Posts tagged homework
TED Talk: the Danger of a Single Story

My daughter was asked to watch novelist Chimamanda Adichie’s TED talk for her geography homework. I was listening to it the background and it made me smile/laugh, quite a lot.

Our lives, our cultures, are composed of many overlapping stories. Novelist Chimamanda Adichie tells the story of how she found her authentic cultural voice -- and warns that if we hear only a single story about another person or country, we risk a critical misunderstanding.

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BBC - Mothers with 'controlling voice' fail to persuade teenagers

Mothers who talk to their teenage children in a "controlling tone of voice" are more likely to start an argument than get a positive response, according to researchers.

The Cardiff University study examined the responses of 14 and 15-year-olds to instructions given to them in different ways of speaking.

It showed that mothers wanting to persuade teenagers to co-operate got better results when they sounded "supportive" rather than when they applied pressure.

The researchers said that in terms of young people's behaviour there has been little evidence about the impact of "tone of voice", rather than the words or actions of parents.

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