Slashdot Mirror
Toronto School Bans Hard Balls
In an attempt to finally "think of the children," Earl Beatty Public school has prohibited students from playing with balls after a "few serious incidents" in which students and staff were hit or almost hit by balls. From the article: "The happy days of kicking a ball around at recess ended Monday after students took home a letter advising that henceforth, no child could bring a soccer ball, football, volleyball or even tennis ball to the junior and senior school in the area of Coxwell and Danforth Aves." I assume all lunches will soon be taken via feeding tube to minimize choking hazards.
I'm watching you.
Will they ban pencils, because they can be sharpened into "stabbing weapons?"
In the days where there are lawsuit trolls roaming the earth trying to turn any mishap into $$$, I can't really blame them.
Yep, that says it all.
Down With Slashdot BETA!!! I've been around the corner and seen the oliphant; you can only abuse me from your perspecti
I call bullshit, you are a passive aggressive American who wants to paint socialism in a shitty light. This has nothing to do with Canada's economy.
soccer ball, football, volleyball or even tennis ball
None of those listed are even hard! What do they consider soft, Nerf?
Stop thinking of the children and their balls.. That's not what we ment when we said 'think of the children'.
First, a story about a Boeing "Penetrator". Now, a summary about balls. "In an attempt to finally "think of the children" Earl Beatty Publid school has prohibited students from playing with balls" practically shoves it in your face. Dick jokes... actually, are still pretty funny. Nevermind go right ahead.
The ban on hard balls being brought to school is a “proactive measure. It’s also a preventative measure,”
Yes. That would work as a preventative too. Most schools take a slightly... different approach, but I suppose banning balls period works too. To prevent head injuries.
"None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license." --John Milton
How can they ban this?
Ooh I know this one!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5K3E5tLoado
My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine
No, I think anyone who has started that practice should probably never stop ... best for the gene pool really.
"Who is the Journal of Quantum Physics going to believe?" --Stephen Hawking
Almost as wacky, I mean, zany; no, I mean bombastic as US laws .. or so I'm led to believe by the news these days.
Probably next ban saying "Eh!"
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
Distinct possibility of frivolous lawsuits cause ban on hard balls at Toronto school.
Undetectable Steganography? Yep, there's an app fo
i was expecting the old governor to say "knives and stabbing weapons"
November 7, the entire school board for my county of 60,000 residents went up for election. Only 2000 people voted. Several of the board members ran uncontested. The rest were reelected.
If you don't like crap like this, get yourself or someone you trust on the school board. It can't be that hard!
The general voting public ignores local politics, which is much more important for day to day life.
Godaddy is a scam and a ripoff.
Why is this on here?! This is not at all tech or nerd related and it is completely overblown. If your RTFA you'll see it is ONE SCHOOL enacting a temporary measure because they have 350 kids on a playground that is too small which also includes a day care with toddlers. I don't even know why the "toronto news" thought this was newsworthy let alone slashdot.
What? Most US public elementary schools have recess, and all US public schools are required to have physical education.
Imagine high school PE without any "balls" allowed (soccer, softball, football, basketball, etc). And of course, that must imply getting rid of any other "dangerous" sports, so there goes all of the gymnastics equipment, floor hockey (the plastic puck might be ok, but letting kids carry 5' long sticks? The horror!), wrestling mats (it's like publicly sanctioned ultimate fighting!), and for those wealthier schools, water polo or swimming (better not teach kids how to swim, someone could drown!)
So it will basically become a bunch of kids running around a track, or on rainy/snowy days standing in a gym doing jumping jacks. On the bright side, it makes me glad I'm old, and not growing up in today's nanny state.
no child could bring a soccer ball, football, volleyball or even tennis ball
Better learn cricket or hockey then. Those games have nice soft balls that are completely armless.
Ask me about repetitive DNA
This whole "think of the children" is getting out of hand. I remember growing up climbing trees, using a tall spiral slide, and playing on monkey bars. Could I have gotten hurt? Sure, but scrapes, bruises, and learning how to fall is a part of growing up. If you remove all possible ways for a child to develop his motor skills and learn how to deal with an occasional "oops" when they get hurt, we are going to grow up with a bunch of kids who prefer to sit out of sports and other social events.
This is life, shit happens. People can get hurt and or killed at any point in their life. Banning sports balls is not the answer.
We used to use these so called "hard" balls explicitly to throw at people with the intent to hit them. I believe they called it a "game"... Ball tag?
Schools will attempt to ban any and everything that could possibly be fun even if there is no chance of someone getting hurt (trading hockey cards was banned from my elementary school), its ridiculous.
Open Source Time and Attendance, Job Costing a
Rocks are not balls and you can still play catch, baseball, hockey, etc. with them.
Troll is not a replacement for I disagree.
Granted, I am probably the first person to RTFA, but of course, despite the play to the aesthetics of outrage, the true story is less absurd, less dramatic:
1. the "ban" is temporary until they can find a better solution to the problem
2. the problem is not that the precious little angels might get hit by balls, it's that the play area is much too small, making accidents too likely.
But don't let me stop the hand-wringing. Carry on, carry on.
They're playing hardball.
..the most serious injury at the school to date involved a parent, who was hit in the head by a soccer ball and suffered a concussion.
If that parent can suffer a concussion from a soccer ball kicked by a kid then they need to wear a helmet whenever they leave the house. Don't punish everybody else for having a skull made out of jello.
Well this is toronto, so it's pretty damn typical of the over-reaction. Then again this is the same city that has flown in the face and allowed segregated based schools, and religious discrimination to occur on the tax payer dole, so I guess I shouldn't be surprised.
Om, nomnomnom...
Kids learn by doing things. Some things have nice results, some are unpleasant. They don't do the unpleasant things again. Part of the reason for having them learn in a school is that it is an environment where they can be guided and with adults around the effects of the unpleasant can be switfly dealt with.
So kids will now not learn that intercepting a hard ball with your head might hurt. They will do that outside of school where if they get knocked down there will not be a responsible adult who can act swiftly -- on the rare occasion that it might be needed. Tell me: is that better or worse for the kids ?
What this is about is cowardly school staff that want to avoid any scintilla of responsibility for minor accidents. The are completely aborgating their responsibility, the responsibility that we expect them to take, the responsibility for which they are paid. Shame of these pathetic, lilly livered apologies for teachers. The only thing that they deserve is our utter contempt.
Their co-conspiritors in this are the money grabbing lawyers who encourage people to sue over exaggerated injuries. They do this not to recompense someone for a trivial bump on the head but to swell their own incomes.
At the end of it: society is poorer for this sort of mentality.
Attention all aliens. Earth is now ripe for invasion. Our descent towards a population composed only of pudgy, pale, velvet skinned meat bags of banality is almost complete. There will be no fight - we are all too busy playing with dolls in the shade.
need not apply.
Why do people really need to worry about this? Kids play, they get hurt, they get better, and stronger, and hopefully smarter. I propose we buy little Aerons for all schoolkids because those plastic stackable chairs suck and will hurt their backs. Many kids aren't athletic, and that's fine, but many/most kids like playing throw/hit the ball games, and they should be allowed to.
/'bout the biggest pair you've ever seen, dingleberry!
I like music
Many kids today are inactive and do everything to play sports. School is an environment to grow, learn, play and socialize. Sports seems to fit this very well.
A colleague of mine at work said their 8 yr old son was sent home from school on Halloween, because their outfit was 'too scary'. The parents got a letter and other kids were apparently dismissed. He had a mummy or vampire costume mom had made him.
I don't have kids yet. It seems odd that the generation that grew out of having hippie pot smoking, acid dropping, heavy metal parents to their kids who, like myself, grew up listening to and enjoying even crazier music and exposed to more sex, drugs and alcohol are the same that are deeply offended by 'scary' Halloween costumes or kids playing sports at school.
I live in Toronto and compared to what goes on in the rest of the city, playing with your (or other people's) balls should be the least of parents' concerns. (pun intended),
as long as they're still allowed to play hockey.
This wasn't brought on by a series of injuries, but a series on "incidents". People were getting hit or almost hit. Oh No! One of those people hit got a concussion! Yes, concussions can be serious, but if you let your kids get any kinds of exercise at all they run the risk of a concussion. I got a concussion falling off a jungle gym. No balls involved at all.
One concussion and some bruises or abrasions is no reason to ban a fun form of exercise. No one ever suggested I stop climbing on things after I hurt myself. (I know that since I've left school, people have made that demand of today's kids, but that's just as unreasonable.
Pretty pretty please say this is just flamebait
But these kid where using ball cannons they fashioned from information the got from Instructables. This enabled them to shoot their balls at velocities 100's of feet per second at other students and teachers. These were scary devices that may have seriously smashed the balls of innocent bystanders.
I think we can still safely call it incredibly stupid. They say the most 'serious' incident so far is that an adult was hit in the head w/ a soccer ball. Then they claim it caused a concussion?!? I don't care if the school includes "Moose" McCormick who has repeated the 3rd grade 20 times, no student has the strength to cause a concussion with a soccer ball, many players get hit in the head with a soccer ball on purpose repeatedly throughout the game.
if we ban Hardball, then Earl Weaver and RBI have to be banned too!
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
I don't know how it works in the USA, but I would have thought "hard balls" only encompasses things like baseballs and hockey pucks (and maybe lacross - I can't remember for sure, but I watched my cousin play a few games when I was in CA and I seem to recall I did not want to get hit by the ball).
Here in Australia I would classify cricket balls as hard balls as well. Hockey balls (my g/f plays grass hockey) as well.
Banning hard balls, I could in some way understand - those things can cause some pretty serious injuries. I recall hearing about people getting killed in cricket games when the ball hits them in the chest hard enough to affect their heart. And of course head injuries are pretty common.
I still think it would be complete bullshit, of course - having grown up playing cricket and T-ball here I think it teaches absolutely invaluable skills about risk assessment and management. I would say that having hard balls thrown at you is pretty much a daily occurrence for children in Australia (although it's been a while since I was in school).
But seriously, soccer balls? Footballs? VOLLEY BALLS? Volley balls are practically made of air. American footballs might be dangerous if you cop the pointy end in an eye socket, but the vast, vast, vast majority of injuries you could possibly get from one of those balls are trivial.
This seems like a classic case of being blinded by one statistically insignificant incident, and massively over-reacting in a way that will disadvantage almost everyone to protect almost noone in any meaningful way.
Hey! That sounds sort of familiar.
You know how many times I got hurt playing soccer and floor hockey during lunch and recess? No one cared and you looked cool with scars in front of the ladies.
by TheSpoom (715771) Uncaring Linux user here. I have nothing to add to this but please continue. *munches popcorn*
... is this the same school that first stopped keeping scores in soccer because they didn't want to "emotionally harm" the losing side?
I weep for the species.
Operation Guillotine is in effect.
Google maps shows a urban JK-8 school with a tiny green space and playground.
The street level view is crowded.
There is a small area set aside with a handful of shade trees, a slide, climbers, etc., for the youngest kids.
A running track frames the play area for the older ones.
There is a batting cage at the far end of the field, but no other permanent structures.
You could probably safely practice and play some team sports here under controlled conditions. But 350 kids on break each doing their own thing?
I don't think so.
The Address: 55 Woodington Avenue, Toronto, ON M43 3J3, Canada
Obligatory wisdom from George Carlin. It's only a matter of time before idly standing around is banned.
The comment subject say "Public Education at it's Best". its is the correct word. Of course nobody reads the comment subjects, that's why you missed it.
Children will need to get permission from the tag-ee prior to tagging them as 'it'.
There's a difference between heading the soccer ball, and getting hit in the face with it (or somewhere else unexpectedly). I doubt the seriousness of the risk of concussion from soccer balls at schoolyard, though.
it isn't just the tests throwing softballs at the kids now is it?
They use pucks not balls.
I'm a good cook. I'm a fantastic eater. - Steven Brust
Head injuries account for between 4% and 22% of all soccer injuries.
In soccer, concussions make up 2-3% of all injuries. This is the same rate as for American football!
A study involving men's and women's college soccer teams from the Atlantic Coast Conference found a total of 29 concussions in a 2-year period. The most common cause of the concussions was when one player's head struck the head of another player. This was also the most common source of concussions in a group of soccer players at the US Olympic Sport Festival in 1993. The second most common cause of concussions occurred when a ball struck a player's head. These head-to-ball concussions happened when a player was hit in the head by a ball kicked from close range. In many cases, the ball traveled so quickly the player did not have time to react. NONE of the concussions were caused by proper heading of the ball. Heading the ball, however, is not without consequences. A player may head the ball many times during practice sessions and about eight times during a game. Many players at the 1993 US Olympic Festival experienced headaches after heading the ball. These headaches lasted from a few seconds to several days.
A Norwegian study found that 35% of 69 Division I soccer players had abnormal electroencephalogram (EEG) patterns. This is more than twice the rate of abnormal EEG patterns in control subjects. Retired soccer players had several brain abnormalities including reduced cortical tissue and increased lateral ventricle size.
Soccer players also seem to perform more poorly than control subjects on some types of IQ tests and many former players (81%) suffer from problems with attention, concentration, and memory. Players who typically head the ball have also been found to have more neurological problems than non-headers. Compared to goalies and midfielders ("non-headers"), forwards and defenders ("headers") performed more poorly on some memory, visual perception and planning tests.
Most of the data come from players at the elite level who have played soccer for many years. Professional soccer players head the ball thousands of times during their careers. There has not been much research on the effects of heading the soccer ball on children or recreational players. Although helmets may protect players from concussions, their usefulness has not been tested. At least one company is selling helmets to be used by children while playing soccer.
So, how can head injuries be reduced and minimized? Here are some recommendations:
Players should have proper instruction on the correct way to head the ball.
The ball should be the appropriate size for the age of the players. Smaller balls are less likely to cause injury. Also, make sure the ball is inflated properly.
Use "no heading" rules for younger players. If a player is not allowed to head the ball, the ball is less likely to hit a player's head.
Use padded goalposts.
Soccer and the Brain
"The ultimate result of shielding men from the effects of folly, is to fill the world with fools." Herbert Spencer
What was missing from the summary is that the serious incident that set this event off was a parent who was hit in the head and ended up with a concussion. Apparently instead of dealing with the one student, they chose to ban balls outright.
There is a good deal of emphasis on the news that the ban is temporary, but that just seems silly to me - if you admit you are going to allow balls again, then why ban them at all?
Another interesting thing that happened in response was a student protest (We Want Our Balls Back). Picture school aged children (grade school, not high school) protesting. You'll see in the article one student exclaimed "“You can take our balls, but you can’t take our freedom!”
It is also somewhat interesting to note that one of the local newscaster's children went to the school and thought it was ridiculous. His comment was (on the subject of a post above) "I've been hurt more by a pencil."
So, it should be clarified in defence of Canadians, that we think it is rather crazy too.
I went to kindergarten at this school and almost drowned while on a class trip, I'm ok with them taking a safety-focused approach.
I've experienced both and never came close to a concussion. While the face hit does sting a bit, I doubt any more force if delivered to the brain than when you head the ball.
What the hell is a baseball court?
Why would you give children landmines? You probably peel the 'DO NOT EAT' stickers off of them before you hand them off, too....
HA! I just wasted some of your bandwidth with a frivolous sig!
Well we already know that capitalism doesn't work, so I can only assume this is a heartfelt wish for communism to come to the fore.
From what I have read of capitalism, I believe it would work. We should try it here in the U.S.
If you are not allowed to question your government then the government has answered your question.
watson can't find that school in Toronto
Elementary Watson : They are encouraging archery.
Why is this relevant news to this site? Has /. become Fark?
This is also an elementary school in the middle of Toronto. It has limited yard space, and hence, not much room for kids to share a relatively small space.
It sounds like the one at the school is actually being enforced, while in Hamilton, I have never heard of this ban, which leads me to believe it was on the books but not really taken seriously, compared to the street hockey ban in Toronto which seems to have had a bigger deal made out of.
Now it must be a girl only school.
Yes, I'm Canadian. Consider how lucky you are to live in America. If you live in the UK, you're worse off.
Of course, you will have bit more trouble explaining to Swedish people that socialism doesn't work.
But carry on, please...
They're just raising these kids to learn to be good Canadians. Everything is dangerous if mishandled. That's why everything is illegal here. People can't think for themselves.. they *need* a nanny state. Besides, if it wasn't a good system, why would China and Russia have adopted it? Even as far as going back to it after flirting with freedom last decade, as in Russia's case.. and look at the US.. they're tripping over themselves to adopt this kind of a state. Just keep the word 'Democracy' in there somewhere, as in Russia, and everybody'll be happy. Ask Putin. He knows..
If you provide the children with too safe an environment, they will be useless when they are later released into normal life.
Move sig!
I suppose a ban on hockey is next...
They all bounce off a skull without endangering life. A cricket ball is hard.
Sign that kid up.
[...] after a "few serious incidents" in which students and staff were hit or almost hit by balls
For crying out loud.
Pretty soon our children will be so safe they won't know how to do anything. A risk-free world is a do-nothing world.
Sorry, but gray text on gray background is making my eyes bleed.
Pfft yeah and I will ask Narnia hows it hanging while I am at it. Stop making up fake countries.
Have they swapped out all mechanical mice with optical mice?
Until you have played ball hockey in the winter, with one of those orange balls from Canadian Tire, which has frozen solid, and someone takes a slapshot with it, and hits you in the balls, you are not entirely Canadian yet.
I'll take one of those in the head any day of the week over the "LBI".
Balls of all types were banned at my kids middle school due to a kid getting ball in the face. This ban lasted one week when the school was flooded with calls from irate parents telling them that they are being idiots. I called the school, and wrote the to local school board. In this case it was a single over zealous vp at this one school.
This was also in Canada, but the west coast.
Anarchists never rule
Badminton is not a big sport in Canada. I'm not sure that many people would notice.
Mimetic poly-alloy..!
I do not want your cheap brainburning drugs. They are useless for work. And I am a working man today.
He's probably also replying because an earlier comment said there their and they're in a mystical way that confused me. That is not hard as its 7.45am and I have already hit the bong.
The new right fascists are bilingual. They speak English and Bullshit.
It's where you get sent if you get caught stealing
The new right fascists are bilingual. They speak English and Bullshit.