Friday, 29 July, 2022
Get ready for a meteor shower; Saudi Arabia’s space-age city in the desert; MP tells kids to dream big; and how to tell if your dog is happy.
LINKS
The Line—Saudi Arabia’s futuristic new city https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0kz5vEqdaSc
Brisbane Olympics – Digital Time Capsule: https://teamaus.olympics.com.au/
Want access to our Squiz Kids Shortcuts + Squiz The World podcasts?
Teachers: Squiz Kids for Schools – Free 30 Day Trial: https://www.squizkids.com.au/squiz-kids-for-schools/
Parents: Squiz Kids Apple Subscriber Content – Free Trial: https://podcasts.apple.com/au/podcast/squiz-kids/id1494238283
Squiz Kids Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/squizkids/?hl=en
Got a birthday coming up and you want a shout-out? Send us an email at [email protected]
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
THE LOWDOWN
——–
Hands up who’s keen to run out into their backyard tonight and take a shower?
I’m talking about a meteor shower … not an actual shower. Cause that would be weird.
And if you look up into the night sky tonight – assuming there’s no cloud and not too much light pollution from lights down here on the ground – you might just be lucky enough to find yourself witnessing the Southern Delta Aquiariids meteor shower or the Alpha Capricornids meteor shower.
A meteor shower occurs when bits of rock thrown off from, say a comet, smash into the Earth’s atmosphere and burn up on contact .. causing the white streaks across the sky. Excitingly: astronomers are also expecting what they call a couple of fireballs over the next two night – which are very bright meteors.
Sounds cool.
The only catch? You’re going to have to wait up until around 11pm .. but hey – it’s not a school night .. what else have you got on?
SPIN THE GLOBE
——–
Each day we give the world globe a spin and find a news story from wherever it stops .. and today we’ve landed in Saudi Arabia, where construction has begun on a futuristic, environmentally friendly city in the punishingly hot desert kingdom.
It will be called “The Line”, and for good reason. It’s going to be a long, skinny city: 170 kilometres long and only 200 metres wide, making a line from the Red Sea through the desert and into the Saudi mountains.
It’s also going to be a very tall city: The Line’s 500-metre high mirrored walls will contain lakes, gardens, trees, and places for 9 million people to live, work, and play.
There will be no cars or roads. A high speed train will zip people from one end to the other in 20 minutes, and the vertically stacked city – it will be taller than the Eiffel Tower and the Empire State Building – is designed so that all your daily needs, like a supermarket, school, and park, are within a five minute walk.
It will produce zero carbon emissions, and all of its energy will come from renewable sources. Imagine that … I’ve put a link in your episode notes to a promotional video so you can see it, instead of imagining it … I think parts of it look a little bit like Wakanda, from the Black Panther movie.
SQUIZ KIDS SALUTES
—
Earlier this week we talked about how a new Parliament was kicking off in Canberra this week – with a bunch of fresh-faced, first time politicians making their first speeches.
And today Squiz Kids salutes one of them in particular – Sally Sitou, who won the election in her south western Sydney seat of Reid – taking in places like Cabramatta.
Standing up in Parliament, Sally proudly told her story: how she was the daughter of migrants, a proud Chinese Lao Australian whose parents gave up everything and everyone they knew in the country of Laos and moved to Australia to give their children a better life.
Sally said she had a message for all Australian children: dream big!
“You are not defined by your postcode, the school you went to or where your parents came from,” she said. “In this country you are defined by the content of your character and what you want to do for others – where the potential and promise of this nation is only limited by our imagination.”
For reminding us how lucky we are: Sally Sitou – Squiz Kids Salutes you.
ANIMAL KINGDOM
—
Researchers in Austria have been studying the way dogs wag their tails … and reckon you can tell whether a dog is happy depending on whether the tail wag is to the left or the right.
Afer a bunch of experiments in which involved humans giving dogs treats and monitoring the direction of their wags – it was found that when they were happy, the tail-wagging was predominantly on the right.
A tail wagging more to the right is thought to be associated with the left side of the dog’s brain, and with more positive dog emotions.
Hmm … I wonder what SquizE the Newshound makes of that.
(HOWL)
Yeah – I agree.
THE SQUIZ
—————–
This is the part of the podcast where you get to test how well you’ve been listening …
- In which country is the futuristic city The Line being built?
- According to researchers in Austria to which side do dogs tails wag if they are happy?
- What sort of a shower is expected in Australia’s night skies tonight?
SHOUT OUTS
——————-–
It’s July 29 … today is Islamic New Year … also known as the Arabic New Year or Hijri New Year — today is the first day of Muharram, which is the first month in the Islamic calendar. So Happy New Year!
It’s also a Friday – and that means the birthday reggae tune to accompany all the birthday shout outs for today and the coming weekend … hit it …
And it’s a happy birthday today to … Issy from Exeter, Luke from Craigburn, Dolev from Chatswood, Ted from Dianella, Myles and Elsie from Maryborough, Emery from Blacktown and Leighton from Baulkham Hills.
And the following Squiz Kids are celebrating a birthday over the weekend.. Liam from Forest Lake, Dylan from Bondi Beach, Sayaka from Upper Mount Gravatt, Willow from Cairns, Charlotte from Rochdale, Thomas from Edensor Park, Toby from Maroubra and Declan listening over in Tokyo, Japan.
A belated birthday shout out goes to… Jerry from Moggill.
A classroom shoutout goes to class 2A and Miss Nawabi at the Australian International Academy in Kellyville – who had a shoutout a few weeks ago but they were all on holidays and missed it. Oops.
The S’Quiz Answers:
- Saudi Arabia
- Right
- Meteor