The Nice People Thread, No.16: A Universe of Niceness.

Jackmydad

ukmaggie45 wrote: »

I'm too old and mentally gone to study Biochemistry any more now. Or anything else really. I'm observing nature currently, have seen some really weird stuff this year! Young blackbird eating dead mouse for one! :eek: Apparently quite rare for blackbirds to eat carrion.

And lots of bumble bees in the plants on our deck. One has been coming into the caravan for around 3 weeks now to visit the nasturtium flowers that we have in tiny vases on a "shelf" between living area and kitchen. She makes straight for the flowers, but also checks out the rest of the room as well. Flies with her proboscis hanging out - I guess she's tasting the air for flower smells? Will miss her when she stops coming - they don't live very long.

If you watch nature regularly you realise that strange things happen.
But that wasn't a young jackdaw was it? Not saying that you don't know the difference, but we had some coming here a bit back that were very "blackbirdish." at a glance.

Pyxis

Jackmydad wrote: »

If you watch nature regularly you realise that strange things happen.
But that wasn't a young jackdaw was it? Not saying that you don't know the difference, but we had some coming here a bit back that were very "blackbirdish." at a glance.

Or maybe during all that hot, dry spell, juicy insects were hard to come by, so a dead mouse was a handy protein source?

ukmaggie45

Jackmydad wrote: »

If you watch nature regularly you realise that strange things happen.
But that wasn't a young jackdaw was it? Not saying that you don't know the difference, but we had some coming here a bit back that were very "blackbirdish." at a glance.

I think it was too small to be even a young jackdaw. We saw jackdaws in the square when we went to Pwllheli market a few weeks ago. One of the seagulls took a dislike to one of the jackdaws and went at it and gave it a good pecking. Seemed a very personalised attack! :eek: Anyway, the jackdaws looked a helluva lot bigger than blackbirds. Plus we don't see jackdaws in the field, or we haven't yet.

But will bear your thoughts in mind - who knows what's around really? Though I've been here non stop since the beginning of May, so am keeping quite an eye on the birds.

Got lots of sparrows, I love them, the little argumentative rascals! Currently there's a new lot of babies that are asking for food all the time. Last sparrow count I did (yesterday) was 20, but from inside caravan am probably missing the same amount down along the patio and bushes along it.

Not seen many goldfinches or greenfinches recently. Hmm.

Jackmydad

Pyxis wrote: »

Or maybe during all that hot, dry spell, juicy insects were hard to come by, so a dead mouse was a handy protein source?

Could well have been. Seemed to be plenty of insects around though. I was watching beetles in the grass in some of the hottest weather. There were lots. Small though.
Even so a free meal is a free meal!

Jackmydad

ukmaggie45 wrote: »

I think it was too small to be even a young jackdaw. We saw jackdaws in the square when we went to Pwllheli market a few weeks ago. One of the seagulls took a dislike to one of the jackdaws and went at it and gave it a good pecking. Seemed a very personalised attack! :eek: Anyway, the jackdaws looked a helluva lot bigger than blackbirds. Plus we don't see jackdaws in the field, or we haven't yet.

But will bear your thoughts in mind - who knows what's around really? Though I've been here non stop since the beginning of May, so am keeping quite an eye on the birds.

Got lots of sparrows, I love them, the little argumentative rascals! Currently there's a new lot of babies that are asking for food all the time. Last sparrow count I did (yesterday) was 20, but from inside caravan am probably missing the same amount down along the patio and bushes along it.

Not seen many goldfinches or greenfinches recently. Hmm.

The gulls know the jackys are competing for food.
I don't really like gulls, as much as you can dislike wildlife anyway.

Plenty of finches here. Some sparrows. A woodpecker. bluetits and several other species, crows, rooks jackdaws, robins. Some dunnocks, some wrens. Swallows, buzzards, and the occasional sparrowhawk! :eek: Blackbirds and thrushes.
Watched some young nightingales on the lawn here a month or so back. I didn't know what they were and had to look them up. I'd heard nightingales around though. The youngsters seemed quite aggressive to other birds.

Cakeguts

Problem solved. I went out and pulled blanket weed out of our pond and had a bit of a think. I had a mother who lied about everything and anything so I get very upset if I think that people are being misled.


I still think that most of the school age students are being misled about A levels and that more people could afford to be honest (and the BBC could stop making the A*s and As sound like a big thing when they aren't any more ) but what was seriously bothering me was what about the people who were like the people at my school who could get 3 As at A level then.



There are still going to be people like that at school and then I looked at mumsnet and another site and all was revealed. The top private schools are doing Pre U exams. They are much harder than A levels and are more like the old A levels that my generation did. They also have higher grades than A levels and the top grade is difficult to get so the top students do get something very special with a top Pre U grade. Prior to the Pre U being introduced some of the students were taking 5,6 or 7 A levels so that explains what they were doing to fill their time in when they got faced with the really easy A levels. That had also been bothering me. I had imagined lots of bored students who could do the A levels really easily having nothing to do to fill the time once I knew that they were taking 6 or 7 A levels I felt better especially since I know what being bored at school due to everything being too easy for them can do to someone.



The good thing that was said about Pre U was that there was no government meddling in it so they can't make it easier for everyone to pass like the A levels.



I assume that state schools have also introduced Pre U for their brightest students so that they can stop taking 7 A levels to fill the time in?



As far as I can make out Pre U has a grade that is counted as an A* at A level and then two more grades above that. The very top one is extremely difficult to get so a real achievement. That made me feel a lot better for the people who could get it because they deserve to have their achievements recognised not just lumped in with the average people who get As and A*s for 3 A levels. (Not sure about the people who get 7 A*s at A level although the A level course is easier as well so it is probably more difficult to get a top grade in Pre U than it is to get 7 A*s at A level.



Anyway I feel much better now and can stop worrying about it now because I realise that the really top people do have a way of having their exceptional achievements recognised just like exceptional under 18 sports people.

zagubov

I've got to say it feels that the A level system is turning full circle. When I first taught A levels thirty years ago there was no coursework or early modules. It was all exams taken after revising two years worth of content. Now it's going back that way.

Shame because the AS levels could make the curriculum broader.

The Pre-U doesn't address this.

I used to teach a course called the IB at a college with a lot of international students. Quite impressed by that.

What both these alternative qualifications have in common is a lack of political interference.

Cakeguts

zagubov wrote: »

I've got to say it feels that the A level system is turning full circle. When I first taught A levels thirty years ago there was no coursework or early modules. It was all exams taken after revising two years worth of content. Now it's going back that way.

Shame because the AS levels could make the curriculum broader.

The Pre-U doesn't address this.

I used to teach a course called the IB at a college with a lot of international students. Quite impressed by that.

What both these alternative qualifications have in common is a lack of political interference.

I think the Pre U is for people who want to study something in great depth and really why shouldn't they? IB is another alternative. A levels are now a one easy size to fit all the average students in the middle leaving nothing for the very top and nothing for the very bottom.



The political interference has made the A level qualification bendy so that it can be manipulated to allow more people to pass or made easier for more people to take it. Real life isn't like that. You can't make everything easier because some people find it hard.



It also can't be very nice to be paraded by the media and congratulated by your school as having done exceptionally well to get 3 A*s at A level and then find out later that you are one of many and there are people with 7 A levels at grade A* that you didn't know anything about or who have top grades in IB and Pre U and are the ones with the higher achievements.



It is much kinder to be honest and say that A*s at A level are now very common and not exceptional because if you don't people get let down when they find out which they will.

michaels

Apparently the hardest year for a levels was 1988 so getting 5 a s then would make someone fairly bright...

zagubov

michaels wrote: »

Apparently the hardest year for a levels was 1988 so getting 5 a s then would make someone fairly bright...

Ah, but they'd have already come through the O level system. Good preparation for the old A levels.