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ABC Listen. Hello there, my friends.
It's Ruby here, and you're listening to News Time.
Hello, Ruby. Hi. On News Time today, I have five stories from right across Australia.
We're going to hear about proficient puzzlers, daring dingoes and a curly solution for hairdressers.
And that is all before our creepy crawley wow of the week.
What do you think? Are you ready?
Let's hear news. Story number five.
Have you ever heard of a Rubik's Cube?
It's kind of like a puzzle.
That's like a 3D cube, and you can turn the little cubes on it to match them up.
Yep, a Rubik's Cube is also known as a magic cube or a speed cube.
It's a puzzle with six sides.
Each side or face is a different colour, and the colours get jumbled up.
Then you have to twist and turn different parts of the cube to unscramble it and line all the colours up on their right faces again.
I've only solved one once, because my friend helped my very into Rubik's Cube friend.
It had me so much. It was pretty confusing.
I tried using some videos online, but that didn't really help.
I'd say quite a few people have had a similar experience.
But the members of one family in the Pilbara region of Western Australia, they are expert speed cubers.
Speed cubers try to solve Rubik's Cubes as quickly as possible, and Pei -Cheng -Ni and his kids Tristan and Taylor -Ni, they can each solve a Rubik's Cube in under 20 seconds.
How does it take me three to four days?
But it takes this, like, 12 seconds.
It is an impressive skill, that's for sure.
Pei -Cheng got into solving cubes when he had to travel a lot for work.
He used his spare time while he was travelling to learn about this popular puzzle.
Then he brought his love for the cube home and shared it with his kids.
Now it's a family activity, and the Ni family spends quality time together honing their sweet cubing skills.
I'm pretty sure they would feel pretty happy because they are together.
Pei -Cheng, Tristan and Taylor are getting ready to head to an international speed cubing competition in Perth in December.
Speed cubers from around the world will come together to see who is the speediest.
This nimble -fingered family, they'll all be competing against each other.
It's not divided by age, so children compete against adults.
I think that would be, like, kind of weird in some ways, because, like, you're competing against your family.
I hope the child wins.
If you win, you have proud rights of your family for years to come.
Pei -Cheng, Tristan and Taylor, happy cubing and good luck.
Izzy McNabb is seven years old and lives in south -west Western Australia.
A couple of hours outside Perth.
One morning, when Izzy was on the bus to school, someone started saying mean things to her, and it made Izzy pretty upset.
That behaviour was bullying.
Have you heard of bullying before?
Someone's doing something annoying to her, and they keep doing it, even though you told them to stop.
This is not good. Bullying is a problem in lots of schoolyards around Australia, and after her encounter on the school bus, Izzy decided she was going to do something about it.
Izzy organised an event at her primary school.
Kids did craft activities, like making butterflies and love hearts and worry dolls, and they were able to chat to each other about what bullying is and how they can stop it from happening.
Izzy also set up a cookie stall at recess to raise money for a charity called Dolly's Dream.
That charity helps stop bullying in schools.
Thanks to Izzy's efforts, they raised more than $600.
I like her idea. The world would be a better place if no -one bullied each other.
Izzy's hoping her efforts will inspire kids to be nicer to each other.
She says that when she sees her friends being bullied, she helps them out, and she tells the bully to stop.
Izzy wants to hold the event again and maybe even bring it to her local high school, too.
I like your style, Izzy.
Well done. Stone enough tree!
If you go out into the Aussie Outback at dusk and dawn, you might find the native Australian animal, the dingo, prowling and howling.
They look like dogs, but they're actually...
they're only, like, related by, like, a little bit.
Farmers don't like them because they chase their livestock.
They're good for the environment because they scare away feral cats and foxes.
They howl. Howl! On Gari, which is an island off the coast of the state Queensland, dingoes live in areas that humans like to go camping.
Sometimes the dingoes might come a bit too close for comfort.
People have been trying to think of ways to gently encourage the dingoes to move away from their tents.
You get some meat and then you make a trail.
Throw meat to the other side of the world.
Interesting ideas. The butchula people, who are the traditional custodians of the land, they've got a method for shooing dingoes that they've used for years.
They create dingo safety sticks.
They're made out of trees that have been cut down.
The trunks are cut and shaped so that they're long and smooth.
And sometimes they're decorated with paint.
They're called wangari sticks, after the Indigenous word for dingo.
If a dingo comes too close, people use the wangari sticks and gently poke them in the dingo's direction.
This can encourage the dingo to move away to somewhere else, away from people, but it doesn't hurt them.
So you're just, like, swinging around and then the dingoes run away.
I think it's good that they're using it like Indigenous ways because the Indigenous people cared for this land a lot.
It's good because they know it works.
Wangari sticks are made by the butchula people, but they're for everyone to use.
The craftspeople who make them say it's a great way to reconnect to culture and care for country.
Story number two. When your hair gets a little bit too long, there's a place you can go to chop that mop.
It's called The Hairdresser.
Get, like, a new look if they want to.
I like going to the hairdresser.
I don't like going to the hairdresser because my mum always says I have to on the weekend, but I never do because I really like my mullet.
Some people love getting their haircuts all coloured or styled, but for some other people, going to the hairdresser can be stressful.
For people with curly or afro -textured hair, there isn't always a hairdresser around who knows how to take care of their hair properly.
Hairdressers are often taught how to take care of loose or straight hair, so it's harder for people who have hair with different textures to find someone confident enough to help them care for it.
My cousin has afro hair.
Probably feel upset because they probably, like, want a new afro hairstyle, but the people don't know how to make it.
It's like, kind of like, excluding them because they don't get to get their hair cut.
Exactly right. Thankfully, some hairdressers around the country are working to change this.
They are learning about the different ways to cut and brush curly hair, and they're studying the special hair products that someone might like to use and the sorts of hairstyles that look good.
One of these hairdressers is Pat.
She has afro hair herself, and she loves helping her clients learn how to love their natural hair.
Hairdressing schools around the country are going to have their lessons updated soon so that salons can welcome more people in for a trim.
Because then people with afro hair get to have their hair cut.
So everyone can be included.
So then there's not, like, one hair that everyone has to get, so then not everyone's the same.
Yep. It's just one of the ways that we can be more inclusive to make sure that everyone gets the things that they need, like a haircut, no matter where they're from or what they look like.
And now, my friends, it's time for...
WoW Of The Week. This story made me go, wow, because I never knew that sprouted sprains, in fact, any brains could shrink or grow bigger.
If you could read the mind of a spider, what do you think they'd be thinking about?
I don't think they'd think of anything.
Oh, the spiders. You think flies because they're hungry.
Well, a team of scientists wanted to take a look at spiders' brains.
Not to read their minds.
They were testing to see where they're living under street lights changes the size of a spider's brain.
You see, scientists had already figured out that all bewaver spiders who build webs under street lights catch more prey.
But they also noticed the spiders in well -lit areas were smaller adults than their cousins out in the country.
The scientists wanted to know whether this difference in size was happening to more than just the spider's bodies.
Maybe it was happening to their brains as well.
What do you think they found?
That spiders have good brain development.
Big! As small as a pea, like an atom.
Interesting guesses.
I won't keep you in suspense any longer.
It seems that growing up in an area with artificial light, like a street light, means that an all -beweaver spider's brain doesn't grow as big.
And the most affected part of their brain is the part that connects to their eyes.
So maybe they might not be able to see as well, either.
Maybe it's because they need less light for brain development.
They need a bigger brain in the outback because it's harder to find food.
There's more research to be done, and scientists are keen to keep an eye on these eight -legged creatures because healthy spiders are key to a healthy ecosystem.
And with that, my friends, our web of stories is complete.
Thank you so much for your help.
Thanks, Ruby. Thanks, Ruby.
Oh, you're very welcome.
I'll be back next week with five fresh stories for you.
Bye. See you later.
See you later, or as they say in Swahili, quaheri.
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