Thomas Alva Edison

Winner:

Thomas Alva Edison was born on February 11, 1847. His parents were from a middle class family. In 1854, his family moved to Port Huran, Michigan, which ultimately surpassed the commercial prominence of both Milan and Odessa. At the age of seven, Edison’s overworked and short-tempered teacher lost his patience with the child’s relatively self-centered behaviour and persistent questioning. Noting that Edison’s head was slightly larger than average, he made no secret of his belief that the hyperactive youngster’s brain was ‘addled’ or ‘scrambled’.

Edison’sa mother became aware of the situation. She was from the prominent Elliot family of New England and was the devout daughter of a highly respected Presbyterian minister. She was an educator in her own right.

Nancy Edison now commenced teaching her last and favourite son the three R’s and the Bible. Meanwhile, his rather roguish and worldly father Samuel was more inclined towards having him master the Classics, giving him ten cents for each one he completed.

At the age of 11, Edison’s parents tried to appease his voracious appetite for knowledge by teaching him how to use the resources of the local library. This was the earliest of the many factors that gradually led him to prefer learning through independent, self-instruction. It wasn’t long before the serious minded youngster developed a deep interest in world history and English literature.

Many years later, Edison’s fondness for Shakespeare’s plays led him to briefly consider becoming an actor. Edison also enjoyed reading and reciting poems. His favourite was Gray’s elegy ‘in a Country Churchyard.’ I want to be a scientist like Thomas Alva Edison and invent new things.

M.S. Ashik Ahmed,
Grade 7C,
Lexicon International College.

Let’s protect our environment

Winner:

The environment is the space that surrounds us. Buildings, trees and animals make up the environment. We have to protect our environment just like our life.

But now people have polluted our environment. We can divide environmental pollution into three segments.

They are air pollution, water pollution and soil pollution. People pollute the air in different ways. People throw garbage everywhere and spray chemicals specially on the soil and plants. Various industries pollute the air. People pollute water in many ways. They throw garbage into the water and release chemicals into the water.

The water then gets polluted. Soil is also important just like water and air. People throw garbage, into the soil as well and in addition people spray chemical fertiliser on the soil to get rid of insects that attack plants. So now the soil is also polluted with chemical spray.

When people pollute the environment they get different types of diseases, such as cancer, fever and tonsillitis.

Therefore, we have to protect our environment and if we protect our environment only our environment will protect us.

Naomi Thamasha Sikurajapathi
Grade – 7,
Sirimavo Bandaranaike Vidyalaya.

Gardening – my favourite hobby

Winner:

Everyone in the world has a hobby. There are many kinds of hobbies. Collecting postage stamps, painting, music, dancing, fishing, bird watching, farming, gardening, collecting coins and hunting are popular hobbies.

A gardener may go fishing as his hobby and in contrast a fisherman may do gardening as his hobby. What is one man’s living may be a hobby to another. It is a common sight to see diligent students engaged in their favourite hobbies during their leisure just for pleasure. Hobbies refresh our brains and improve our intelligence after a hard day studies.

I chose gardening as my hobby. I am encouraged to spend my leisure on this profitable hobby. It produces peace of mind and entails a habit of humanity and benevolence. Gardening is one of the most ancient hobbies of the human race and everyone can engage in it. The poor may practise it on a small scale and the rich may invest capital and enhance it.

My father being a superb gardener with flowers and vegetables encouraged me to spend my leisure in gardening. Our compound is spacious and it permits me to have a vegetable garden in the rear of the house and a flower garden in the front compound. In the kitchen garden I grow capsicums, I like growing capsicums chillies, brinjals, tomatoes and lady’s fingers. It gives me pleasure to eat the vegetables that I grow.

The flower garden, makes our house beautiful. We have bougainvillea with large red and purple flowers growing up the walls, crotons with richly coloured leaves and grafted hybrid multi-coloured roses and shoe-flowers enhance the environment of our house. The flower and vegetable gardens are a delight and my friends are impressed with my garden I am proud of my garden.

J. Robert Anoj,
J/St. John’s College,
Jaffna.

Switzerland - the playground of Europe

Winner:

Across the Alpine border is Switzerland one of the most stable and democratic countries in Europe.

The country is held in high esteem for it chiefly honours the principle that nations of the world should cooperate politically, economically, culturally and work towards greater mutual understanding.Switzerland being a full-fledged democratic country and because of its regulating governance according to the will of the people and because of the uprightness of the Parliament, there are no inter-racial problems or any partisan activity among the people of this country.

The area of this beautiful country is five-eighth of the area of Sri Lanka that is, about 40,800sq.km. It is a multilingual nation with four official languages. German, French, Italian and Romansch. Seventy percent of the people speak German, 19 percent French, 10 percent. Italian and one percent speak Romansch.

There is freedom for everyone to follow his or her religion and language. The capital of the country is Berne but the largest city is Zurich. Geneva is the Palace of the League of Nations, overlooking Lake Geneva covers a large area nearly five acres.

Here you find the assembly hall, council room, library and secretariat of the league.

Switzerland gets abundant riches from agriculture, industry and other resources. On the whole Switzerland is prosperous and blessed with amicable and peaceful surroundings.

It is a unique multilingual nation.

Thabitha Ireen Jeyakumaran,
Grade VI (D) English Medium
J/ Chundikuli Girl's College,
Jaffna.

Our cultural heritage

Winner:

Sri Lanka is not just a speck on the world map. It is not a mere pearl on the Indian ocean but a mighty island. Though it is tiny, Sri Lanka is unimaginably beautiful with the splendour of the ruin's of many kingdoms. Intellectual stimulation of our ancient kings, their spirited peace and joy of enchanting artistic creations, sounds of traditional music, all combine to make our unique cultural heritage.

The culture of our motherland is a legend that lives. It goes back to thousands of years carrying a huge history. Not many countries in the world can claim to have descended from ancient civilisation like Sri Lanka.

Ancient tanks, which had large volumes of water, enabled Sri Lanka to be self-sufficient in rice.

Murals and paintings in Sigiriya, rock carvings at Ambekke temple evidence the craftsmanship of our ancestors.

The ruins and stupas in Anuradhapura, Polonnaruwa and Yapahuwa still tell the majesty of our ancient history.

Great reservoirs such as the Kalawewa, Tissawewa and Yodha Ela mirror the reflections of great intellectual capacity of the heroic kings.

The Temple of the Sacred Tooth Relic in Kandy, the Galle Fort and the golden beaches of Trincomalee not only signify a cultural value but also attract tourists to our motherland.

Even the vast stretch of evergreen forests like the Sinharaja, which has been one of the treasure troves of our motherland was proclaimed as a natural heritage.

Lanka's ancient cultural value is an anthology of multiculturalism with its never failing beauty and fertility.

Being Lankans when we close our eyes for an instant, a thousand and one pictures of splendour will flash through our minds.

Its magnificent processions, traditional religious and national festivals, dresses, dances, rituals and ceremonies, music, local food, lifestyles, sculpture and architecture flit through our minds.

Thus what a rich value of culture we possess!

How proud we are to inherit this heritage!

It is our duty to preserve and protect this wealth our ancient great personalities bestowed on us and preserved for us to enjoy even today.

So let's preserve our cultural heritage whether it's a precious stones or a grain of sand for posterity.Let us look after it for generations to come!

L.A. Ayodya Eshani Senarathna,
Grade 10-D
St/Bernadette's Model School,
Polgahawela.

A strange world

What a strange world
If the flowers sing songs
And the trees dance
This is a strange world
Birds are swimming
And the Dolphins are flying,
Cats are jumping
So this is a funny world
Rabbits are gliding
Butterflies are going to school
Boys and girls drink the nectar of flowers
So this is a happy world
If rose flowers were ice-cream
And rivers were milk
Then this is a beautiful world
And this will be a joyful world

Fathima Azrina Ahsan,
8-B
Sri Thaksala Maha Vidyalaya,
Sarikkamulla.