These days, the participation trophy is most common type of award among children ranging anywhere from 3 to 18 years old. Kids compete in a wide variety of sports and activities throughout their youth, often winning trophies when there isn’t anything to be won at all. So what kind of lesson are we teaching our children when we reward them for losing?

This phenomenon is quite common these days, especially in your commonplace sports like soccer, basketball, baseball, and football. Let’s say, for example, children compete in a weekend long soccer tournament. Over the course of the weekend, there is a team that loses every single game. At the end of the tournament, it is highly likely that this team will still be handed a trophy at the end of the day. Of course you want your child to feel as though his or her hard work is rewarded properly, but as your child grows older, you might also not want him or her to think that a reward is expected even when there is no work put behind it.

Sports, however, aren’t the only culprit. In the academic world the same thing often happens. A student might have easy teachers throughout elementary and high school and receive A’s all of the time. Then all of a sudden this student goes off to college studying just as much as he did in high school (which was likely very little) and doesn’t understand why he is getting C’s on his paper.

So what is a parent, coach, or teacher supposed to do? What are your thought on this subject?

The Ultimate Fighting Championship’s debut on network TV was the most-watched live hour ever for mixed martial arts in the United States, Fox Sports said Sunday.

Saturday’s one-hour UFC broadcast averaged 5.7 million viewers, 16% higher than the 4.9 million average for CBS’ live airing of EliteXC in May 2008, which culminated with a fight between Kevin “Kimbo Slice” Ferguson and James Thompson. The UFC show this past weekend featured a heavyweight title fight between Cain Velasquez and Junior Dos Santos, who won with a knockout in just 64 seconds.

HEAVYWEIGHTS: Dos Santos wins title

AS IT HAPPENED: UFC on Fox play-by-play

DOS SANTOS: UFC boosted in Brazil

The college football showdown between the University of Oregon and Stanford University attracted 11 million viewers in the 9 p.m. to 10 p.m. timeslot, but UFC did better in mixed martial arts’ core demographic of men ages 18-to-34. UFC pulled a household rating of 4.3 for that group, better than any college football telecast this season except for last week’s game between the University of Alabama and Louisana State University, both ranked among the top three teams.

Whether UFC topped EliteXC’s peak rating won’t be known until later this week. The May 2008 show peaked with more than 7 million viewers for the Ferguson fight, which took place more than two hours into the EliteXC program. But EliteXC did not face national competition from other major sports for that show.

While the UFC broadcast is a record average for a U.S. show, the most watched MMA shows of all time aired in Japan. Several bouts for Japanese organizations pulled in tens of millions of viewers during the sport’s peak in the country in the early-to-mid 2000s.

It’s that magical time of year when we all like to spend time with our friends and family. But many of us find that we spend most of our time in our kitchens preparing food. But I have found that adding just a few key pieces of kitchen equipment have helped me enormously at this busy time of year.

Without doubt my favorite piece of equipment is my trusty food processor. My trusty old Kenwood is used almost daily to make cakes and biscuits and slice and dice vegetables.

Then there is my blender. This I use for making tasty and healthy smoothies for the children. But this gizmo is also great for making lovely soups. If you don’t already have one of these I strongly recommend that you get one. You will quickly discover how beneficial these gadgets can be.

And I can’t really talk about kitchen essentials without mentioning the all important toaster and kettle. The kettle is probably the most important piece of kitchen equipment in my house.

But a recent addition to my kitchen equipment has been a fantastic coffee machine. I really enjoy a good cup of coffee and my coffee machine really delivers. It’s really good to give your guests a fantastic cup of coffee before they head on their way.

And a key piece of kitchen equipment for me, both at Christmas and throughout the year, is my lean-mean-grilling-machine. These are particularly good for meats including steaks, chops, fish cutlets and chicken breasts. My grilling machine is my favorite way to cook meats.

I recommend equipping your kitchen with a few labor saving utensils like these this Christmas. These devices are not only enormously useful at this busy time of year but they’ll save time every day of the year.