EFFECTS OF DIVORCE ON CHILDREN

UNITED STATES EDUCATIONAL SYSTEM

The education system in the United States is controlled by state and local governments. This is because the tenth amendment to the United States Constitution says that powers not given to the federal government are left to the states. So the federal government has no power to establish a national educational system. Federal agencies do not make education policy. These decisions are made at the state or local levels.

So you might expect education laws to be different in each state. But they are similar. For example, in all fifty states and six territories, all children must attend school from the age of six or seven to the age of sixteen. Public schools are free of charge for grades one through twelve. The schools receive money from the state government.

Private schools also operate in all states and territories. Some private schools are operated by churches and religious groups. Other private schools are not linked to any religious organization. Private schools must be approved by the state in which they operate. Most private schools do not receive government money. The parents of private school students pay the school.

American students generally attend school from the first through the twelfth grades. Students are in school from Monday through Friday. They attend classes from about eight in the morning until three in the afternoon.

The school year usually begins in September and continues until June. Most states require a school year of one-hundred-eighty days. Some schools have changed this schedule and require students to attend school throughout the year.

More than forty-six-million students attend American public schools. Another six-million attend private schools. More than one-million students do not go to school at all. Their parents teach them at home. This home-schooling has become popular in the last fifteen years or so.

 

 

VALENTINE’S DAY

Americans celebrate Valentine’s Day each year on February fourteenth. It is a holiday for lovers.

Valentine’s Day is a good day for a man to ask his girlfriend to marry him. It is also a good day for couples to get married. But most Americans do not go that far to celebrate the day named for Saint Valentine. He was an early Christian churchman who reportedly helped young lovers.

Valentine was executed for his Christian beliefs on February fourteenth, more than one-thousand-seven-hundred years ago. But the day that has his name is even older than that.

The ancient Romans celebrated a holiday for lovers more than two-thousand years ago. As part of the celebration, girls wrote their names on pieces of paper and put them in a large container. Boys reached into the container and pulled out the name of a girl. That girl became his girlfriend or sweetheart for a year.

Lovers still put their names on pieces of paper. They send each other Valentine’s Day cards that tell of their love. Sometimes they also send other gifts too, like jewelry or flowers or candy.

Americans usually send cards through the mail system or in a computer message. But there is another way many Americans send messages of love on Valentine’s Day. They pay to have them printed in a newspaper.

Some of the messages are simple and short: “Debby, I love you very much. From Bob.” Others say more: “Dan, roses are red, violets are blue, I hope you love me as much as I love you. Forever, Mary.”

There is only one problem in sending a Valentine’s Day message this way. It will only reach the one you love if he or she reads the Valentine Day messages in the newspaper that day.

 

EFFECTS OF DIVORCE ON CHILDREN

Ending a marriage can be a sad, unpleasant, and painful experience, especially for children. In the United States, the number of children affected by divorce grows by about one-million each year. As the number increases, experts continue to debate the effects of divorce on children.

Some experts say divorce is harmful to children. Some studies show that children of divorce have more problems. For example, some children of divorce are more often aggressive toward parents and teachers. They have a greater risk of leaving school before completing their studies. They have more health and learning problems. However, experts note that these problems are not necessarily caused by divorce alone.

During the Nineteen-Seventies, many Americans believed that divorce was the best solution for married people who were not happy. People did not think divorce would harm children. They thought children would go through a period of change when their parents ended their marriage. Then the children would be all right.

These beliefs have changed in recent years. Researcher Judith Wallerstein studied more than one-hundred children of divorce over a twenty-five-year period. She says some children never recover from divorce. She says they often have problems with their own adult relationships as a result of their parents’ divorce.

Mizz Wallerstein says her study proves that parents should stay together for their children, even if they are unhappy. However, some people say that children suffer more in a situation where there is much conflict. They say it is better for children to live with one divorced parent than to live with two parents who are angry and unhappy.

Other experts note that many children of divorce do not have serious problems. This is because their parents are able to deal with the situation in a responsible way.

Experts say that some people who get divorced are able to put the needs of their children first. They say that they are able to show the children that their love and support will continue after the divorce.

THE AMERICAN FLAG

Manufacturers of American flags have been working many additional hours lately. Workers in factories from China to the American state of Florida are trying to make enough flags to satisfy American public demand. Record numbers of people in the United States are buying the red, white and blue flags. Sales have increased by at least two-hundred percent since the terrorist attacks on September Eleventh.

In the past, many Americans only flew the flag outside their homes on national holidays, like the Fourth of July and Memorial Day.

Now, people are flying these flags everywhere. Americans have placed the flags on trucks, cars, boats and bicycles. They have hung the flags from office buildings, homes and stores. Flags are waving over theaters, concert halls, private clubs and hotels.

Some Americans were surprised to learn that there are laws governing the flag. For example, it should not be flown at night unless it is lighted. The flag should not hang outside in bad weather unless it is made of protective material. It should never be worn on clothes.

After the terrorist attacks, President Bush ordered the American flag flown at half-staff. This meant that flags on poles were flying at half the distance to the top. This position is a sign of mourning.

The American flag has a long and interesting history. America began as thirteen British colonies. Each colony had its own flag. However, the American colonists fought under a common flag during the Revolutionary War against Britain. It had thirteen red and white stripes to represent the thirteen colonies. A blue square area in the upper left corner contained the British flag. The current American flag still has the stripes. Fifty white stars in the blue area now represent the fifty states in the union.

Recently, sixty graduates of the United States Naval Academy honored those killed and injured in the terrorist attacks in an unusual way. They formed teams of runners. They carried an American flag about three-hundred-sixty kilometers from Washington, D-C, to New York City. They carried the American flag from the Pentagon to the ruins of the World Trade Center.

 

NATIVES OF ALASKA

Three racially different groups of Native people live in Alaska -- the Aleuts, Inuits and Indians. Experts say the presence of these different Native people shows Alaska’s position between Asia and the Americas. Experts say that modern Native Americans developed from Asiatic people who traveled to Alaska about twelve-thousand years ago. Some of those people settled in Alaska. Others traveled to other parts of North America and to South America.

Today, about six-hundred-twenty-thousand people live in the state of Alaska. Fewer than half the people who live in Alaska were born there. About sixteen percent of the state’s population are Native people.

The largest group of Native people in Alaska are the Inuit. Some people still call the Inuit people Eskimos. Many Inuit reject this name. They want to be called Inuit, which means “the people” or “real people” in their own language.

Inuit culture developed more than one-thousand years ago. Most Inuit have always lived near the sea which provided much of their food. They also hunted animals and used their skins to make their clothes and homes.

Most Inuit people in Alaska today live in small settlements. They still hunt and fish for their food. Yet much of their traditional way of life has ended. The Inuit live in wooden houses instead of the traditional ones. They wear modern clothing. They speak English. And Christianity has taken the place of traditional beliefs.

Alaska’s Native people have long claimed much of the land in the state. In nineteen-seventy-one, the United States Congress approved a law in response to these claims. The law gave almost one-thousand-million dollars and rights to about ten percent of Alaska to the state’s Native people.

 

LIE DETECTORS

A lie detector is a machine that is designed to show if a person is telling the truth or not. It does this by measuring a person’s bodily reactions while being questioned. It is also known as a polygraph.

American medical student John Larson invented the polygraph machine in Nineteen-Twenty-One. “Polygraph” means many writings. The name was chosen because the machine records many body reactions while a person answers questions. The machine is based on the idea that stress produces changes in the body when a person does not tell the truth.

Taking a lie detector test involves placing several devices on different areas of a person’s body. Rubber tubes on the chest and stomach record breathing. Two small metal plates attached to the fingers measure sweat gland activity. A device on the arm measures blood pressure. The body’s reactions are recorded by another device.

During a lie detector test, an expert first asks a series of questions that show how the person’s body reacts when giving true and false answers. Then the expert asks the important questions. All this takes about two hours. Later, the expert reads the information and decides if the person answered the questions truthfully or not.

Lie detectors are used in the United States mostly by law enforcement agencies. Lawyers also sometimes use them.

There is much debate about the use of a lie detector. Some people believe it violates a person’s privacy. Many people do not believe it really can tell if a person is lying or not. The American Polygraph Association says a trained expert can tell most times if the person has lied. But even that organization admits that mistakes happen.

Polygraph results generally are not considered legal evidence in most United States courts. They are permitted in some courts and in some states. Some areas of the country have banned the use of lie detector tests as evidence. The Supreme Court has not yet ruled about the use of lie detector test results in the American legal system.

 

OLYMPIC FLAME

The Olympic Flame links the old and new Olympic Games. In ancient Olympia, a fire burned for the god Zeus during the Olympic sports competition. Now, runners bring a torch carrying the flame from Olympia, Greece to every new Olympics.

The torch was lit on November nineteenth in Olympia. It first traveled to Atlanta, Georgia, where the last Olympic Games in the United States were held. Then it began a twenty-two-thousand kilometer trip across forty-six states to Salt Lake City.

Many kinds of vehicles are carrying the Olympic torch. They include cars, airplanes, trains, ships, dogsleds, sleighs, and even a snow mobile. Runners in many cities across the country are also carrying the torch.

The flame lights a torch each morning to start the run that day. Each runner then lights the next runner’s torch. Officials say the flame travels about three-hundred-thirty kilometers each day.

The Salt Lake City Olympic Committee chose the runners who are carrying the torch. People in their towns and cities nominated the runners for the honor. Some of the runners are famous. Others are not. Last week in Los Angeles, for example, one-hundred people carried the torch. They included Olympic figure skater Michelle Kwan, actor Arnold Schwarzenegger and a teenaged girl who helps young students.

Olympic officials say more than eleven-thousand runners will have carried the flame by the time it reaches Salt Lake City on February eighth. The name of the last person to carry the flame is kept a secret. He or she will enter the sports center to light the torch that will officially start the Winter Olympic Games.

 

PENSIONS

A pension is the money that a worker or his or her family receives after a worker retires, is unable to work or dies. People have pension plans from working in private industry, in the armed forces or in government. People can also establish their own pension plans. Many of those who create their own plans work for themselves or for a company that does not provide a pension plan.

Reports say most American workers have some kind of pension plan. Most pensions of people who worked for the government are paid for with money that came jointly from workers and their agencies. Most private pension plans are paid for by the employer.

A federal government program called Social Security provides money to most American workers after they retire. Social Security is the largest retirement program in the United States. Workers pay into the program a percent of what they earn each month. Their employers do the same.

Most self-employed people also pay into Social Security. These people then will receive money each month after they retire for as long as they live.

The Social Security program was established in Nineteen-Thirty-Five. It was never meant to fully support someone who has no other money. Especially today, money received from Social Security is not enough to provide for most people’s needs.

Many companies have their own retirement plans for their workers. Federal law requires companies to give pension rights to all people who have worked for the company for a set number of years. People can also establish individual pension plans through banks or insurance companies. They put in so much money each month, then receive payments after they reach about sixty-five years of age.

Most Americans say they cannot live as they would like on money provided by only one pension plan. So they have more than one. For example, a man who retires after twenty years of military service receives pension money each month from the federal government. He may also collect money from the Social Security system, and from other private investments he has made.

 

AMERICAN FAMILIES

There have been many changes in American families in the past few years. So there are many different kinds of families today. There are fewer traditional families in the United States today than in the past. The traditional family includes a man and woman who are married and their children. Fewer than twenty-five percent of American homes have these traditional families.

One major influence on families is the high number of marriages than end in divorce. More single parents are raising their children today. There is also a high rate of unmarried women having babies.

Research has found that the marriage rate in the United States is dropping. More men and women are choosing to live together and have children, but not get married. Population experts say that the number of unmarried parents in the United States increased more than seventy percent in the past ten years.

Another kind of American family is the stepfamily. A stepfamily includes a married man and woman and at least one child from a former marriage or relationship. Many stepfamilies include children of both the man and woman from earlier marriages and children from their current marriage.

Foster families are also a part of American life. A child who does not have parents is placed in the home of a foster family until the child can be adopted. Adoption is the legal process by which a child becomes part of a family. Many men and women who are not able to produce children will adopt a child instead. Some people who have given birth to their own children choose to give a home to other children through adoption.

Studies also show an increase in the number of children who have parents of the same sex. Sometimes, one of the adults is the biological parent of the child. Sometimes the children are adopted.

So, as you can see, the traditional family in the United States is changing. However, many Americans say it is not important if family members are related through biology or not. The important thing in a family is love.

 

SKYSCRAPERS

Skyscrapers are the world’s tallest buildings. They are called “skyscrapers” because they rise so high that they seem to touch the sky.

Skyscrapers provide space for offices, eating places, homes and hotels. The first one was built in Chicago, Illinois in Eighteen-Eighty-Five. It was almost fifty-five meters tall. Today, skyscrapers are much taller. The world’s tallest skyscrapers are in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. They are the Petronas Towers. Each building is four-hundred-fifty-two meters high.

New York City has more skyscrapers than any other city in the world. New York is also home to the world’s most famous skyscraper -- the Empire State Building. It was built in Nineteen-Thirty-One. It was the world’s tallest building for more than forty years. It is still one of the most popular.

Each year, more than three-million people ride an elevator to the top of the Empire State Building. They stand outdoors in a special observation area almost three-hundred-eighty meters above the ground.

Last month, the American Society of Civil Engineers honored the Empire State Building as one of the greatest structures of the twentieth century. The group called it a “Monument of the Millennium.”

Other famous skyscrapers in New York include the two buildings of the World Trade Center. The Center was built in Nineteen-Seventy-Three. It occupies six-and-one-half hectares of land. Its two buildings are more than four-hundred-ten meters tall. They once were the tallest buildings in the world. About fifty-thousand people work in the World Trade Center. About seventy-thousand others visit the two buildings every day.

One place to learn more about skyscrapers is the Skyscraper Museum in New York City. It was organized in Nineteen-Ninety-Six to show visitors the tall buildings of the past, present and future. The museum explains the history, design, building and operation of skyscrapers. The Skyscraper Museum is not among the most well-known museums in New York. But its managers say people should see it first, before visiting other areas of New York City.

 

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

The Library of Congress is America’s national library. It has millions of books and other objects. It has newspapers, popular publications and letters of historical interest. It also has maps, photographs, art prints, movies, sound recordings and musical instruments. All together, it has more than one-hundred-million objects.

The Library of Congress is open to the public Monday through Saturday, except for government holidays. Anyone may go there and read anything in the collection. But no one is permitted to take books out of the building.

The Library of Congress was established in Eighteen-Hundred. It started with eleven boxes of books in one room of the Capitol building. By Eighteen-Fourteen, the collection had increased to about three-thousand books. They were all destroyed that year when the Capitol was burned during America’s war with Britain.

To help re-build the library, Congress bought the books of President Thomas Jefferson. Mister Jefferson’s collection included seven-thousand books in seven languages.

In Eighteen-Ninety-Seven, the Library moved into its own building, across the street from the Capitol. Today, three buildings hold the library’s collection.

The Library of Congress provides books and materials to the United States Congress. It also lends books to other American libraries, government agencies and foreign libraries. It buys some of its books and gets others as gifts. It also gets materials through its copyright office. Anyone who wants copyright protection for a publication in the United States must send two copies to the library. This means the Library of Congress receives almost everything that is published in the United States.

Computer users can learn more about the Library of Congress and its collection on the Internet Computer network. The address is w-w-w dot l-o-c dot g-o-v. Again, the Library of Congress web address is w-w-w dot l-o-c dot g-o-v.

THE WASHINGTON MONUMENT

The Washington Monument is the tallest structure in the city. It stands almost one-hundred-seventy meters tall. It is named for the first President of the United States, George Washington. Millions of people from around the world visit the white stone structure every year.

The monument is a structure called an obelisk. Its four sides end in a point at the top. Fifty American flags surround it. They represent the fifty states. Lights shine on the Washington Monument at night. It can be seen from far away. Fireworks are launched from near the monument on American Independence Day – July fourth -- and at other special celebrations.

It took many years to build the Washington Monument. One group started raising money for a memorial in Eighteen-Thirty-Three. Officials placed the first stone of the monument on July fourth, Eighteen-Forty-Eight.

Roman Catholic Church leader Pope Pius the Ninth gave a piece of marble from Rome for the monument. But the stone was stolen in Eighteen-Fifty-Four. After that, the public almost stopped giving money for the structure. Many people believed it would never be finished.

A group called the Know Nothings was suspected of trying to stop the monument from being built. Finally, in Eighteen-Seventy-Six, Congress voted to pay for building the Washington Monument. It was finished in Eighteen-Eighty-Four and opened to the public in Eighteen-Eighty-Eight.

The Washington Monument recently re-opened after being closed for more than a year. Officials used that time to make improvements. New security measures also were added. And a new elevator now carries visitors to the observation area on top of the monument. From there, visitors can look out over the capital city.