Mother and Mega-Star, Happily BalancedBy LEAH ROZEN Julia Roberts, above in “Eat Pray Love,” coming in August. She is still one of the world’s biggest stars, but these days the family comes along on the film shoots. Read Article
5 hired after Obama vouched for themAs an Illinois state senator, Barack Obama recommended 16 people for state jobs. He has since distanced himself from former Gov. Rod Blagojevich.
Magazine Preview | Smarter Than You ThinkWhat Is I.B.M.’s Watson?By CLIVE THOMPSON The category is artificial intelligence. This question-answering computer system is ready to challenge some flesh-and-blood “Jeopardy!” champions. Read Article
Can we learn from American schools?Cutting and sticking? For six-year-olds? Kate McCann had doubts about the US system. Two years later, she's convinced English children start learning too young James and Rosie are happier and learning rapidly under their new regime This time two years ago, my daughter Rosie was getting used to life as a "kindergartener" in an American elementary school. This was actually the second time she'd begun her education. The first time had been the September before, when, aged four-and-a-half, she'd started at the reception class of a West Country primary school. The apparent backward step was necessary because we had relocated to America, where children begin their education later than in England. And to say that it was a culture shock is rather an understatement. In our new town, kindergarten was only half a day long and had the academic rigour of a nursery school. Delaying my daughter's education for a year felt, to me, like a huge leap of faith. Every ingrained English middle-class instinct I had told me that children start school at four, not five or six: that this was a mistake and that my child would forever be behind in her schooling. Related articlesJeweller Jade Randeria: 'Now I've a chance to shine'Of course, at this stage, I'd conveniently forgotten how worried I'd been about the overly-academic focus of Rosie's reception class the year before. By the end of the six-hour academic school day, Rosie had often been overtired and uncooperative. The required nightly reading homework was just too much for her – and sure enough, she became a reluctant reader. But no, here in the US, I had forgotten all this and was suddenly feeling very anti-kindergarten indeed. My child was light years ahead of these American children – surely…
Barack Obama promised a new era of post-partisanship. In office, he's played racial politics and further split the country along class and party lines.
