A local substitute teacher was terminated from his post here after being accused of performing "wizardry. "According to Jim Piculas, a substitute teacher at the Rushe Middle School in Pasco County, he was removed from his post last January, with officials bearing their accusations on a disappearing-toothpick act that he performed for his students a week before.

British school teachers are advocating for education reforms, including a return to an early 1980s style of teaching, characterized by a strong liberal education. In essence, teachers are calling for more hours for play and less rigid methods in teaching young Britons how to read. Steve Sinnott, general secretary of the National Union of Teachers, told Guardian Unlimited, "Teachers want a return to a system which is liberal and flexible and not top-down and imposed by government. We want a return to a time when there was a potential for magic moments in the classroom. "

A man from China got the shock of his life upon discovering a chicken he placed in the freezer for two days came out alive and crowing. According to Gan Shugen, of Chengdu City, he got the hen which was wrapped in a thick plastic bag with its legs bound as a gift from a relative.

A web search reunited two South Florida sisters with their Russian cousin, after being separated for 70 years. The three were pulled apart back in 1937, when the Soviet Union forced their parents to flee to the United States, taking them along. Ossie Rasher, 81, and Sophia Altfield, 78, were reunited with their cousin Rosalie Berkovich, 80, after Berkovich's son scoured Google and found Rasher and Altfield's names on a genealogy website earlier this month. The three met up only a few weeks after.

Mexico police officials are now investigating a popular horror story-writer who allegedly chopped up his girlfriend from limb to limb and ate her. Police said that Jose Luis Calva's first declaration after he was arrested was that he idolizes British actor Anthony Hopkins in his portrayal of the cannibalistic professor Hannibal Lecter, Brisbane Times said.