Screentime Research

A pair of Oxford researchers have published a paper in Nature on adolescent computer use effects, showing that "screen use itself has at most a tiny association with youth mental health" (Orben & Baukney-Przybylski, 2019). Director of Research at Oxford's Internet Institute, Professor Andrew Baukney-Przybylski, continues "The 0.4% contribution of screen use on young people's mental health needs to be put in context for parents and policymakers. Within the same dataset, we were able to demonstrate that including potatoes in your diet showed a similar association with adolescent wellbeing. Wearing corrective lenses had an even worse association".

With 300,000 young research participants, this paper is a meta-study of three large pieces of research on well-being and digital-technology use in the UK and the US between 2007 and 2016. Orben & Baukney-Przybylski (2019) reviewed the data sets, and running all theoretically plausible analyses available, which included both dependent and independent variables, including, and excluding, co-variates. The number of analyses allowed a complex understanding of the associations and variation between digital-technology use and well-being to be developed.

And the bottom-line? There appears to be little to no causal relationship between screen use and lack of well-being. The results show instead that smoking marijuana has 2.7 times more negative association; being bullied, 4.3 times. Well-being is more strongly related to having enough sleep, and having breakfast.

Sam

References:

• Orben, A., & Baukney-Przybylski, A. K. (2019). The association between adolescent well-being and digital technology use. Nature Human Behaviour, published online 14 January 2019. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41562-018-0506-1
• University of Oxford (January 2019). Technology use explains at most 0.4 percent of adolescent wellbeing, new study finds. Retrieved from https://medicalxpress.com/news/2019-01-technology-percent-adolescent-wellbeing.html

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Being able to read Kindles in Calibre

I have a few hundred Kindle ebooks. However, Kindle seem to want us all to use their software. Unfortunately, the software they supply is flaming, horribly, grimly awful for reading books. I find it clunky, obtrusive, has poor controls, and more often than not it impedes my reading instead of assisting it.

I prefer to use other software. I like to use Calibre to read my ebooks on my PC, and FBReader on my phone. But to do that, we've got to get around the DRM, as that limits us only to the terrible kit that Amazon provide. I don't want to give the books away to other people or do anything dodgy, I just want to read them and to enjoy the reading.

The following help me to do just that:

1. Download an older version of the Kindle software, rather than use their lightweight 'online' version. We can browse and download earlier builds - the latest few versions of which are compatible with Windows 10 - here.
2. Once we have that installed, we need to ensure that we have downloaded the latest version of Calibre, and installed it. Go to https://calibre-ebook.com/download
3. Then we go here, read the instructions, and download the latest version of the apprenticeharper plug-n here. Extract the zip file for "DeDRM_tools_x.x.x.zip". We don't need to worry about the sub-zip files.
4. Then we open Calibre, and go to Preferences | Advanced | Plugins | Load Plug-in from file.
5. Navigate to the zip file "DeDRM_plugin.zip" in the "DeDRM_calibre_plugin" folder. Click yes to the "Are you sure?" message box.
6. The plug-in should install. Close Calibre.
7. It may pay to restart our device.
8. Then navigate to wherever the Kindle viewer has saved our files to (usually something like "C:\Users\[YourName]\Documents\My Kindle Content"). Import the latest ".azw" file into Calibre.

Now we should be able to view our ebooks in our chosen software without any difficulty.

Sam

• NB: the same Calibre process also works for pdf files if you would rather not read them outside Adobe Digital Editions. Simply find the folder, and import the file into Calibre.

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Dunning-Kruger need not apply

Earlier this year I participated in a professional development workshop, providing feedback on a proposed professional development process for the Career Development Association of New Zealand (CDANZ).

One of the proposals was that members would continue to evaluate themselves through a self-reflection process, and although the aim is that the organisation will randomly audit self-reflection documentation, what our feelings were about the lack of external review. It was suggested that issues may arise around members underselling their abilities, or over-blowing them.

There are always a few who will rely on chutzpah over actual ability. However, these people are rare in the career development industry, not normally finding adequate reward, glory or fame in what is, after all, a helping field.

Then there is the Dunning-Kruger effect, where "people are incompetent in the strategies they adopt to achieve success and satisfaction, they suffer a dual burden: Not only do they reach erroneous conclusions and make unfortunate choices, but their incompetence robs them of the ability to realize it" (Kruger & Dunning, 1999, p. 1121). This too would be rare in career development. It would be rare because to be a professional member of the association requires on-going professional development, and has - and will continue to - require members to stay up-to-date with new developments in their specialty.

In my view it is underselling - humility - that is far more likely to be a problem in the career development field. Characteristics useful in counselling professions tend to be empathy, patience, good listening skills, perception, acceptance, and creativity. These are characteristics which develop emotional intelligence, not diminish it. Practitioners need to be client-centred, because any intervention, suggestion or knowledge sharing needs to be about the client - and possibly Whanau - not the practitioner. The spotlight goes on and remains on the client, with the career practitioner as a mirror, using career expertise to reflect the client back to themselves.

As we use reflection so much for our clients, self-reflection is a very normal tool for career practitioners. It allows us to finally see ourselves within the work. Formal training in the field relies heavily on self-reflection both for assessment and as a model of practice. It is embedded through peer supervision, professional supervision, and regular, structured learning.

We do need checks and balances though to ensure that we are seeing ourselves realistically, and that it to be sure that we are not being too hard on ourselves.

The Dunning-Kruger Effect need not apply.



Sam

• Reference: Kruger, J., & Dunning, D. (1999). Unskilled and unaware of it: how difficulties in recognizing one's own incompetence lead to inflated self-assessments. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 77(6), 1121-1134. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.77.6.1121

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Chutzpah

In the Guardian recently I read a wonderful example of chutzpah (pronounced as a short 'hoots' like 'puts', and a long 'pa' like a [beauty] 'spa'): "a child who kills the parents and then begs the mercy of the court because now he’s an orphan" (Hern, 16 February 2019, quoting Roger McNamee). While I knew what chutzpah was, this was such a clear illustration of the brazenness of the concept it briefly took my breath away.

That is exactly it!

Absolute audacity. That's chutzpah. It can be viewed as a positive trait if you live in an individualistic society, and as a negative one in a collective society. Confidence, a self-made man, entrepreneurial and a risk-taker versus boundless arrogance, entitlement, over-confidence and narcissism.

Chutzpah. Saying one thing one minute, then swearing blind that that was not what was said when circumstances change. Brass. Cheek.

...or as I would prefer to call it: lies. Insolence. Falsehood. Selfishness. Manipulation. Egoism.

There are a few politicians who have chutzpah in spades. I wish they would trade it in for truth, honesty, and community, particularly in New Zealand. We are slowly becoming a more collective society, and chutzpah doesn't fit. And the more I look at the political debacles overseas, the less I think it fits anywhere.

How do we make it not OK? Perhaps we have to start labelling this behaviour for what it is. Lies. Arrogance. Entitlement.

Tricky.



Sam

Reference:

• Hern, A. (16 February 2019). Roger McNamee: ‘It’s bigger than Facebook. This is a problem with the entire industry’. Retrieved from https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/feb/16/roger-mcnamee-zucked-waking-up-to-the-facebook-catastrophe-interview

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Listening to audiobooks

Fifteen years ago I was introduced to audiobooks by a friend. I had dog-sat while he went overseas, and my - unexpected - reward was an mp3 player with a couple of audiobooks loaded on it. Since that wonderful gift, my audiobook collection has grown to the high hundreds, and I listen to audiobooks daily.

Why daily? Because I sleep deeply and short: my husband sleeps lightly and long. Audiobooks fill the gap between my needed sleep, my low boredom threshold and my husband sleep's very well indeed. I use a trusty old iPod Nano which I clip onto my pillow, and listen n whisper-quiet through $3 earphones from AliExpress (here). The earphones usually crap out within about 6 months from being rolled on, so I don't go for high value or high cost ones.

What is even more interesting is that I will listen to audiobooks that I probably wouldn't have the patience to read, or think of buying. One of my favourite audiobooks is the seven volume work on Winston Churchill by William Manchester. I have an annual Audible subscription, have converted DVDs and CDs, have downloaded books from authors, and have borrowed audiobooks from libraries.

What do I use to listen? I listen on my phone, my iPod, or my PC. My iPod is my go-to listening device, but sometimes - if I am travelling internationally - I will load some extra books on my laptop, to be transferred to my iPod as I run low, as well as filling up my iPod. When travelling within NZ, sometimes I will add some books to my phone as well as on my iPod.

But the result of all these devices is that DRM causes me grief: many formats lack transferability, particularly Audible. To avoid that, I use a couple of pieces of kit to help me with getting the books that I own - or have borrowed for a time - onto my phone, my iPod, my laptop or my PC.

One way using three pieces of kit:

• When downloading books from the Audible library, download (a) in Enhanced format, (b) using the latest Audible Download Manager, but (c) have an OLD version of Audible Manager installed (version 5.5.08 or earlier). Once you have downloaded, use a piece of German freeware kit called AaxToMp3GUI.exe (download here) and go to the file that Audible had saved your download to. Although this software is in German, you can easily work out that "Durchsuchen" means search, and "Umwandeln" means convert. Conversion will take a while. Then save the file and import it into whatever the software is that you use.

And another way using one piece of kit:

• Manage all your downloads and file conversions using OpenAudible (download here). I have tried this and it seems to work just fine. Simply import your existing Audible files and the software will auto-convert them to mp3s. It says that it will work for the US, UK, DE, FR, AU, JP & CA regions (no mention of NZ, but we are probably lumped in with Aussie). The cool thing about this software is that you can do everything in one step: download, MP3 conversion, and file management, right from the desktop. Tip: set your conversion folder location as the same as your fave player folder (eg iTunes location).

I hope this allows you all to listen to your books more easily.


Sam

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Boundary crossing

Earlier this year I read an article on FastCompany about social media gaffes which cost people the job they were currently applying for. The excuses to not hire were: overly argumentative on political views on private Facebook (FB) page; a death as a missed appointment excuse busted on FB; a distasteful symbol worn in a FB profile photo; a person's Twitter account linked to the potential employee with distasteful material; a sports fanatic swearing on FB; holding views on FB contrary to company views; potentially misogynist doodles posted on Tumblr; and posting FB plans of a summer celebration after accepting an internship (Ziv, 13 February 2019).

While I can understand the employer's point of view in wanting to mitigate hiring risk in each of the eight situations listed in the article, what the article was silent on was the employees' right to privacy. Any or all of the issues mentioned above may have been simply showing off, a costume party, a one-off, immaturity, or simply prejudice on the part of the employer.

This online investigation done by the recruiters or employers during recruitment is known as 'cybervetting'. Cybervetting happens “when information seekers (employers) gather information about targets (workers) from informal, non-institutional, online sources to inform personnel selection decisions” (Berkelaar, 2014, p. 480).

Ziv's article was really about cybervetting. What Ziv's article didn't talk about was that this is potentially an illegal invasion of privacy. Permission for the searches described in Ziv’s article are unlikely to have been given by the candidate (13 February 2019). In research that a colleague and I did a couple of years ago (Fijn & Young, 2016), we found employer justification for cybervetting range from mitigating hiring risk, to that the information is freely - publicly - available.

In New Zealand the Privacy Act does not allow anyone to collect information on you for any purposes other than those you have signed up to. The Privacy Act was established in order to protect citizen's rights to keep their private life private. However, the act is silent on what this means in the internet age. While Kiwis can refuse Ministry of Justice vetting, for example, it probably won't prevent a recruiter looking up news articles to find out whether we have been in court or not.

In our research, we found that 14% of employers would ask 'friends' of a candidate to show them the candidate's professional or social media pages. We found two things staggering: firstly that companies did it, and secondly that 14% of companies actually admitted that they did it. What was also interesting was that recruiters said they did not do this, and that it was unethical. Our findings were that cybervetting is not really considered to be ethical behaviour by either employees or employers: there is an element of the underhand about it. While both employees and employers accepted that it happened, neither seemed very easy about the fact that it was done (Fijn & Young, 2016, 2018).

In theory, good pre-employment screening should ensure that the candidate has the skills for the job. If pre-employment screening doesn't supply that information, then the employment process itself needs work.

To build trust in the employment relationship, both sides need to be 'honest' while marketing themselves (and right there is the elephant in the room!). During that discovery process of finding out whether a candidate can do the job or not, what business is it of the employer whether they want to be a Morris dancer in their spare time, or grow silk worms? To me this smacks of the employer requiring everyone to be the 'same', squeaky-clean, and to 'own' employee performance effectively 24/7. It appears to illustrate a growing inequality in the employee/employer relationship, showing more power on the side of the employer.

Cybervetting appears to blur the boundaries between what is public and what is private. But it is internet access to our publicly-lived private lives which is facilitating the ability to cybervet.

We need to talk about the issue of cybervetting, privacy and trust openly and come to a place where everyone is protected: where there is a balance between power, risk and reward.


Sam

References:

• Berkelaar, B. L. (2014). Cybervetting, Online Information, and Personnel Selection: New Transparency Expectations and the Emergence of a Digital Social Contract. Management Communication Quarterly, 28(4), 479-506. https://doi.org/10.1177/0893318914541966
• Fijn, E. & Young, S. (2016). Employer and Recruiter use of Cyber-vetting. Our Value, Our Voice: CDANZ (Career Development Association of New Zealand) National Symposium, Ara, Christchurch, 3-4 October 2016. Retrieved from http://www.cdanz.org.nz/professional-learning/past-event/2016-cdanz-national-symposium/
• Fijn, E. & Young, S. (2018). Students views on employers and cybervetting. Social Justice: CDANZ (Career Development Association of New Zealand) National Symposium, Victoria University Wellington, Wellington, 23-24 October 2018. Retrieved from http://www.cdanz.org.nz/uploads/Young%20-%20Student%20Views%20on%20Cybervetting,%20CDANZ%20NN,%20Oct%202018.pdf
• Ziv, S. (13 February 2019). 8 cringeworthy social media mistakes that cost candidates the job. Retrieved from
  https://www.fastcompany.com/90306133/8-cringeworthy-social-media-mistakes-that-cost-candidates-the-job

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Assigning a new drive letter

Having had my trusty old PC die recently, I was forced to use my laptop. I was interested to note that quite often when I plugged in one of my removable hard drives, my laptop would assign a different drive letter to it. As I tend to use shortcuts a lot when I am working, the constant re-allocation of different drive letters meant that those productivity tweaks would not work.

From many years ago, I knew that there was a way to permanently allocate a drive letter to HDDs, so I went looking. I found a lovely, simple set of instructions, as follows:

• Key Windows and X to open the Power User menu
• Select Disk Management
• on the list, right-click over the drive name, and select "Change Drive Letter and Paths" from the pop-up menu
• Click the Change button
• Use the drop-down menu and select the drive letter you want to allocate.

All I had to do was to check check that it would reconnect after the next reboot. And it did.

Job done.


Sam

• Windows Central (10 March 2017). How to assign permanent letters to drives in Windows. Retrieved from https://www.windowscentral.com/how-assign-permanent-drive-letter-windows-10

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Adobe Acrobat licencing error

I have had a problem on my laptop of my Adobe Acrobat reporting a licencing error. I thought I had solved it, then on a restart, found the issue was still live. I would start Acrobat, then a message box would appear with the heading "The licencing for this product has stopped working", and an explanation "You cannot use this product at this time. You must repair this product by uninstalling and reinstalling this product or contacting your IT Administrator or Adobe customer support for help" and "(143:4)". I had already reinstalled the product, which had only stopped the error until I rebooted the system.

On googling the issue, I found this is an old problem. However, it obviously still an active one. Luckily for me, there is a fairly simple fix.

Go to the bottom of the Adobe page here, and download the Windows version of the Adobe software licencing repairer (LicenseRecovery109.zip), then follow these instructions:

• Close ALL Adobe applications
• Extract the download using Winzip
• In the folder LicenseRecovery109, open the sub folder LicenceRecovery
• Doubleclick the file LicenseRecovery.exe
• A DOS window will open (see image with this post)
• Confirm whether you want to run the tool in English by keying 'e'. Enter.
• Key 'n' to run the tool (as you have already exited any Adobe products). Enter.
• Wait for the product to run.

All should be good.


Sam

• Reference: Adobe Help Forum (n.d.). Error: "Licensing has stopped working" | Windows. Retrieved from https://helpx.adobe.com/nz/creative-suite/kb/error-licensing-stopped-windows.html

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Scanning receipts

If we are aiming for a paperless office (as I am) then something that will scan and turn screens into pdfs, or receipts into pdfs is a great idea. The Microsoft Office Lens app lets us do just that: to capture and process an image of any receipt, whiteboard, card, screen, note or what-ever-takes-our-fancy on our phone.

The best thing is it is so easy peasy to use. Install "Microsoft Office Lens". The first time you open it, you will be asked to give it permissions over your still images and video recordings. Tick yes, then take an image of your first tiem.

You can save as images, as pdfs, as a ppt, or as OneNote (I don't know yet if I will prefer pdfs or jpgs on my phone, so am saving them both ways at the moment, until I decide).

All you have to do is to point and click, pretty much. You will get a red outline for whatever it is that you are focusing on, so shift the phone around until the border frames your item. Take the pic.

We can modify by pinching the image to zoom in or out; we can crop using the crop icon; rotate; put text on the image too. We can change the file name on the export screen, and save as pretty much anything we like, and once saved, we can share from Office Lens. We can sign into our Microsoft account (one of the reasons why I am thinking that perhaps I may only use images when scanning, is because they will go straight to Google Photos and then I am not signed into Microsoft on my phone).

This is a good wee piece of kit. Give it a try.


Sam

• Reference: Whitney, L. (6 October 2018). How to scan printed documents with the free Microsoft Office Lens app. Retrieved from https://www.techrepublic.com/article/how-to-scan-printed-documents-with-the-free-microsoft-office-lens-app/?ftag=TRE4e2523d&bhid=40778246

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Career Crisis Card Sort

Last year I was in Amsterdam, and happened across a book shop & cafe called "The School of Life". There I found a number of card sorts and other tools which I thought might be useful for my career practice (and the coffee was good too!).

I purchased a card sort, called the "Career Crisis Prompt Cards", which contained 60 cards designed to help the user consider elements of a career transition, or, in the words of The School of Life, "to unblock career crises and free up our thinking around work - setting us on a path to a job that will tap into the best parts of us".

I have some reservations about some of the cards, as the statements are unsafe from a career development point of view. For example, facing a Pasifika client with the card "A palliative nurse described one of the major regrets of the dying as the wish that they’d had the courage to live a life true to themselves, not the life others expected of them" would be culturally inappropriate.

I will remove probably a dozen of the cards. Some of them will spark ideas for replacement text which I may sticker, or get new cards to replace those I have removed.

The way I thought I would use the cards would be to have clients select those cards which they had a reaction to, then to rank, prioritise or group them in a way that was meaningful to them.

The School of Life suggested some further ways the cards could be used, including:

• Use the cards reflect on which parts of your current job you find least appealing and which jobs you have found most rewarding.
• Post a card to a friend experiencing doubts about their chosen path.
• Keep a card in your wallet to remind you to be brave in seeking out a new direction in life.

They should be an interesting tool to trial, once they have been appropriately curated.


Sam

• Reference: The School of Life (2019). Career Crisis Prompt Cards. Retrieved from https://www.theschooloflife.com/shop/career-crisis-prompt-cards/

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10 tips for a healthier business

If you have business goals, do you find it strange how we can slack about for the whole year, and then - lo-and-behold - at the beginning of a new financial year we suddenly decide to mend our ways, or turn over a new leaf, or stop procrastinating?

Then, of course, we are more than able to slack about for the rest of the year just so that we can make the same resolution again on the next tick of the annual clock.

If we know why our resolutions fail, we can work our way around our problem behaviours. Often our goals are simply too hard to achieve or are set with too short a time-frame. We try to tackle too much at once. We also tend to be too hard on ourselves, thinking that a small backslide means we have failed totally and we should abandon what progress we have made.

So, like how to eat an elephant, with all new tasks and projects, we need to plan what we are going to do, in smaller, more easy-to-complete bites. A little bit of planning out what needs to be done for the coming year can actually make it easier to keep some of our goals on track.

Try these ideas:

1. January: Strategic Plan. Review it, and create a task reminder in Outlook to check progress next year
2. February: Mission / Vision Statements. Check they are still consistent with your strategic plan. Create a task reminder in Outlook to check them again next year
3. March: SWOT Analysis. Look to your organisation's future. List your strengths and weaknesses, analyse your market and research opportunities and threats
4. April/May: Business Plan. Update it and put a task reminder in Outlook to check progress each month. If you don't have a Business Plan, actually write one - incorporating your SWOT analysis. If you don't know how to write a Business Plan, do a course, get some books out of the library and get some mentoring to help you complete it
5. June: Budget. Set up your budgets for the year, run them past your accountant. Be realistic and ensure they fit with your business plan. Create a task reminder in Outlook for next year
6. July/August: Procedures & Policies. Have your staff review them - have NEW staff review them. Update your master policy list. Does it cover all eventualities? Test: if a key staff member walked out tomorrow, could you hire someone new and have a smooth transition? If not, get your organisation's knowledge down on paper where it can stay with you, not walk out the door. Create a task reminder in Outlook for next year
7. September: Invest in Yourself. Go and learn something new. There is no better way to grow your business than to pick up some new ideas from someone fresh
8. October: Give Something Back. If you aren't already involved in a sponsorship or some kind of volunteer programme, have a think about what might suit your organisation. You can use the link for PR, or keep it quiet - whatever suits you best. Think about a charity, sports group, school or voluntary group. Volunteer for one of the Chamber of Commerce's committees or join Rotary
9. November: Team-Building. Take your people somewhere to show them your appreciation of their efforts this calendar year. Spending quality time with the people who actively support and achieve your goals pays great dividends. Create a task reminder in Outlook for next year
10. December: Review the Resolutions. See what you managed to achieve and how close each item was to completion. Celebrate your achievements; analyse why others didn't work, and LEARN from your past mistakes. And, create a task reminder in Outlook for next year!

OK. All ready for a new financial year?


Sam

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New Year Traditions

No doubt this will seem like a crazy time of year to be thinking about this, but have you ever wondered where New Year resolutions came from? Or why New Year shifts around between different nations?

Well, New Year in New Zealand is a double-whammy. While broader New Zealand follows the Western tradition of 1 January, Matariki is the Māori New Year. Matariki is the Māori name for the Pleiades, a constellation and star path used for navigation. Its rise in the southern hemisphere winter - usually June - marks the start of a new year (Te Ara, 12 June 2006). So mid-winter and mid-summer are a pretty normal times to think about New Year if you are a Kiwi.

Resolutions apparently are due to the Iraqis of the ancient world. First observed in ancient Babylon - Iraq - about 4000 years ago, the new year celebration is our oldest global holiday. Around 2000 BC, the Babylonian New Year began on the first day of northern hemisphere spring; the first new moon after the spring equinox (Peterson, 28 December 2017).

Babylonian celebrations lasted for eleven days, and as part of the party, citizens made resolutions (Dishman, 28 December 2018). Apparently the most popular resolution was to return borrowed farm equipment. Hah ...I'd like it if today some people's resolution was to return the books they had borrowed from me!

The Romans continued with the Babylonian tradition of having new year in late March, but their eternal tinkering with their calendar got them out of sync with the sun, until in 46 BC, Julius Caesar let the current year drag on for 445 days, declaring January 1 to be the beginning of the New Year (Dishman, 28 December 2018).

The Romans didn't tend to go in for resolutions so much though: more on the "feasting until they popped". The Jews seem to have kept the resolution practice up though, particularly with the idea that things need to be returned and all bills paid by the last day of the year (McElravy, 2 January 2018).

The Chinese New Year falls on a different date each year. Running for 15 days, the first day of the new year is the first new moon and ends on the full moon 15 days later, known as the spring festival (Kelly, n.d.). As the Chinese calendar is sun & moon-based, they have to "catch up" with the solar calendar by inserting an extra month once each 7 years out of 19.

New Year has only been celebrated as a holiday by Western nations for the past 400 years. While some denominations observe New Year as the Feast of Christ's Circumcision (McElravy, 2 January 2018), New Year is an essentially pagan festival, adopted by the church post-middle ages. I wonder if this might have been a strategic marketing move by the church, under the "better with them than against them" principle.

Western modern New Year traditions are to (a) have a party and (b) make resolutions, with the most popular resolutions being (Dishman, 28 December 2018; Peterson, 28 December 2017):

• getting fit
• losing weight
• saving more / spending less

The old Scottish tune, "Auld Lang Syne" - which literally means "old long ago," and colloquially "the good old days" - is sung at the stroke of midnight in almost every English-speaking country in the world to bring in the New Year. Early variations predate 1700 with Robbie Burns documenting the accepted 'modern' version, published posthumously in 1796 (Scotland.org, 7 February 2017). Most of us only know one verse anyway - and get the words wrong at that!


Sam

References:

• Dishman, L. (28 December 2018). The 4,000-year-old history of New Year’s resolutions and how they became big business. Retrieved from https://www.fastcompany.com/90279920/the-4000-year-old-history-of-new-years-resolutions-and-how-they-became-big-business
• McElravy, E. (2 January 2018). From Babylon to Self-Betterment: A Quick History of the New Year’s Resolution. Retrieved from https://michaelhyatt.com/history-of-resolutions/
  
• Kelly, J. (n.d.). How Chinese New Year Works. Retrieved from https://people.howstuffworks.com/culture-traditions/holidays-other/chinese-new-year1.htm
• Peterson, J. (28 December 2017). 4,000 years of making and breaking New Year's resolutions. Retrieved from https://www.deseretnews.com/article/865694435/4000-years-of-making-and-breaking-New-Years-resolutions.html
• Scotland.org (7 February 2017). The History and Words of Auld Lang Syne. Retrieved from https://www.scotland.org/features/the-history-and-words-of-auld-lang-syne
• Te Ara (12 June 2006). Story: Matariki – Māori New Year. Retrieved from https://teara.govt.nz/en/matariki-maori-new-year

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