation skills recently rewarded him with sightings of turtles, water beetles, tadpoles, a beaver lodge and an osprey. “I really love nature,” he said, begging his family to stay a bit longer. Junior Ranger programs highlight a park’s nature, historical sites or architecture. For example, the George Washington Memorial Parkway’s 10-stop Junior Ranger program includes Dyke Marsh Wildlife Preserve, Theodore Roosevelt Island and Fort Hunt Park. Early morning and dusk are great times to try to spot herons, eagles, owls and raccoons in these wooded, waterside parks. Rangers at the Chesapeake & Ohio Canal National Historical Park recently sparked the imagination of students from Washington’s School Without Walls at Francis-Stevens, telling them about the tough life of 19th-century families who lived aboard canalboats as they hauled cargo between Georgetown and Cumberland, Maryland. Children, often barefoot, were responsible for walking the mules along the rough, rocky towpath. The 184-mile trip took five to seven days. Third-graders Angel Phillips and Mili Quinlan disagreed on how they felt about the mule-tending task. Angel said, “It would be amazing!” while Mili said, “I’d rather live in a real house.”. Another Junior Ranger option in Maryland is Glen Echo Park, the only national park that was once an amusement park. Learn about its 1900s architecture and the 1960s protests that led the park to allow black visitors. Some of the original buildings have been repurposed as art, dance and theater spaces. You can ride the colorful, hand-carved wooden animals on the 1921 Dentzel Carousel from April 29 through the last weekend in September. Junior Rangers understand how the National Park Service emblem, which is nearly 66 years old, helps make connections across all parks. The emblem’s arrowhead shape represents archaeological discoveries that help us understand the people who once lived and worked on these lands. The buffalo and sequoia symbols represent the wildlife and plants that make these parks their home. Doing your part to keep the parks clean, leaving animals and plants undisturbed, and sharing what you learn is part of being a Junior Ranger. With your help, our national parks will amaze and educate visitors for generations to come. This is National Park Week, so check local parks for special programs or visit nps.gov/findapark/national-park-week.htm. What: Kenilworth Aquatic Gardens. Where: 1550 Anacostia Avenue NE, Washington. When: Daily 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. through April, then 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. from May through October. How much: Free admission and parking. For more information: A parent can call 202-692-6080. Pick up a Junior Ranger booklet at the visitor center or download it at nps.gov/keaq/learn/kidsyouth/upload/Whole%20Jr.%20Ranger.pdf. Where: 7300 MacArthur Boulevard, Glen Echo, Maryland. When: Pick up a Junior Ranger booklet at the ranger station from 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. daily. (Call ahead to make sure a ranger is on duty.). How much: Free admission and parking; free park ranger tours with reservations; $1.25 per carousel ride; fees for some events. For more information: A parent can call 301-320-1400 or visit. nps.gov/glec/learn/kidsyouth/beajuniorranger.htm. For George Washington Memorial Parkway, C & O Canal and all other Junior Ranger programs, visit nps.gov/kids/jrRangers.cfm, where you can download activity booklets or find out where to pick them up. Search alphabetically or by state. Click on the “i” icon on park pages for hours, locations, entrance fees and events.

The long-awaited offspring of Internet sensation April the Giraffe is being described as “spunky and independent.”. The owner of Animal Adventure Park in Harpursville, New York, says the not-yet-named baby boy was on its feet within an hour after its birth Saturday — and galloping around its mother within three hours. Jordan Patch, who owns the park with his wife, Colleen, says he was so excited that he was shaking when he made the calls to assemble the delivery team. More than a million online viewers watched April deliver her calf in Harpursville, a rural upstate village about 130 miles northwest of New York City. The zoo began live-streaming from April’s enclosure in February. Patch says April is “recovering perfectly” following the delivery of the calf, which was 5-foot-9-inches tall and weighed 129 pounds. The calf and mother can be seen on the park’s Giraffe Cam, but the park plans to turn off the camera in the next few days. April, who is 15 years old, has three other young but this is her first since arriving at Animal Adventure in September 2015. A 5-year-old giraffe named Oliver is the dad. The calf will remain with April until he stops nursing, at about six months. At that point, he will move to another zoo. Giraffes are the world’s tallest land mammal and are found mostly in southern and eastern Africa. In 1985, slightly more than 150,000 were living in the wild, according to the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN). But as of 2015, that number had dropped to fewer than 98,000. IUCN blames illegal hunting, habitat loss and conflicts with humans. The organization recently listed giraffes as “vulnerable” to extinction on its Red List.

In Amy Sarig King’s new novel, “Me and Marvin Gardens,” a boy named Obe discovers a new type of animal. It has the jaw of a pig, the snout of a tapir (a large, hoglike mammal) and the friendly personality of a dog. Strangest of all: It eats plastic. Obe is going through a tough time, and the creature becomes a good friend. He names it Marvin Gardens, after a property in his father’s favorite board game, Monopoly. Obe tries to keep Marvin Gardens a secret because he doesn’t want anyone to try to capture or hurt him. But Obe’s former best friend Tommy finds out about his pet. “The novel draws almost completely on my own childhood experiences,” King said. Like Obe, the author grew up in the country, close to Reading, Pennsylvania. She loved a nearby cornfield and creek, as does Obe. And she felt sadness and anger when developers bought the field and built houses on it, just as Obe does. King even modeled Marvin Gardens after a dog she had more than 10 years ago. The dog, Stella, was “goofy and curious,” like Marvin, even if she didn’t eat plastic, King said. In the book, Obe is bullied by Tommy and some of his new neighbors. They exclude him and call him a hippie because he tries to clean up the local creek. King, too, was bullied as a kid. Like Obe, she was even punched in the nose. When she visits schools, King frequently talks about friendship and bullying and how to deal with unkind people. She encourages students to share their ideas for helping the environment. “I’m always so impressed by . . . how much they know about recycling, especially,” she said. Obe’s science teacher, Ms. G, talks to her students about pollution and recycling. Across the United States, Earth Day is celebrated April 22. But Ms. G decides that April should be Earth Month, and she shares a fact a day to help her students learn more about, and appreciate, the Earth. As she researched interesting facts, King made a discovery that changed the way she consumed water. “It takes a plastic bottle 500 years to decompose, and Americans throw away 2.5 million of these bottles per hour,” she said. King decided to get a reusable bottle for water — and so do many of her readers, she added. Saturday is Earth Day, and, like Obe and Ms. G, you might celebrate by helping the Earth. Obe picks up trash in the creek. Ms. G shares important facts with others. This year, King and her family will celebrate with a furry friend. After years of not having a pet, King recently brought a cat into their home in Lititz, Pennsylvania. Writing about Marvin Gardens “reminded me of how lovely it is to share my life with animals,” she said.

Thousands of kids, and some adults, joined President Donald Trump on Monday for the annual White House Easter Egg Roll. Trump’s wife, Melania, and their son, Barron, 11, and the Easter Bunny were also there. About 21,000 people were expected at the egg-rolling event, which dates to 1878. That is down from about 35,000 in 2016. Among the activities were a reading nook, an area to send messages to U.S. troops and a stage with entertainment. “As we renew this tradition, thank you for joining us,” the first lady said. Moments later, the president blew a whistle three times, each time sending groups of youngsters to use a wooden spoon to push a dyed egg across a finish line. He, the first lady and Barron also joined kids at a table to color cards to send to U.S. service members. Seven-year-old Johnny Wilmer of Arlington, Virginia, said his egg-rolling effort ended with a second-place finish. It was his first Easter egg roll, and he said while he and his father, Jack, waited for Trump to appear that the experience had been “great.”. — Associated Press.

A tiny, icy ocean world orbiting Saturn is now a hotter-than-ever candidate for potential alien life. Cassini, an unmanned NASA spacecraft, has detected hydrogen molecules in geysers shooting off the moon Enceladus. The hydrogen may be the result of deep-sea chemical reactions between water and rock, which could spark microscopic life, scientists announced Thursday. NASA and others are quick to point out this latest discovery does not mean there’s life on Enceladus (ehn-SEHL-uh-duhs), but that there may be conditions favorable for life. A liquid ocean exists beneath the icy surface of Enceladus, which is barely 300 miles across. Thanks to Cassini, scientists have long known about the moon’s geysers, which spew water vapor from cracks at the moon’s south pole. The heavy presence of hydrogen suggests chemical reactions between the warm water and ocean-floor rock that could support life. Cassini uncovered the hydrogen during its final close flyby of Enceladus in 2015, when it dove deeper than ever through the moon’s clouds of vapor and particles. The researchers reported that the hydrogen, along with carbon dioxide that was also found, could mean that undersea microorganisms are producing methane. The gas is produced in a similar way in Earth’s oceans and waterways. “It really represents a capstone finding” — or high point — “for the mission,” said Linda Spilker, a scientist on the Cassini project who noted that the spacecraft has been circling Saturn for more than a decade. “We now know that Enceladus has almost all of the ingredients that you would need to support life as we know it on Earth,” she said at a NASA news conference. Observers asked the scientists questions using Twitter, including whether NASA was talking about tiny bacteria or something much bigger, such as giant squids. “Most of us would be excited with any life,” said Mary Voytek, a senior scientist for NASA. “We’re going to start with bacteria and, if we get lucky, maybe there’s something that’s larger.”. The findings were reported Thursday in the journal Science by a team from Southwest Research Institute in San Antonio, Texas. Launched in 1997, Cassini is now finally running low on fuel. The spacecraft will duck through the gap between Saturn and its rings 22 times before spiraling out of control and burning up in the sky above Saturn this September. Cassini has no instruments that can detect life, so it will be up to future robotic visitors to seek out possible life on Enceladus, the scientists said. Europa, an ice-covered moon of Jupiter that is also believed to have an ocean, may have water-vapor jets spewing into space as well, similar to Enceladus. The Hubble Space Telescope has observed what looks to be plumes, or long clouds, coming from Europa. A spacecraft under development called the Europa Clipper could shed more light on the matter. It’s set to launch sometime in the 2020s. Voytek said her money is still on Europa for potential life, versus Enceladus. Europa is much older, and any potential life there has had more time to emerge.

Have you ever heard your mom or dad say that someone’s hormones were raging? The comment is usually uttered when a teenager is grumpy for no apparent reason. Although it’s true that certain hormones increase during adolescence, your endocrine system has been making them your entire life! The brain uses nerve impulses to coordinate thousands of actions in your body. When you make a fist, electrical signals from your brain direct the muscles in your hand and forearm to contract. It takes about one one-hundredth of a second for the impulse to travel from your brain to your muscles. The brain also controls body functions with chemicals. The endocrine system is the name for a group of organs that release hormones into the bloodstream to regulate cell function, growth and development, and sleep, among other things. The brain is linked to the endocrine system by an area called the hypothalamus (pronounced hi-po-THAL-a-mus). Hormones and nerve impulses work differently, but they’re both fast. Nerve impulses are like emails that instantly reach their destination after you hit the “send” button. Hormones are more like phone calls that take a bit longer to connect. One of the coolest things about the endocrine system is that it has an “on/off” switch that works like a heating system. The thermostat in a home constantly monitors air temperature. Suppose the thermostat is set at 68 degrees during the winter. If the temperature drops below 68, the thermostat automatically turns on the furnace. The furnace then burns gas or whatever fuel it uses to increase the temperature in the home. When the temperature hits 68, the thermostat turns off the furnace. The air will now begin to cool. When it drops below 68, the process starts all over again. The principle that controls heating systems is called a ­negative-feedback loop, and the same thing controls most of the organs in your endocrine system. This system allows bodily functions to stay remarkably fine-tuned. The scientific name for this balance is homeostasis ­(ho-me-o-STAY-sis). Here are some of the actions carried out by the major parts of your endocrine system: • The pituitary gland is called the “master gland” because it plays a key role with other parts of the endocrine system. It also makes several hormones, including growth hormone, which is essential for growth. • The pineal (PI-nee-ul) gland makes melatonin, which is released at night to help regulate sleep. Looking at bright screens such as cellphones and computers before bed can make it harder to fall asleep because light lowers how much melatonin is released. • The thyroid (THI-royd) gland makes two hormones that are essential for cell growth and energy metabolism. • The parathyroid glands make a hormone that controls calcium and vitamin D levels in your body. • The pancreas (PAN-cree-ess) makes several hormones, including insulin, which is like a biological key that lets a sugar called glucose enter cells so the glucose can be stored or used as an energy source. • The adrenal (uh-DREE-nul) glands make hormones that control blood pressure and water balance. • The ovaries (females) and testes (males) make hormones that regulate puberty and reproduction. So the next time you have a bad day, think twice before blaming it on your hormones. If you read today’s article, there’s a good chance your parents did, too.

Scientists have identified the oldest known relative of the dinosaurs and are expressing surprise at how little it resembled one. Researchers on Wednesday described fossils of a long-necked, four-legged, meat-eating reptile called . It reached up to 10 feet long and prowled across what is now Tanzania, in East Africa, about 245 million years ago. Teleocrater lived during the Triassic Period, millions of years before the first dinosaurs. Scientists called it a close cousin rather than a direct dinosaur ancestor. Its appearance, part crocodile and part dinosaur, was different from what scientists had expected from the earliest members of the dinosaur family tree. “I’m surprised by the mosaic” — or mix — “of features that it possesses,” said Kenneth Angielczyk, one of the researchers in the study, which was published in the journal Nature. “In terms of how it shakes up our understanding of dinosaur evolution, Teleocrater shows that the earliest members of the dinosaur lineage,” or family tree, “were very unlike dinosaurs,” Angielczyk said. Dinosaurs belong to a larger group called archosaurs (ARK-uh-sores). About 250 million years ago, that group split into two branches: crocodilians (which include alligators and crocodiles); and another branch that includes dinosaurs, birds and extinct flying reptiles called pterosaurs (TARE-uh-sores). Teleocrater is the oldest-known member of the dinosaur-pterosaur-bird branch. Scientists had expected such a dinosaur forerunner to be a smallish, two-legged predator. Although dinosaur predators had two legs, the teleocrater instead was four-legged. It looked similar to a Komodo dragon, a large lizard that lives in Indonesia. Virginia Tech paleontologist Sterling Nesbitt, the study’s main author, said fossils of at least four teleocraters were found in southern Tanzania. Unlike a dinosaur, the teleocrater had ankle joints that could rotate from side to side and flex up and down, giving it a crocodile-like walking style. Teleocrater’s remains were found in the same Tanzanian region as fossils of the two-legged meat-eater nyasasaurus, which lived perhaps 2 million years later. Some scientists regard nyasasaurus as the earliest-known dinosaur.

They are supposed to make the games fun and fair for the players and fans. Take the recent example of Lexi Thompson, a golfer on the women’s professional tour known as the LPGA. Thompson was leading by several strokes during the fourth and final round of the ANA Inspiration, one of the tour’s major tournaments. It looked as though she would win, but the LPGA slammed her with a four-stroke penalty. Thompson did not replace her ball in precisely the same spot after she picked it up from the green on the 17th hole of the third round. (Golfers are allowed to put down a marker behind their ball, pick up the ball and place it back on the green in front of the marker.). No one noticed at the time that Thompson had not placed the ball down in exactly the right spot — not the other golfers playing with Thompson nor any LPGA official. Thompson simply put her ball down and knocked in her 20-inch putt. (Pros rarely miss a putt that short.). But someone watching the tournament on television had noticed. That person emailed the LPGA saying Thompson had not replaced the ball properly on the green. The LPGA reviewed the TV footage and determined that Thompson had misplaced the ball, probably by about the width of a fingernail. So the LPGA penalized Thompson two strokes for moving her ball, and it charged her two more strokes for failing to report the first two-stroke penalty in her third-round score. (Of course, she hadn’t known about it.) LPGA officials told Thompson about the penalties the next day, after she had played 12 holes of her final round. Despite having those four strokes added to her score, Thompson tied for first place, but then she lost in a playoff. So if she had not been penalized, Thompson would have won easily. This time, the LPGA and its rules got in the way of being fair. First, it’s crazy to have someone who is watching the tournament on TV make a penalty call that the players and officials standing nearby did not see. After all, only certain golfers are on TV. Is it fair that they are watched more closely than other players? Second, where Thompson placed the ball on the green — less than an inch from the right spot — didn’t make any difference. Thompson said she wasn’t trying to make the 20-inch putt easier. Finally, it doesn’t make any sense to give Thompson another two-stroke penalty for reporting the wrong score when she was not told about the first two-stroke penalty until the next day. How could she be expected to know about the penalty when she hadn’t been told and didn’t think she had done anything wrong? I know rules are important, but sometimes rules are wrong. Bowen writes the sports opinion column for KidsPost. His latest book for kids — “Outside Shot” — has just been published.

Two months after the world’s youngest nation declared a famine, hunger has become more widespread than expected, aid workers say. A northern region in South Sudan, which became independent from Sudan in 2011 and has been tangled in civil war for more than three years, is on the brink of starvation. Without sustained food assistance, about 290,000 people are at risk of dying. In February, the United Nations and South Sudan formally declared a famine in two of the African country’s northern counties. Now five counties in the area known as Northern Bahr el Ghazal face the same fate. Severe hunger in the region has been fueled by its remote location, harsh climate conditions and rising food prices caused by the civil war. “We’ve only eaten leaves for three days,” said Abuk Garang, a young mother in the city of Aweil. She and her 7-month-old son were later given a bag of sorghum, a grain, from aid workers in a nearby town.

For 48 days each spring, Sophia Fakhoury keeps all meats and cheeses off her plate and — with mixed success — out of her mind. She doesn’t touch a bit of bacon or lamb, two of her favorite foods, and she says the only dairy product she consumes is milk, “because it gives me vitamin D that I need while I’m growing.”. The fast, as this special diet is called, is done in preparation for Easter, Christianity’s most important holiday. Children usually start the practice during middle school. “It’s my favorite time of the year,” says 12-year-old Sophia, a seventh-grader at Irving Middle School in Springfield, Virginia. “It’s more about giving back than taking for yourself. It brings our whole community together.”. Sophia attends St. George Antiochian Orthodox Christian Church in Northwest Washington, where her father is an usher and her mother helps lead community-service projects for teenagers. St. George Antiochian (an-tee-OH-kee-an) is part of a group of churches with roots in the ancient city of Constantinople, now known as Istanbul, Turkey. These churches, known as Eastern Orthodox, trace their roots to the very beginning of Christianity and have traditions separate from the faith’s Catholic and Protestant branches. St. George’s services often feature burning incense, which fills the sanctuary with a spicy smell, and songs and chants performed in English and in Arabic. “Ninety percent of our people here are really Christians of the Middle East,” says Father Joseph Rahal, the church’s priest. Sophia’s father was born in Jordan; other churchgoers are from Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, Sudan, Ethi­o­pia and the Palestinian territories. In the Orthodox Church, Easter is commonly known as Pascha (PASS-kuh), the Greek word for Passover. “It is a joyous time,” Rahal says. The holiday celebrates the resurrection, or rising from the dead, of Jesus, whom Christians consider to be the son of God. “If it wasn’t for that resurrection, we wouldn’t be Christian,” Rahal says. “Everything in our tradition is centered around this. You could call it the church of Easter.”. Not all Christian churches celebrate Easter at the same time. Its date is determined in part by the phases of the moon, but Eastern Orthodox churches also set the date based on the Jewish holiday of Passover. This year, for the first time in three years, Eastern Orthodox churches and their Protestant and Catholic counterparts are celebrating Easter on the same date: April 16. The Easter season kicks off with a 40-day period known as the Great Lent, when kids and adults avoid certain foods, focus on prayer and reflection, and give back to the community. Sophia is helping to make blankets that will be donated to the homeless, and she was among a group of kids who visited Charlie’s Place, a Washington homeless center, to prepare and serve soup and other foods. During Holy Week — the period just before Easter — Sophia and other kids, including Aaron Johnson, a 12-year-old from Fairfax County, Virginia, go to church services each evening. The services are “very beautiful and sad at the same time,” Aaron says. The Friday evening service ends with a reading known as the vigil, when some of the church’s older kids stay up all night and read the Bible from front to back. Kids and teenagers take turns, sleeping when they become tired, and finish on Saturday afternoon. The reading occurs in front of a wooden structure — it represents Jesus’ tomb — that Aaron and others help decorate with flowers. Sophia says she’ll probably stay up until 2 a.m. to prepare for the late-night Saturday service, which ends at midnight with an Easter feast that can last for two hours. She usually eats eggs and bacon during the celebration, but just a little bit, so her stomach doesn’t get woozy after going without meat for so long. There’s one more big service Sunday morning, when Bible passages about the resurrection are read in six or more languages. Kids hunt for colored eggs, a symbol of new life, “and then we go and sleep,” Aaron says. It’s a happy day, but “we’re all very tired.”. Passover This Jewish holiday celebrates the Jews’ being freed from slavery in ancient Egypt. It occurs around the same time of year as Easter. Bible The sacred text of Christianity. Certain books in the Bible are also part of Jewish scripture, and some stories also appear in different forms in the Koran, the sacred text of Islam. Palm Sunday A part of Holy Week that is celebrated one week before Easter. The service traditionally features the waving of palm branches, because according to the Bible, tree branches were laid before Jesus when he entered Jerusalem shortly before his death. Holy Friday The Friday before Easter, also known as Good Friday. The death of Jesus, who was nailed to a cross, is commemorated in church services on this day. Kaak (KAH-yak) A crown-shaped Middle Eastern cookie, made from semolina and dates, that symbolizes the crown of thorns placed on Jesus before his death. Sophia’s family makes these each Easter. Judaism’s most important holiday is a time for family and self-reflection. Fasting is just one part of Ramadan, Islam’s holy month. 12 lighthearted holidays celebrate tongue twisters, ‘geekness’ and ugly sweaters. How to make cascarones, colorful eggs filled with confetti.

Last month we wrote about James Madison, the Founding Father who included the guarantee of a free press when he wrote the Bill of Rights. We announced an essay contest to find out your thoughts on a free press. The deadline for entries is Thursday (which is also the birthday of Madison’s friend and fellow free-press supporter Thomas Jefferson). Here are the details: If you are in grades four through eight, write us a short essay (no more than 300 words) on whether the free press is important in the 21st century and why. Send it, along with your name, age and home town, to KidsPost, The Washington Post, 1301 K St. NW, Washington, D.C. 20071. Or fill out our form at wapo.st/freepressessay. A parent or teacher must give permission for you to enter and provide their contact information. The winner will receive four tickets to the Newseum in Washington and will have the essay published in Kids­Post on May 3, which is World Press Freedom Day. Send questions to kidspost@­washpost.com.

Katie Damon’s second-grade class at ­Terraset Elementary School in Reston, ­Virginia, is the April Class of KidsPost. These 24 students look up to family members, enjoy Mo Willems’s books and would like to care for animals when they grow up. We will publish a Class of KidsPost each month of the school year. If you would like your class considered, ask your teacher to download our questionnaire at wapo.st/classofkidspost2016, fill it out and send it, along with a class picture, to kidspost@­washpost.­com. If your class is chosen, we’ll send a KidsPost Chesapeake Bay poster, a book and Kids­Post goodies. Favorite author and favorite book: Ms. ­Damon’s students mentioned many authors, but Mo Willems was the favorite, with five votes. The preferred titles were two from the Elephant and Piggie series: “Are You Ready to Play Outside?” and “My New Friend Is So Fun!” Dan Gutman, who wrote the “My Weird School” series, took second place, with two votes. Favorite singer or musician: These kids are pop music fans. Taylor Swift won this category with three votes. Other students prefer Coldplay, Nick Jonas and Flo Rida. Favorite game, sport or hobby: Soccer scored the most votes (five), but close behind were baseball, basketball and Minecraft, with three votes apiece. Person, living or dead, you ­admire most: Five chose Mom and Dad as most admired, with Mom in second place and Dad in third. Altogether, two-thirds of the class most admired a member of the family, including one with four legs and a tail. Favorite website: The math-game site DreamBox tied for first place with video-playing YouTube. Each received three votes. If you could go on a trip anywhere, where would you go? Three kids picked Orlando, Florida, or one of its theme parks as their top destination. California and Hawaii each received two votes. Other dream vacation spots included Paris, ­Japan and Antarctica. Favorite birthday food: Cake was the clear winner in this category, with eight votes, or nine if cupcakes are included. Second place went to pizza, with five votes. Two kids favored something healthful: apples. If you could have a superpower, what would it be? If these kids got their wish, they would be sneaking all over school. Invisibility was the ­superpower of choice for four students. Second place was a tie between super-speed and the ability to turn into animals. What do you want to be when you grow up? Four students in the class hope to be veterinarians one day. Another four would like ­careers as professional athletes, although they each chose a different sport. Other interesting careers: clown, detective and “imagineer,” or someone who builds rides at Disney World. What is the biggest problem in the world, and what can kids do to help solve it? Four kids chose Donald Trump, who was a presidential candidate when they filled out the survey. Their advice at the time was about voting, so we hope to hear back on how they think the president is doing. Four other second-graders picked school. We suspect, however, that they might not think it’s the biggest global problem, but the biggest problem in their lives.

Malala Yousafzai, the youngest winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, is to become the youngest United Nations Messenger of Peace, the organization’s chief said Friday. Yousafzai, 19, will be appointed on Monday by U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres and will help promote girls’ education around the world as part of her new role. The Pakistani education activist came to prominence when a Taliban gunman shot her in the head on her school bus in 2012 as punishment for campaigning for girls to go to school. The militant Islamic group had banned education for girls and women. Yousafzai has since continued campaigning on the world stage and in 2014 became the youngest Nobel Peace Prize winner. “Even in the face of grave danger, Malala Yousafzai has shown an unwavering commitment to the rights of women, girls and all people,” Guterres said in statement. “Her courageous activism for girls’ education has already energized so many people around the world. Now as our youngest-ever U.N. Messenger of Peace, Malala can do even more to help create a more just and peaceful world.”. Yousafzai, who received medical treatment in Britain where she has since studied, has also set up the Malala Fund to support girls’ education projects in developing countries. A regular speaker on the global stage, Yousafzai visited refugee camps in Rwanda and Kenya last July to highlight the plight of refugee girls from Burundi and Somalia.

Over the past year Ada and Anuma have broken Marta Llanes’s television and computer keyboard, chewed her telephone to pieces and ruined much of her furniture. She has forgiven them each time. It’s hard to stay angry at a baby chimpanzee when it clambers up your leg and into your arms and plants a kiss on your cheek in a plea for forgiveness. While zoos in other countries may have specialized facilities for raising baby animals, in Cuba the job falls to Llanes. A 62-year-old zoologist, she has cared for 10 baby chimps in her apartment in Havana, the Cuban capital, since she started working at the city zoo in 1983. It’s hard work that requires watching the apes nearly 17 hours a day until they are returned to the zoo after their first birthday. “I try to be the mother chimpanzee,” Llanes said. “If they say ‘hu,’ I say ‘hu.’ If they want me to drop to the floor, I drop to the floor. The only thing I can’t do is swing. I used to do it, but I can’t anymore, but they have to be taught to swing. They have to be taught everything.”. She leaves her home a few hours each week when another zoologist delivers milk, fruit and cleaning products, and cares for the animals while Llanes takes a break. Meanwhile, Llanes’s apartment looks like any that’s home to two very young kids. In her case, these infants are able to scramble up chairs, tables and virtually any other object with already-strong arms and legs, and with feet that have opposable “thumbs.” The floor is covered with toys. The electric sockets have been covered to prevent a dangerous accidental shock. Ada, the female chimp, is 13 months old. The male, Anuma, is 15 months. Both wear diapers. The chimpanzee, an endangered species, separated from humans on the evolutionary tree about 7 million years ago. Chimps share about 90 percent of humans’ DNA, and are known for their intelligence and use of basic tools. They often live for 50 years in the wild and can live even longer in captivity. Llanes, who has an adult daughter, says it can be difficult to get female chimps to care for their offspring in captivity, and she’s been happy to step in. She is raising the baby chimps because their mothers at the zoo are too young and did not learn how to feed or care for them properly. “I have to be at home with them 24 hours a day,” said Llanes, who rises at 5 a.m. and often watches the chimps until 10 p.m., with an occasional break when everyone is napping. Llanes lives in a fifth-floor apartment in a building with dozens of residents, virtually all of whom say the baby chimps are good neighbors. “They don’t bother anyone,” said Cari Dib, 65. “Plus, they’re adorable.”.

Question marks. They are those squiggly notes at the end of sentences that ask things such as “How old are you?”. In sports, question marks are the parts of a team you are not quite sure of as the season begins. The more question marks a team has, the more trouble that team may experience during the season. The Washington Nationals began their 2017 Major League Baseball season Monday with a 4-2 win against the Miami Marlins. The Nats had a record of 95-67 (95 wins and 67 losses) in 2016. That was very good, and Washington should be very good again this season. Still, the Nats have some question marks: Can Blake Treinen be the team’s closer? In baseball, the closer is the relief pitcher who gets the last few outs of the game. Closers are important because no team likes to lose a game in the last inning or two. Manager Dusty Baker says he will try Blake Treinen as the team’s late-inning guy. Treinen is talented and throws hard, but he has never been a full-time closer. So no one is 100 percent sure he can do the job. (He did earn a save on Opening Day.). Will Ryan Zimmerman and Jayson Werth be very good? Zimmerman and Werth have been terrific players over their long careers. But Zimmerman has missed more than 40 percent of the Nats games during the past three seasons. He really struggled at the plate in 2016, hitting just .218. Are all his injuries catching up with him? Werth will be 38 years old in May. That’s not old for most jobs, but it is old for a baseball player. The Nats have to wonder whether they can count on their veteran left fielder for the long season. Which Bryce Harper will show up this season? Two years ago, Harper was unbelievable. The Nats’ right fielder batted .330, blasted 42 home runs and was named the National League’s Most Valuable Player (MVP). In his other four seasons in Washington, Harper has been good but not as great as he was in 2015. So, will Harper be good or great this season? Can Trea Turner play shortstop in the majors? Turner was outstanding when he came up from the minors and shifted to center field last year. The speedy rookie batted .342 and stole 33 bases in only 73 games. The Nats will switch Turner from center field to shortstop. Turner played the position in college and the minors, but not in the majors. Can he play a steady shortstop for 162 games? I think the Nats should take care of enough of these question marks to win more than 90 games and finish on top of the National League East Division. Bowen writes the sports opinion column for KidsPost. He is the author of 22 kids sports books, including nine about baseball.

An incoming Kansas high school principal resigned Tuesday after student reporters raised questions about her credentials. Amy Robertson, an education consultant in the United Arab Emirates, was hired in March to become the principal of Pittsburg High School in southeastern Kansas. Six student journalists at the school’s paper, the Booster Redux, started researching her background and experience. They published an article on their findings Friday. “There were some things that just didn’t quite add up,” Connor Balthazor, 17, told The Washington Post. The main concern was that she had reported receiving her master’s and doctoral degrees from Corllins University, an online school that is not officially recognized, or accredited, by the U.S. Department of Education. Robertson says she received her degrees before the university lost its accreditation. Pittsburg Schools Superintendent Destry Brown said the district will probably change its hiring practices. “Our kids ask questions,” he said, praising the students’ reporting, “and don’t just accept something because somebody told them.”. — Staff reports and wire services.

Scripps National Spelling Bee winners aced “Gesellschaft” and “Feldenkrais” to be named co-champions of last year’s competition, but it was the word “tie” that gave organizers a headache. On Tuesday, the contest revealed new rules aimed at preventing ties after the annual competition ended in a dead heat three years in a row, with joint winners both getting $40,000 cash prizes in 2016. Organizers said they would prefer to see a clear-cut champion, rather than a shared title. The 290 young spelling whizzes from across the United States and six foreign countries in this year’s bee will face a new written tiebreaker when they square off from May 30 to June 1 in Oxon Hill, Maryland, organizers said. The written test introduces a fresh hurdle for participants spelling ever-tougher words in the bee, which began in Louisville, Kentucky, in 1925. “During our history, students have expanded their spelling abilities and increased their vocabulary to push our program to be even more challenging,” Paige Kimble, the bee’s executive director, said in a statement. Ahead of this year’s title round, the finalists will be tested on 12 words, which they will hand write, and 12 multiple-choice vocabulary questions. If it is mathematically impossible for one champion to emerge through 25 rounds, bee officials will declare the speller with the highest test score the winner. If there is a tie on the test, judges will declare co-champions. This year’s bee will draw contestants ages 5 to 15 culled from more than 11 million in the spelling program. The winner — or winners — each will receive the cash prize of $40,000. Last year, Nihar Janga, a fifth-grader from Austin, Texas, and Jairam Hathwar, a seventh-grader from Painted Post, New York, were named co-champions after battling 25 rounds head to head. To gain the title, Nihar spelled “Gesellschaft,” a type of social relationship, and Jairam aced “Feldenkrais,” a method of education.

NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft is now halfway between Pluto and its next much, much smaller stop. New Horizons — which reached the milestone this week — is bound for an even more remote object called 2014 MU69. Like Pluto, the object orbits in our solar system’s twilight zone known as the Kuiper belt, but it is barely 1 percent its size. MU69 is nearly 1 billion miles beyond Pluto. The spacecraft is scheduled to swoop past MU69 on January 1, 2019. “That flyby will set the record for the most distant world ever explored in the history of civilization,” chief investigator Alan Stern of Southwest Research Institute said in a statement. With 466 million miles remaining, New Horizons will go into a five-month hibernation later this week. Although still zooming along, the spacecraft is slowing down slightly as it gets farther from the sun. Besides aiming for MU69, New Horizons will study a couple of dozen other Kuiper belt objects from afar. New Horizons arrived at Pluto in July 2015, becoming its first visitor from Earth. It launched from Cape Canaveral in January 2006. The spacecraft is currently 3.5 billion miles from home. It takes radio signals five hours and 20 minutes to reach the spacecraft from the control center at Johns Hopkins University in Laurel, Maryland.

They thought it would be over within months. They were wrong. Instead, the world was at war for four long years. Powerful nations took sides — the Allies versus the Central Powers. From 1914 to 1918, they battled across Europe and into Asia and Africa. The United States supplied the Allies with goods but tried to stay out of the fighting. But in April 1917, 100 years ago this week, it joined the Allies (led by Great Britain and France) by declaring war on Germany and Austria-Hungary. World War I brought an end to one way of fighting and the start of another. Soldiers on horseback, called cavalry, were replaced by tanks. By the war’s end, more than 16 million people had died. The shocking numbers of dead and wounded led some to call it “the war to end all wars.”. They were wrong about that, too. U.S. kids don’t learn much about World War I in school. For starters, the war was a long time ago, and it wasn’t fought here. Also, America joined late, so its losses were limited. America got into the war mostly because German U-boats (subs) kept sinking unarmed ships in the Atlantic. Germany knew this risked pulling the United States into the war but thought it could defeat the Allies before U.S. troops or warships were ready. Instead, America’s entry changed the course of the war. In addition to troops, the United States provided arms, tanks, ships, fuel and food to its friends. This aid helped the Allies win. As in any war, unexpected heroes arise. Here are two American ones: You could say Stubby joined the Army in 1917. The terrier pup with a short tail showed up one day at a training camp in Connecticut and became the troops’ mascot. He learned their bugle calls and drills. When the men left to join the fighting, they smuggled Stubby onto their ship. He was discovered after they arrived in France but was allowed to stay after lifting his right paw to his forehead and saluting the commanding officer! On the battlefield, Stubby’s keen nose picked up the tiniest trace of poison gas, and he barked until everyone donned gas masks. (Dogs and horses also had masks.) Stubby’s keen ears helped him find wounded soldiers in the field. He listened for English being spoken, then barked until medics came to help. He even captured an enemy soldier by biting him on the leg. Stubby took part in 17 battles and was made a sergeant. He has been the subject of several books and a movie that is due out in 2018. That’s what Alvin York wrote to explain his feelings about going to war. York’s father had died when Alvin was young, and he was needed at home in Tennessee to help raise his eight younger siblings. But the Army had other ideas and shipped him to France. In October 1918, York led an attack on a German machine-gun nest. With just a rifle and pistol, he killed several German soldiers and captured 132. When he got back to camp, he wrote later, a general said: “ ‘Well, York, I hear you have captured the whole ... German army.’ And I told him I only had 132.”. Though awarded the Medal of Honor — the highest U.S. military award — York shunned celebrity and went home to Tennessee. Back on the farm, the war hero with the third-grade education raised money to build a good high school for his neighbors’ kids.

Wildlife enthusiasts around the world can follow the daily journey of Yosemite National Park’s black bears from their laptops and smartphones, tracking the animals as they lope up steep canyons and cross vast distances in search of food and mates. Park rangers on Monday unveiled Keepbearswild.org, showing where select bears fitted with GPS collars are heading. The tracking tool, which pings the bears’ steps from satellites, have already revealed surprises, wildlife biologists say. “I think people are going to be blown away,” said Ryan Leahy, a wildlife biologist at Yosemite National Park who leads the project. “It’s our responsibility to keep bears wild.”. A bear’s location is delayed so people aren’t tempted to track it down in real time, rangers said. But the tracking collars alert rangers so they can block a bear from going to a campground or parking lot in search of food. The goal of the website is to draw in the public so they know to slow down while driving and properly store food when they visit the park’s towering granite cliffs, charging waterfalls and abundant wildlife, including up to 500 black bears. Yosemite attracted more than 5 million visitors last year. Too often, black bears — many of which are actually brown in Yosemite — are hit and killed by drivers on Yosemite’s winding roads. The website shows where 28 bears were struck by cars last year, many fatally. The park has used as many as 20 GPS collars for the past three years, learning that bears in the park begin mating in May, more than a month earlier than previously thought, rangers said. Leahy also said that the tracking devices show that bears move more than 30 miles in a day or two, moving with ease up 5,000-foot canyon walls. The Yosemite Conservancy has spent $1.2 million since 1998 to help the park manage bears. The latest project cost $279,000, rangers said. The tracking technology and website help rangers learn even more about bears’ habits to protect them, said Frank Dean, the conservancy’s president, and it raises awareness among visitors about what they can do to save bears. “People love to see bears,” Dean said. “Protecting them is something we can all do.”. Yosemite’s effort drew praise from Jesse Garcia, a black bear specialist with the California Department of Fish and Wildlife. He said it’s important for park visitors to understand bears while in the animals’ natural territory. “You’ve got to give them their distance and always be aware, knowing that they’re there,” Garcia said.

Last spring, JJ Edwards had seven furry roommates: Fairley, Farley, Felicity, Finley, Fleur, Fritz and Friday. Sharing a room with that many animals may sound chaotic, but it’s no big deal for the 10-year-old. JJ and his family have taken in more than 50 homeless kittens over the past six years. And they expect more in the next few weeks. That’s because it’s kitten season, the time of year when there is a surge of kittens born. Some are taken in by Pet­Connect, a Maryland animal rescue organization where JJ’s mom,. Catherine, is executive director. The Edwards family volunteers to “foster,” or provide a temporary home for some of the homeless animals. The kittens usually stay at the family’s Gaithersburg home for just a few weeks, until they’re old enough to be adopted. Each kitten season, JJ turns his bedroom into a feline romper room. It’s decked out with cat trees, cat toys and carpeted stairs to help the kittens climb onto his bed. He gets them used to being around humans. “They were tiny and super scared at first,” JJ said of last year’s kittens. To help them learn to trust humans, JJ often sat on the floor outside his room and waited for them to come out. The kittens grew more confident, snuggling and purring a little more each day. When JJ held up a wand toy with a dangling feather and danced it around, they chased, pounced and backflipped. One challenge of fostering kittens is keeping things tidy, JJ said. The kittens he has cared for loved to scatter their toys and tip over their food bowl. When Jimmy, a gray-and-white kitten who stayed for almost three months, got adopted, JJ was sad. “Letting a kitten leave is hard,” he says. “Sometimes I cry, but mostly I’m happy they got a good home and a good life.”. Last Christmas, JJ had a wish come true: His parents let him keep a kitten he had cared for. Puff Daddy, now 4 months old, makes friends with visiting foster kitties and helps JJ entertain them. “I think the kittens appreciate me,” he says. “I watch them, stay with them, take care of them, and they purr.”. Springtime means lots of baby animals — birds, squirrels, bunnies and more. “Wild animals have wild homes,” says Stephanie Shain of the Humane Rescue Alliance, an animal protection and rescue group in Northwest Washington. “But kittens need to be in people homes with a human family to care for them.”. She says kids can do a lot to help, such as: ●If you have a pet cat, make sure it’s spayed or neutered to prevent more litters. ●Learn as much as you can about helping homeless pets and share what you know. ●Work with your parents to raise money for a rescue organization. ●Check out rescue organizations’ wish lists and collect items to donate. org/in-kind-donations, or PetConnect Rescue, PetConnectRescue.org/muddy-paws/wish-list.). Another thing you can do is talk to your family about fostering for a rescue group near your home. “We would never be able to save the lives of so many kittens if we didn’t have foster homes,” Shain said. Fostering kittens during spring is usually a short-term commitment, because kittens tend to get adopted quickly.

An Egyptian excavation team has discovered the remains of a pyramid that dates to the 13th dynasty, some 3,700 years ago, according to one of that country’s top officials in antiquities, or ancient objects. The head of the Ancient Egyptian Antiquities Sector, Mahmoud Afifi, said in a statement Monday that the remains were located north of the king Sneferu’s bent pyramid in the Dahshur royal necropolis, about 25 miles south of Cairo. Because of the bent slope of its sides, the pyramid is believed to have been ancient Egypt’s first attempt to build a smooth-sided pyramid. The necropolis was the burial site for courtiers and high-ranking officials. Adel Okasha, the head of the Dahshur necropolis, said the remains belong to the inner structure of the pyramid, including a corridor. Other remains include blocks showing the interior design of the pyramid. The pyramid is not as old as others in the area. The Dahshur pyramids are said to have been built between 2613 B.C. and 2589 B.C. — Associated Press.

Fed up with the theft of toilet paper from public bathrooms, tourist authorities in China’s capital have begun using facial recognition technology to limit how much paper a person can take. The unusual move — part of a “toilet revolution” — is another step in China’s vast upgrading of public facilities. Bathrooms at tourist sites, notorious for their primitive conditions and nasty odors, are a special focus of the campaign, a response to a vast expansion in travel within China and demands for better-quality facilities from a wealthier public. “Today in China, people are highly enthusiastic about tourism, and we have entered a new era of public tourism,” said Zhan Dongmei, a researcher with the China Tourism Academy. “The expectation of the public for the toilet is becoming higher.”. At Beijing’s 600-year-old Temple of Heaven, administrators recognized the need to stock the public bathrooms with toilet paper, a requirement for obtaining a top rating from the National Tourism Authority. But they needed a means of preventing patrons from stripping them bare for personal use. So they introduced new technology that dispenses just one two-foot section of paper every nine minutes following a face scan. “People take away the paper mostly because they are worried they can’t find any when they want to use it the next time. But if we can provide it in every toilet, most people will not do it anymore,” Zhan said. Launched two years ago, the revolution calls for at least 34,000 new public bathrooms to be constructed in Beijing and 23,000 renovated by the end of this year. Authorities are also encouraging the installation of Western-style sit-down commodes rather than the more common squat toilets. Around $3.6 billion has already been spent on the program, according to the National Tourism Administration. The ultimate target, Zhan said, “is to have a sufficient amount of toilets which are clean and odorless and free to use.”. At Happy Valley, the largest amusement park in Beijing, around 4 million annual visitors rely on 18 bathrooms, each of which is assigned one or two cleaners who must make their rounds every 10 minutes on busy days. “People come here to have fun, but if the toilets are disgusting, how can they have a good time here?” said Vice General Manager Li Xiangyang. “It is the least we should do to offer a clean and tidy environment for tourists to enjoy both the tour of the park and the experience of using our toilets.”.

A few times each fall, before the ground freezes and the air gets too cold, Jim Bintliff takes a shovel and buckets down to the banks of a muddy river in southern New Jersey. He’s there to harvest mud — odorless and puddinglike, with a chocolate color to match — that has become as much a part of Major League Baseball as Cracker Jack and batting helmets. His Lena Blackburne Baseball Rubbing Mud is applied to every baseball used in a big-league game, to help pitchers grip the ball better as they launch it toward home plate. “When fresh baseballs come out of the box, they’re quite slick. For a pitcher, that equals danger,” says Shawn Kelley, a Washington Nationals reliever who will be in the bullpen Monday for Opening Day. “If a pitcher were to throw a brand-new baseball, most would tell you they couldn’t be assured that it would even end up over the plate.”. In August 1920, Cleveland Indians shortstop Ray Chapman died after being hit in the head by a pitch from Carl Mays, a New York Yankees right-hander. It was the first and only time in MLB history that a player has been killed by a pitch, and it led the league to look for new ways to protect batters and improve pitch accuracy. Balls began to be rubbed with mud, clay, shoe polish or tobacco juice, but the homemade mixtures often damaged the balls’ leather, turned it black or simply smelled bad. Blackburne, a third-base coach and former infielder, began using a better product in the late 1930s: mud that he found near his childhood home of Palmyra, New Jersey, where the slope of a riverbank that sent water into the nearby Delaware River formed a natural goop with a thick, baseball-friendly consistency. The magic mud soon spread through baseball’s American and then National leagues. Bintliff, 60, said he and his wife, Joanne, now sell about 2,000 pounds of mud each year, to every MLB team as well as to minor-league and college squads. The business has been in the family for three generations, ever since Blackburne passed it along to Bintliff’s grandfather, a close friend. “There’s an art to harvesting mud,” Bintliff told KidsPost last week. He usually wades knee-deep into the muck, which he said is on public land, and shovels near the surface. If he goes any deeper, the mud becomes black and begins to smell. To perfect his product, Bintliff ages the mud in 35-gallon trash cans for about six weeks before sending it on to buyers. (A “personal size” half-pound container of mud sells for $24.) Each MLB team gets 12 pounds for spring training and the regular season, he said. Dan Wallin, the Nats’ equipment manager, said it takes him or a clubhouse assistant about 45 minutes to rub the mud on the 12 dozen baseballs that are prepared for a game. Applying the brown stuff can “make it harder for a hitter to see the ball,” he said, so he and his staff try to find a nice middle ground “where the pitchers like it and the hitters don’t complain.”. Rawlings, a sporting-goods company that makes all of the hand-stitched baseballs used in MLB games, is working on a new ball “that is easier to grip and does not require rubbing with mud,” according to an MLB spokesman. The experimental ball “would change things” for Lena Blackburne, Bintliff said, but in the past decade, he’s also found surprising new customers: pro football teams. The National Football League did not immediately answer a request for its comment, but Bintliff said that about half of NFL teams buy Lena Blackburne mud to help their players grip the ball. So his business, which he plans to pass along to a daughter, may not dry up anytime soon.

Dandelion yellow has reason to be blue. Crayola announced Friday, National Crayon Day, that it’s replacing the color dandelion in its 24-pack with a crayon in “the blue family.”. The company says it will leave it to fans to come up with a name for the replacement color. It’s only the third time in Crayola’s long history that it has retired one or more colors, and the first time it’s swapped out a color in its box of 24. Other colors that previously got the boot include maize, raw umber and orange yellow. Crayola crayons were first produced in 1903 by Binney & Smith Company.

In the summer of 1914, tension was building across Europe. In the east, the Ottoman and Austro-Hungarian empires were threatened by ethnic groups seeking to break away or expand their reach. To the west, Germany was flexing its industrial muscle, while the powerful British navy was the envy of the world. A wave of nationalism — pride in one’s country, often in the belief that it is better than any other — was sweeping over the continent. Nations were busy building their militaries and forming alliances with one another for protection. Even so, few people thought a war would result. That changed in late June when Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne, went to Bosnia to inspect troops. Bosnia was part of Austria then, but Serbia claimed it, too. As Franz Ferdinand and his wife rode in an open car through Sarajevo, Bosnia’s capital, a Bosnian Serb who opposed Austro-Hungarian rule shot and killed them. Austria-Hungary blamed Serbia and declared war. Other nations, united by their treaties, jumped in. By early August, World War I had begun. When it was over, more than four years later, the map of Europe looked very different. Empires had toppled. New countries had formed. The war set off a century of change in Europe’s borders. They shifted again when a second world war broke out just 20 years after the first one ended. The map has continued to change, right up to the present day. The countries that fought in World War I split into two camps. Russia, France, Belgium and the United Kingdom (Great Britain and Ireland) were among those that sided with Serbia. They were called the Allies. Opposing them were the Central Powers: Germany, Austria-Hungary, the Ottoman Empire and Bulgaria. A few countries — Spain and Switzerland, for example — stayed neutral, not choosing a side. The United States, largely in response to German submarine attacks on its ships, joined the Allies in April 1917. Most of the fighting took place on two fronts in Europe, but the war also spread to the Middle East, Africa, South America, Asia and some Pacific islands. For three of the biggest nations involved, the war was a family affair. Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany, Czar Nicholas II of Russia and his wife, Empress Alexandra, were all cousins of Britain’s King George V. Explanation: George’s father, Wilhelm’s mother and Alexandra’s mother were all children of Queen Victoria. That made George, Wilhelm and Alexandra first cousins. Nicholas’s mother was the sister of George’s mother, so Nicholas and George were first cousins. Nicholas and George looked like twins and were sometimes mistaken for each other. On Christmas Eve 1914, something amazing happened. German and Allied soldiers in trenches along the Western Front in Belgium stopped fighting for a few hours. Instead, they sang carols, exchanged food and small gifts and even played soccer in the narrow strip of “no man’s land” between the armies. The truce spread along the entire front and lasted for a week in some places. Germany hoped to defeat the Allies in the west quickly, then turn and attack Russia. But it got bogged down on the Western Front. Soldiers on both sides hunkered down in hundreds of miles of trenches, sometimes just yards apart. This reduced the impact of exploding shells and kept machine guns from firing down long lines of men. The war was fought in ways new and old. As in previous wars, horses pulled cannons, ammunition and supplies. Pigeons and dogs carried messages. Dogs also sniffed out explosives and acted as guards. Jars filled with glowworms lit the trenches. At the same time, tanks and airplanes were used in combat for the first time. And weapons such as machine guns and flamethrowers were updated, with deadly effect. Airplanes were fairly new when the war broke out. At first, they were used just to spy on the enemy and direct artillery fire. Later, pilots chased and shot at one another in “dogfights.” German pilots had parachutes, though they often failed to work. Allied pilots were not issued parachutes, in part because officers thought pilots would bail out at the first sign of trouble. Top aviators were called aces. The most famous was Germany’s Manfred von Richthofen, known as the Red Baron, who shot down 80 enemy planes. The top Allied pilot, René Fonck of France, had 75. The Red Baron did not live to see the war’s end. He was killed in combat in 1918, at age 25. Looking to break the stalemate of trench warfare, the Germans turned to chemical weapons. A yellow-green cloud that drifted over Allied troops at Ypres, Belgium, in April 1915 marked the first use of poison gas in the war. Thousands of soldiers choked to death as the chlorine gas attacked their lungs. Months later, the Allies launched their own gas attacks. In addition to chlorine, both sides used phosgene and mustard gas, which blistered the skin. Gas attacks are thought to have caused more than 90,000 deaths in the war. The rate dropped a lot once soldiers were issued gas masks. Special masks were made for dogs and horses. In the east, the armies of Russia, Austria-Hungary and Germany battled across a wide-open landscape. Although the Russians claimed early victories, they were soon overrun by the Germans and suffered big losses. At home, the Russian people were fed up. Riots and strikes led to two revolutions in 1917. First, the czar was forced out. Then the government that replaced him was ousted. The country was then led by Vladimir Lenin and his followers, the Bolsheviks (later called communists). Lenin had promised to end Russia’s role in the war. In March 1918, Russia signed a peace treaty with the Central Powers, agreeing to give up vast areas such as Poland and Ukraine. World War I had some of the deadliest battles in history. Ypres, Verdun, the Somme, Gallipoli and Tannenberg are names that live on in history books. The cost in human lives was devastating. More than half of the 65 million men who served were killed or wounded. Almost as many civilians were killed. The conflict raged until November 1918. The U.S. entry into the war had helped persuade Germany to surrender. The main peace treaty was signed in Versailles, France, on June 28, 1919 — five years from the day in Sarajevo when a gunman fired the shots that set off what some had called “the war to end all wars.”. Czar Nicholas II, the last emperor of Russia, was offered a haven in Great Britain after he was forced off the throne in 1917. But his English cousin, King George V, nixed the offer, fearing a riot if the czar moved to Britain. Nicholas and his family were executed by the Bolsheviks the next year. Kaiser Wilhelm II, Germany’s last emperor, was forced out in November 1918. He lived in the Netherlands until his death in 1941. Franz Joseph I, emperor of Austria and king of Hungary, remained on the throne until his death in 1916. His grandnephew succeeded him, but the monarchy ended when the war did. In 1918, thousands of American soldiers headed overseas to fight. At the time, no one realized they were carrying a virus that would prove more deadly than the war itself. In fact, it caused the most devastating epidemic the world has known. It got the name Spanish flu because Spain had the first public reports of the epidemic. Over two years, a billion people — half the world’s population — reportedly fell ill. Estimates of how many died go as high as 50 million, far more than the 16 million to 17 million people who died in the war. The flu was even said to have altered battle plans when officers realized they didn’t have enough healthy men to mount an attack. Hoping never to see another world war, several countries got together and in 1919 created a group dedicated to world peace. They called it the League of Nations. The idea was to resolve disputes peacefully or, if that could not be done, to apply economic and military pressure. Members agreed to defend one another if threatened. The league had 42 founding members. Germany and Russia were not allowed to join at first. They joined later, with 19 other countries, but did not stay members for long. The United States, one of the league’s biggest backers, worked with it but never joined. Opponents believed that joining would have forced the United States to get involved in disputes overseas. The face of Europe changed dramatically after World War I. Four empires collapsed: the Russian Empire in 1917, the German and Austro-Hungarian empires a year later and the Ottoman Empire in 1922. As a result, several countries were formed or grew in size. New nations included Austria, Czechoslovakia, Finland, Hungary, Yugoslavia and the Baltic states. Poland was reborn. In the 1930s, times were hard in Germany. The country’s new leader, Adolf Hitler, and his followers bristled over the harsh punishment Germany was given in the Treaty of Versailles. Hitler decided to rebuild Germany’s armed forces and create a new empire, uniting Germans who lived throughout Europe. Germany paid a heavy price for being on the losing side. More than 2.5 million of its soldiers and civilians died and, with defeat, its empire was broken apart. It lost 10 percent of its remaining population and nearly 15 percent of its land to other countries. One parcel gave Poland access to the Baltic Sea while splitting Germany in two. The smaller part became known as East Prussia. The Treaty of Versailles required Germany to reduce its army to no more than 100,000 men and banned it from having tanks, military aircraft, submarines and chemical weapons. In addition, the Germans were to pay a big penalty, called reparations, for wartime damage. Some thought the amount was too much. The total was later reduced. A look at the map explains why Poland’s history has been one of strife. Neighboring Russia, Austria and Prussia (later Germany) had their eyes on it at various times. They succeeded in carving it up in the late 1700s. As a result, the Polish people were split in World War I. Polish soldiers served on both sides. Civilians suffered greatly, since much of the worst fighting on the Eastern Front was on their land. But when the war ended, land that had been taken by others was returned, and the nation of Poland was reborn after nearly 125 years. The Bolsheviks had promised the Russian people “peace, bread and land.” Instead, food was scarce, land was disappearing and the peace seemed fragile at best. The civil war lasted until 1921. The next year, Russia, Ukraine (which Russia had reclaimed) and regions to the south formed the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR). The Soviet Union, as it was called, lasted until 1991. Adolf Hitler grew up in Austria. He wanted to be an artist but lacked the talent. He moved to Germany as a young man, fought for Germany in World War I and then entered politics. He gave rousing speeches, which led to his becoming head of the Nazi political party. The Nazis believed Germans were a superior people. They hated Jews and communists and sought to destroy them. Hitler and the Nazis amassed great power in the 1930s. People who opposed them were killed or sent to prisons called concentration camps. Once he became Germany’s leader, Hitler wanted more land. First, he made Austria part of Germany. Then he took part of Czechoslovakia. On September 1, 1939, Germany invaded Poland, starting World War II. The war lasted six years. In its last days, when Hitler realized the war was lost, he killed himself. The term “Third Reich” describes the period from 1933 to 1945, when the Nazis controlled Germany and overran Europe. The word “reich” (pronounced RIKE) means “empire” or “realm.” The Nazis were creating a third great empire for the German people. The first had been the Holy Roman Empire, which Germany led from 962 to 1806. The second was the German Empire, which began in 1871 and ended with World War I. Hitler designed the flag for the Nazi party. Its colors — red, white and black — were those of the German empire that ended with World War I. In the middle of the flag was a hooked figure called a swastika (SWAHS-tick-uh). The swastika was a symbol of German national pride. It appeared on posters, armbands and military badges. If people see a swastika today, they usually think only of the Nazis. But the swastika is an ancient religious symbol for good luck. Swastikas are often seen on houses and temples in India, for example. The 1936 Summer Olympics were held in Berlin, Germany. Hitler saw this as a chance to show the world how Germany had rebounded from World War I. There were big rallies for the Games, new sports venues and even new sports: Men’s basketball was added that year. But that wasn’t the whole story. Jews and others whom the Nazis thought inferior were not wanted on Germany’s Olympic team. Hitler’s anti-Jewish campaign — which featured “Jews not welcome” signs — was going strong in 1935. But before foreign visitors arrived in Berlin for the Games, those signs were taken down. In their place were colorful posters promoting Germany and its belief in racial superiority. The United States and some other countries thought about skipping the Games. Jewish and black athletes weighed that option, too. But African American journalists said the athletes should go, to show how wrong the Nazis’ racial beliefs were. The U.S. team that went to Berlin had nearly two dozen black and Jewish athletes. Track and field star Jesse Owens won four Olympic gold medals, setting or matching three world records. A top German official, noting the success of black athletes such as Owens, wrote in his diary: “This is a disgrace. White people should be ashamed of themselves.”. On the night of November 9, 1938, violence broke out across Germany, Austria and the part of Czechoslovakia that Germany controlled. The shops and homes of thousands of Jews were trashed. More than 250 synagogues were set on fire. Police and firefighters stood by and watched. The violence became known as Kristallnacht, or Night of Crystal. It’s also called Night of Broken Glass because of the glass shards in the streets afterward. Nazi officials said the violence was unplanned, but that wasn’t true. They had encouraged it. A day later, 30,000 men were arrested just because they were Jews. They were sent to concentration camps. Because the German people seemed to accept what had happened, Nazi leaders felt they could be even harsher. Jews were barred from many jobs. They could leave their homes only at certain times. They could not go to theaters or concerts, and their children could not attend public schools. Kristallnacht was a major step in the Nazis’ plan to rid Germany of all its Jews. Great Britain and France had allowed Germany to take over Austria and then part of Czechoslovakia, thinking that Hitler might stop there. But when Germany invaded Poland on September 1, 1939, Britain and France considered it an act of war. The two countries demanded that Hitler withdraw his troops. He refused. Two days later, they declared war on Germany. Italy and Japan joined Germany as the major Axis Powers. The chief Allied partners were Britain, France and, later, the Soviet Union and the United States. By 1942, the German war machine had rolled over much of Europe. With France occupied, Russia under attack and the United States still gearing up to fight, Germany seemed unstoppable. Next, it planned to invade Britain. The first step was to defeat the Royal Air Force (RAF). For three months in 1940, pilots from both sides dueled it out in the Battle of Britain. Then German bombs began falling on British cities during nighttime raids. More than 40,000 people died in the eight months of what was called the Blitz. In the end, though, the RAF and the British people proved tougher than Hitler had expected. As Winston Churchill, the British prime minister, had said just a month before the Blitz: “We shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender.”. The beginning of the end for the Nazis came on June 6, 1944. More than 150,000 British, American and Canadian troops landed in Normandy, France. The Allied invasion had been years in the planning, but the Germans were caught off-guard. They thought the invasion, when it happened, would come elsewhere on the coast. It may have helped that the weather was bad that day — not ideal for sending 7,000 ships across the English Channel. That added to the surprise. Even so, many men never made it off the beach as German guns fired down from the bluffs. The number of Allied troops killed or wounded on the invasion’s first day is estimated at 10,500. For the Germans, the number was between 4,000 and 9,000. In the days and weeks that followed, the Allies slogged their way through France. The liberation of Europe was underway. From 1933 to 1945, the Nazis murdered two-thirds of the Jews in Europe — 6 million people. The Nazis blamed Jews for Germany’s defeat in World War I and the punishment that followed. They thought Jews were less than human. They had a plan to get rid of them. They called it the “Final Solution.”. Under this plan, Jews were first stripped of their rights. Their homes, businesses and synagogues were attacked. In some cities, they were forced into sealed-off areas called ghettos and given little food and water. The most horrific part of the plan was the concentration camps. Jews were rounded up and shipped off to these camps. When they got there, some were forced to work, while others, including many children, were killed in large gas chambers. Then their bodies were burned and dumped in pits. The Nazis didn’t hate only the Jews. They also killed about 5 million Gypsies, Poles, Catholics, communists, disabled people and others they didn’t like. The name given to this mass murder is the “Holocaust,” which comes from a Greek word that means “sacrifice by fire.”. Of the more than a million Jewish children killed in the Holocaust, none is better known than Anne Frank. Anne’s family fled Germany when the Nazis came to power. The Franks went to Amsterdam, in the Netherlands, but eventually the Germans showed up there, too. Then Anne’s family went into hiding. She was 13. For two years, Anne, her mother, father and older sister hid in a secret apartment in the attic of a family business. Their secret was kept by brave friends who brought them food and clothing. In August 1944, German police found the attic hideaway. The Franks and the others were taken to concentration camps. Like her sister and her mother, Anne did not survive the war. But the diary she kept while hiding in the attic did. When it was published in 1947, her father, Otto, said: “If she had been here, Anne would have been so proud.”. The war in Europe lasted six years and claimed millions of victims. The Soviet Union alone counted 20 million dead, a third of them civilians. In the Siege of Leningrad, which lasted more than two years, thousands of the city’s residents starved or froze to death. Germany and Poland each lost more than 6 million people in the war. Germany’s death toll was half military, half civilian. Poland’s was almost entirely civilian. When the war ended, the Allies again changed the map of Germany and Eastern Europe. About 25 percent of Germany’s land was given to Poland and the Soviet Union. The Soviets claimed eastern Poland, which resulted in Poland’s boundaries shifting to the west. The rest of Germany was split in two, with the Soviets controlling the eastern side and the Allies controlling the west. France and Czechoslovakia regained land taken by the Germans. The Soviets took back the Baltic states (Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania), which Germany had occupied, and got back a slice of Finland. At the war’s end in 1945, Europe was in shambles. Cities were in ruins; roads, bridges and factories wiped away. Millions of people were homeless. In some areas, food and jobs were scarce. Countries had no money to rebuild. The United States had not felt the war in the same way. Financially, it was doing well. President Harry S. Truman and other U.S. leaders agreed that the country should extend a helping hand to nations in need. The result was the Marshall Plan, named for Secretary of State George C. Marshall. Under this plan, the United States gave more than $13 billion in assistance to 16 European countries between 1948 and 1951. That amount is equal to about $128 billion in 2014 dollars. The United States helped partly because it wanted to stop the Soviet Union from spreading communism, a form of government in which there is little or no private property, to Western Europe. Representatives from 26 nations met in Washington, D.C., in January 1942. They approved a plan setting up a peacekeeping body similar to the League of Nations, which had basically collapsed when Germany invaded Poland in 1939. But these delegates wanted to try again. The new body was to be called the United Nations. In June 1945, delegates from 50 countries met in San Francisco, California, to sign the U.N. charter, officially launching the organization. Tension was high in Germany, which was divided in four and occupied by Britain, France, the United States and the Soviet Union. Western European countries became nervous about Joseph Stalin, leader of the Soviet Union. He wanted a weak Germany. He also wanted more control in Eastern Europe. He insisted that a single political party, the Communist Party, rule all those nations. British Prime Minister Winston Churchill said Soviet control was like an “iron curtain” pulled across Europe. Western European countries explored ideas for working together to counter this growing threat. By 1948, Stalin worried that the economy in western Germany was becoming stronger than in the Soviet-controlled east. He blocked all ground access to the capital, Berlin, which was in the Soviet zone but had portions controlled by the United States, Britain and France. The people in those areas were cut off from supplies. The three countries organized an airlift, a series of airplanes trips, to get food and medicine to people there. The flights continued for almost a year, until the Soviet blockade was lifted. One pilot who became famous during the airlift was Gail Halvorsen. The U.S. pilot dropped candy from his airplane and became known as “the candy bomber.”. After Western Europe had been torn apart by two world wars, its leaders began to consider tying their economies and militaries together to form a single, stronger body. French officials Jean Monnet and Robert Schuman proposed in 1950 that France and West Germany combine their coal and steel resources. This would help both countries and make it difficult for one to wage war against the other. It was a way to prevent World War III. Italy, Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg signed on to this Coal and Steel Community. Its early success led to a bigger plan to join forces. In 1957, the countries formed the European Economic Community (EEC). Long after the airlift, Berlin remained the focus of the East-West divide. East Germany and West Germany had become separate countries in 1949, with the Soviet Union in control of the East. But West Berlin was governed by West Germany. Thousands of people escaped the harsh East German government by fleeing to West Berlin. East German officials wanted to stop this, and in 1961 they closed the border. A concrete wall went up, with a few official border crossings. East Berliners were forbidden to cross, although many risked their lives to do so. The wall would stand for nearly 30 years. The Soviet Union’s control of Eastern Europe always was difficult to maintain. Moscow attempted to strengthen its hold over the remaining East European countries in 1955 by creating a joint military. In the next three decades, there were revolts in Hungary, Czechoslovakia and Poland. Soviet troops were sometimes used to crush those rebellions. When Mikhail Gorbachev became Soviet leader in 1985, he favored “glasnost,” a Russian word that means “open discussions.” He aimed to break from Soviet policies to help the economy. In a 1987 speech at the Berlin Wall, U.S. President Ronald Reagan urged the Soviet leader: “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall.” About two years later, the wall came down, and by 1991 the Soviet Union collapsed. Over time, the idea of creating a partnership among European countries became popular. By 1986, six more Western European countries had joined the EEC and a decade later 15 were members of what was renamed the European Union. Most nations agreed to give up their currency, or money, and adopt the euro. Beginning in 2002, someone could travel from Greece to Ireland and make purchases in euros. That was a big step toward a unified Europe. In the past 10 years, the partnership has expanded into parts of Eastern Europe. The 28 members that battled one another in two world wars now mostly find common ground. One part of Eastern Europe shows that peace isn’t permanent. Ukraine lost a part of its country to Russia this year. People living in Crimea voted to join Russia, but questions arose as to whether they had been pressured to do so. At the time, Russian President Vladi­mir Putin said he wasn’t interested in other parts of Ukraine, but now rebels in eastern Ukraine are fighting to join Russia. In the next few years, the map of Europe may be redrawn once again.

Thomas Jefferson was the third president of the United States. That’s the most boring thing you’ll read about him in this story. Consider this: For most of the people who have been president of the United States (and there have been only 43, and they’ve all been men), that title would be the highlight of a lifetime, the accomplishment to be most proud of, the first thing to appear on your gravestone. Not so with Jefferson. He chose three accomplishments to be recorded on his tombstone, and being president didn’t even make the list. We’ll get around to telling you. KidsPost’s Tracy Grant recently spent a day at Monticello, Jefferson’s beautiful mountaintop home (Monticello is Italian for “little mountain”) in Charlottesville, Virginia. This article isn’t meant to tell you his life story, because endless books have already been written about him. It is meant to give you a sense that this fun, funny, endlessly curious man would have been an in­cred­ibly cool person to know. He totally would have had an iPad. Jefferson loved science, technology and innovation. One of his favorite devices was a rotating bookstand that could hold five books at once. Kind of like having five windows open on your computer. He was a great grandfather. He had 12 grandchildren, and many of them lived with him at the same time. He would organize races for the kids on the enormous lawn of Monticello. He also taught them how to play chess and a game called Goose, one of the first board games in the United States; it’s a bit like today’s game of Chutes and Ladders. He loved to play. As a boy, the freckle-faced Jefferson played with his friends on the land where he would eventually build Monticello. He would explore the woods, creeks and streams. He was an early archaeologist. He had the bones of a mastodon, an animal from 40 million years ago that looked a bit like an elephant, sent to him at the White House. He laid the bones out in what is now known as the East Room in an attempt to build a skeleton. He loved books. And we really mean he LOVED books. How many books do you have in your house? More than 20? More than 50? More than 100? In 1814, the original Library of Congress was attacked by British troops and all the books were burned. Jefferson offered his personal library as a replacement. In 1815, the Library of Congress was restocked — with Jefferson’s 6,487 books. He loved to write letters. He also used a machine called a polygraph that made copies as he wrote. He loved vanilla ice cream. He probably first tasted ice cream while traveling in France. He brought home a recipe for it, which is now in the Library of Congress. He would have loved Home Depot. “Putting up and pulling down, one of my favorite amusements,” Jefferson said about the building of Monticello. It took him more than 40 years to complete the house’s 33 rooms on four floors. Many of the rooms are octagonal, because he loved the shape. He had skylights put in the ceiling because he wanted to bring the beauty of the outside in. He loved their singing and often had at least four at a time. His favorite bird was named Dick. What he was most proud of: Now that you know how much Jefferson loved to read and to write and how much he valued knowledge, here is what is inscribed at his grave: “Here was buried Thomas Jefferson, Author of the Declaration of Independence, of the Statute of Virginia for religious freedom and Father of the University of Virginia.”. Read more from KidsPost: 10 things you may not know about Abraham Lincoln. KidsPost’s Guide to the presidents. New museum in Virginia explores other heroes of the Revolutionary War. Mount Vernon gives visitors a chance to “Be Washington”. No monument for James Madison. But one of his legacies is freedom of the press.

The first time I hiked to the bottom of Grand Canyon National Park, I knew I wanted to work there. Now, as a park ranger for the National Park Service, I share the science, history and beauty of this natural wonder with thousands of visitors from around the world. They preserve some of America’s most beautiful and historic places. Park rangers protect the parks’ animals, plants, land, buildings, artifacts and people. We have a variety of jobs, depending on where we work and what we studied during college. Interpretive park rangers (including me) teach people about what makes each national park special and what we can all do to take care of it. We lead hikes, teach school field trips, work at visitor centers and help people stay safe during their visit. Many interpretive park rangers studied science, natural resources or history in college. Protection rangers make sure visitors follow the rules while exploring the parks. They complete special law enforcement training to do their jobs. They may also rescue stranded or sick visitors, provide medical care, fight wildfires and work at large events such as the presidential inauguration in Washington. Rangers who work in smaller parks might do many of these jobs at once. One of my favorite parts of my job is showing children their first view of the Grand Canyon during school field trips. After walking on a trail through the forest, we arrive at the rim of a huge canyon about 10 miles across and one mile deep. Children are often amazed at the canyon’s size and colors. I also love working outdoors in many types of weather. I carry a radio, first-aid kit, water, snacks and sunscreen in my backpack wherever I go. The Grand Canyon is my office! Park rangers wear a uniform. The flat hat protects us from the hot sun, and hiking boots allow us to walk rocky trails. The National Park Service symbol on the sleeve of our uniform shirt helps visitors recognize us so they can ask for assistance. Being a park ranger requires a lot of energy. I walk several miles and talk with hundreds of people each day. Nearly 5 million people visit Grand Canyon National Park every year; interpretive park rangers must enjoy working with people and speaking in front of groups. Rangers must also be prepared for any situation. Recently, I broke up a traffic jam caused by a huge male elk standing in the road. Elk can become dangerous when they get scared, so I asked visitors to park their cars and take pictures from a distance. Believe it or not, I also help protect people from squirrels. It is illegal to feed or approach wild animals in national parks. But sometimes, visitors try to feed rock squirrels and end up getting bitten. Park ranger jobs are very competitive, so it is important to go to college. Many park rangers start as volunteers or seasonal employees and work their way up to permanent jobs. We often work at many parks during our careers. The best way to get a job with the National Park Service is to intern or volunteer in national parks during or after college. The Pathways program helps students find temporary positions so they can try different jobs. The National Park Service isn’t just for park rangers. It hires carpenters, janitors, scientists, mechanics, writers and other professionals, too. Ann Posegate offers a timeline of opportunities for kids interested in a career with the National Park Service. Today: Become a WebRanger at webrangers.us. Elementary school: Visit local, state and national parks. Become a Junior Ranger while visiting national parks. Join a Girl Scout or Boy Scout troop. Middle school: Learn at museums, zoos and aquariums. Play a team sport. (Rangers work in teams to take care of the parks.). High school: Volunteer at a city or state park. Work as a counselor for a summer camp, or get a job working with people. Exercise outdoors; try activities such as hiking, biking and skiing. Join a Youth Conservation Corps program at a nearby national park, forest or wildlife refuge. College: Get a bachelor’s degree in environmental studies, natural resources, science, history or law enforcement. Apply for summer internships in national parks. 401: the number of National Park Service sites. 3,861: the number of park rangers who work for the National Park Service. 28,000: the number of National Park Service employees (including park rangers). 280 million: the average number of visitors to national parks each year. Read more from KidsPost: National Parks are full of the deepest, tallest and biggest. Denali National Park has Park Service’s only sled-dog team. Kids in Parks encourages families to hit the trails.