Consumer Stuff...

Just taking a blog break…

Spent the last 4 hours marking and sorting through a range of various ongoing work tasks, some of which have been sitting waiting my attention for a while..

Enjoying the first half of ‘Everytown’ (read various reviews of it today too in the Guardian) where philosopher Julian Baggini moved into my old village near Rotherham. As Sarfraz Manzoor said “Although Baggini tries to fit in he is an outsider in this world – a stranger in his own country.”

Also currently watching Bear Grylls in the Alps: good for Extreme Environments for those centres doing mountains as their context.

The Guardian have given away a world map today which has stickers with Wonders of the World: the 7 wonders of the Ancient World today, to be followed by the Wonders of the Natural World, Alternative Wonders and Wonders of the 20^th Century

An interesting source of discussion.

Quite a few People as Consumers links around too:

Julian Baggini talks about the importance of CONVENIENCE to people today. This overrides other factors. He mentions the existence of motorway service stations as one piece of evidence of this…

New film out in May called “Black Gold”, with a tagline “Wake up and smell the coffee”. It is an expose of the coffee industry in a similar way that “Supersize Me” investigated McDonalds and Fast Food.

Also finally got round to reading Fairtrade magazine “Fair Comment” for Spring 2007 which I got just before Fairtrade fortnight. Good quote by Dame Anita Roddick on the front cover:

“If trade undermines life, narrows it or impoverishes it, then it can destroy the world. If trade enhances life, then it can better the world.”

Interesting article on Bananas in the centre of the magazine: good that Sainsbury’s and Waitrose are switching all their bananas to Fairtrade certified source.

Article on the front of the Daily Mail that the Government are going to try to change all light bulbs from incandescent bulbs to low energy ones. There are various tables which give information about the energy used by the bulbs, but not the cost of actually producing them, or disposing of them, which needs to be factored in to the overall environmental cost.

Another article which I read in ‘The Times’ on Tuesday suggested that what we should do to save the planet is to switch off our gadgets. This is cheaper than developing new technology. It would be cheaper to use washing machine on lower temperature cycles than buy a wind turbine…

Young People's Geographies

OK - we are back to some lessons on the blog again as I will not be here on Tuesday the 13th of March.
For that particular day, I will be in Norwich for a MIDDLE LEADERSHIP day.
Then on Thursday the 15th of March, I will be in Leicester on the 3rd of the YOUNG PEOPLE'S GEOGRAPHIES days.
The work for the Tuesday lesson is already on the blog, and I took you through it on Friday.
You need to finish off the 2nd piece of coursework. Save a copy in your folder (and on a pen drive if possible) and then PRINT OFF the map and the tabulated explanation for the choices that you have made.
Please be CREATIVE ! Don't settle for the obvious...

Big Issue !

This is the 250th post on the weblog - hurrah !

You were asked today to do some homework for next Friday (the 16th)
You will need to identify what you feel are THE 5 BIGGEST ISSUES facing:
a) King's Lynn
b) the United Kingdom

Be prepared to justify them!

Grot Britain

Rather than Great Britain... geddit ?
This is a site which was featured on the local news in Norfolk tonight, and would make an interesting idea for My Place.
This photographer showcases 'alternative' views of Norwich (and other places too) and is making them into postcards and greetings cards, such as the one below. A prize for the first person to produce a version for King's Lynn, perhaps using BIG HUGE LABS tool to tart them up. You can also earn money by sending your pictures to the Grot Britain site.

Do we have a problem with wind ?

Sorry for the obvious 'wind' joke...

Wind Energy is a feature which ties us with the rest of the UK and the World.
The UK is the windiest country in Europe, which means it has a lot of potential energy to be harvested.

We have some turbines already in Swaffham, including the ones at the Ecotech Centre, and also Scroby Sands.

We will be exploring the links that we have in the area with wind power in terms of: links with air masses, manufacturing of turbines etc.

In the Lynn News tonight there are several stories relating to proposed turbines, and the potential impact on the landscape.
One of these has a link to the FENS which we looked at earlier in this section, when we considered local physical landscapes.

Useful websites:
1) An EDP MINISITE on the reasons why Norfolk and Suffolk make good locations for turbines. (EDP is the Eastern Daily Press: a local newspaper)
2) ECOTRICITY projects: including Swaffham, and also the Michelin factory in Dundee
3) SCROBY SANDS near Great Yarmouth
4) YES2WIND: site in association with Greenpeace, WWF and Friends of the Earth supporting the development of wind power
5) An example of a site OPPOSING WIND POWER SCHEMES
This has lots of additional links

And don't forget GEOGRAPHYPAGES of course.

And the image at the top is taken by me of a windfarm near Penistone just up the road from where a friend of mine used to live. Good mountain-biking territory !

Food Miles: People as Consumers

This is something which we will explore in more detail after Easter when we move on to People as Consumers.

The FARMERS WEEKLY INTERACTIVE site has various resources that will be of use to you.

There is also a rather long (117 page) DEFRA report on the impact of Food Miles. There is also a GAME BOARD with distances travelled by food in 2 identical meals which are moved by car or plane.

The EAT THE SEASONS website is a useful one as it tells you what foods are in season, and therefore would not be imported foods. The loss of SEASONALITY is a related issue to the one of FOOD MILES.

The BIG BARN website shows you where to find local food producers.

How has the UK Changed ?

This is an interesting page on the BBC website.
It looks at the changes that viewers have flagged up in the UK within the last decade in response to a viewer who is planning to return to the UK after 10 years living in Australia.

Coming up soon, we will have to explore what we think are the BIG ISSUES facing the UK.

SOCIETY GUARDIAN has a list of some BIG IDEAS:

• Immigration
• Social Disorder - ASBOs and rising Prison population
• Social Exclusion - child poverty & homelessness
• Drugs

And we can perhaps easily add some others:

• Terrorist threat
• Climate Change
• Debt
  

What do you think are the big issues ? Add a comment below if you're a KES pupil...