Population Pyramids!

Today, in class we talked mostly on Population Pyramids. Population Pyramids are geographical drawings that shows the distribution of many age groups in a population.The three types or basic shapes of pyramids are known as the box, the christmas tree, and the cup. The christmas tree is what is known as a "developing nation". The growth rates are slow, it may have a high birth rate, and a short life expectancy. Some examples are places like Namibia and Bangladesh. The box is also a devloped nation but has slow growth as well. It also may have low infant mortality, slow population growth, and a long life expectancy, compared to the christmas tree. Some examples are places like the United States and Sweden. Finally, the cup is a fully developed nation; with a negative growth. Which my have a low birth rate, shrinking population, and a long life expectancy like the box example. Lastly, we reviwed and looked over some examples of Population Pyramids, figuring out why people are dying slower in this country versus another, why people are living longer, etc. That pretty much sums up the discussion of class today.

Factbook Fun!

Today in class, we reviewed our blogs about Factbook. For our last blog, we had to type a paragraph about Factbook, a country, and how it connects to population and migration. Some of the students in the class volunteered to say something about their country that they chose. I chose the country Italy, and one interesting fact to me was that the entire country of Italy only has 98 airports! Then Mr. Schick announced that we had a test! I was pretty nervous even hearing that we had one because I didn't do so well on the last one.I think that he said that the test is 100 points, so I really hope that I do well on it. Also, the test will be placed sometime in the second quarter, I am not sure when though.  Last, Mr. Schick told us a story about him, back when he was making movies. He said that whilst he was creating a movie in Los Angeles, he went out onto the football field, and sung the National Anthem! Which I thought was pretty funny of him. At the end of the class, I discussed with Mr. Schick my grade, and I really want to boost it. I have worked so hard to get that passing grade, and I hope Mr. Schick is lenient enough to do so. That is mostly all we talked about in Human Geography today!

CIA World Factbook Research!

Today in class, we discovered and learned about the website 'Factbook'. Factbook provides information on the history, people, government, economy, energy, geography, communications, transportation, military, and transnational issues for 267 world entities. On this website you can search any country you perfer to learn about. For example, if I chose the country 'Italy', when you click on the title, the page shows the map of Italy and the over 153 photos of Italy. The page also shows an introduction of Italy, which is mostly about the orgin and birth of Italy. Italy became a nation-state in 1861 when the regional states of peninsula, along with Sardinia and Sicily, were united  under King Victor EMMANUEL II. An era of parlimentary government came to a close in the early 1920s when Benito MUSSOLINI established a Fascist dictatorship. His alliance with Nazi Germany led to Italy's defeat in World War II. A democratic republic replaced the monarchy in 1946 and economic revival followed. Italy is a charter member of NATO and the European Economic Community (EEC) and its subsequent successors the EC and the EU. It has been at the forefront of the European economic and polictical unification, joining the Economic and Monetary Union in 1999. Persistent problems include sluggish economic growth, high youths and female unemployment,    organized crime, corruption, and economic disparities bewteen southern Italy and the more prosperous north. The geography of Italy, is that the location is in Southern Europe, a peninsula extending into the central Mediterranean Sea, northeast of Tunisia. The coastline is 7,600 km. The population of Italy is 62, 137, 802 people, as of July 2017. Some common langauges there are Italian, German, French, and Slovene. The government of Italy is called the Italian Republic. The capital of Italy is Rome. The legal system there is a civil law system; judicial review of legislation under certain conditions in Constitutional Court. Italy has a total of 98 airports. Some other facts that I learned about Italy was that it's population growth rate is -0.1% which would be an annual change in 2017. The unemployment rate is 9.7% as of August 2018. The life expectancy is age 82.54 years as of 2016. Lastly, the fertility rate is 1.35 births per woman, as of 2016. Other interesting facts about Italy is that it is the fifth most populous country in the world, which I thought was interesting because I never really thought Italy had that many people living there. The capital of Rome is almost 3,000 years old! That is the overall status of Italy as of today.

Missed Class Due to Sports!

Today, I missed most of the class due to sports. I had an 'away' soccer game against McDonough. I only was present for ten minutes of the class, I didn't get any notes for that amount of time, so I will be emailing Mr. Schick. When I left class, I went to my locker to get all the supplies that I needed for each of the classes that I had homework in. Then, I went to the locker room to change into my soccer uniform. We took the bus to the school, in my opinion the school was huge compared to ours. It had much more tennis courts, and even had a rock climbing course, which I thought was crazy! Unfortunately, we had lost the game, the score was two to one. We were in the lead with one goal, then they tied us, and got lucky with one last goal to end the game. Lastly, some of the team took the bus home, others traveled by car. That is mostly what happened that day after Human Geography, I hope that I can get all the notes that I need for class!

Life Expectancy and Test Review!

Today in class, we reviewed the test that we had all took. But when Mr. Schick called your name up to get your test. He had a bell to ring, one rang would mean that you got a ninety percent on the test, and two rangs meant that you got one-hundred percent. Unfortunatley, I didn't get a rang added to my name because I got a lower grade than that. There were quite a few people in the class who got two rings, which was good. But I think only one girl in the entire class got two rangs. Instead of Mr. Schick just announcing the answers out loud for us to check. We went through each row of people, answering the questions, in order. As we went through the test, Mr. Schick was really disappointed to see that some people in the class, got the easy questions on the test wrong. After we finished reviewing the test, he said that the people who got a low grade can retake the test for extra points, but only before the quarter! Which I will be doing soon, and I hope that it helps my grade. Then, we took notes on one slide of the presentation. The slide was on 'Life Expectancy', which is the average number of years to be lived by a group of people born in the same year. One high life expactancy was in a place named Monaco. Which was 89.52 total: 85.63 men, 93.58 women. Then we looked at the U.S. Which was, 79.68 total: 77.32 men, 81.97 women. Last, was the life expactancy of Chad, which was, 49.81 total: 48.64 men, 51.03 women. Lastly, we talked about why women might live longer than men, which is probably because women actually cared about their health and wellness, more than men did. They also visited the hospital more frequently than men, because of female problems.

New Unit!

Today we discussed a new unit, which was about population and settlements. We went over a slideshow with the teacher. We also took notes about the population on Earth as of today. There are Over 7.5 billion people on the planet right now. It's increasing by over 73 million people per year. 90% of this population growth takes place in the developing countries of Africa, South and East Asia, and Latin America. We also saw a website online where you can see the amount of people that are on Earth as of now. You can also how many people die in a certain amount of time, and how many people are born. More people are being born than dying, which is a postive thing. I think the estimate was that every 12 seconds someone dies, and every 8 seconds someone is born. Then it showed the top 10 most populous countries in the world. Which are China, India, U.S, Indonesia, Brazil, Pakistan, Nigeria, Bangladesh, Russia, and Mexico. That is all we mostly talked about today in class. 

Test Day!

Today, we took the test. I felt pretty confident before taking the test, and other people told me that it was easy. Before the test started, Mr. Schick let us review our notes a little. Then he explained the directions of the bubble sheet and how to fill it out. We also had to write an 'honor code' which we wrote "I am a person of integrity." I thought that was strange, but as long as I'm signing the Honor Code somehow, I'm fine with it. Then, he finally passed out the test, I was a little nervous at first, I have to be honest. But when I reviewed the questions on the test, I knew the answer to most of them. I answered the questions I knew first, then went back to answer the ones I was unsure about. That's usually my method for taking tests. I only didn't know the answer to a couple, or at least I think I didn't. After the test, he let us start off our blogs, but I didn't start mine then, because someone was taking a little more longer than expected. Overall, I hope that I got at least a passing grade on that test.

Second Review Day

Today in class, we reviewed for the test on Friday again. We went over the second part of the test and other aspects of it. Dimitri was back from his abscence, we told him what he missed on that day. Then instead of a regular class, we played a game about the test. Dimitri set up two sections of the classroom, we had team names, and captains. The two captains were Jillian and Alexa. To play the game, the captains had to pick a player from their team, to go up and answer the question. Whoever wrote down the answer on the board first, won that round of the game. As we were going through the game, there were some questions that were hard to answer and understand. But, I think Dimitri picked some of the questions that weren't going to be on the test. Then we went back to Unit 1 and played from there. I'm pretty sure that we lost the game, but I still learned a lot anyway. I also learned that I need to study more, which I will do. Now, I feel okay still, about the test, but I still have some more studying to do.

Review Day

Today in class, we reviewed for the test on Friday, October 18th. The section on the test where we have to identify the time for another place besides Maryland, is the only part that I am really haveing trouble with. It would be nice if Mr. Schick would post information on how to do find the time of location. The rest of test review, was pretty simple, all we did in class today, was time of location. We also looked through our maps, which I think we can use for the test. I hope that I do a good job on the test because, I need to really boost my grade for Human Geography. I also, would apperciate if Mr. Schick would post a small, overall, review of the test on his blog page. Overall, I feel okay about this test, so far, but I think I will study more for the test.

Answers for Assignment on Monday!

Ancient Cartography: Eratosthenes was a Greek astronomer, geographer, and mathematician who lived from 276-194 B.C.

Time Zones:
Portland, Orgeon- 7:00 AM.
Greenwich, England- 3:00 PM.
Toronto, Ontario- 10:00 AM.
The South Pole- 3:00 PM.

Locations and place names:
List five toponyms that are named after physical features: 

• Bharat.
• Bolivia.
• Cambodia.
• Colombia.
• Cook Islands. 

 List five toponyms that are named after Native American places: 

• Philadelphia.
• Sante Fe, New Mexico.
• Providence, Rhode Island.
• Chicago. 
• New York City.

List five toponyms that are named after a person of prominence: 

• Abbot, Maine- John Abbot (treasurer of Bowdoin College).
• Abbott, Texas- Joseph Abbott (Texas politician). 
• Abernathy, Texas- Monroe Abernathy (one of the developers of the town).
• Abington, Massachusetts- Anne Venables Bertie, Countess of Abington, Cambridgeshire. 
• Ackerman, California- John Q. Ackerman (first postmaster). 

List five toponyms that have some religious affiliation: 

Sangre De Cristo mountains -- (Blood of Christ)

• San Francisco -- (St. Francis) 
• St. Paul (Minn.) 
• Bethlehem (Penn.) 
• St. Charles (M0.)
• San Jose (Cal.) -- (St. Joseph)

Latitude and Longitude: 

• Baltimore, Maryland- 39.2904 N, 76.6122 W.
• Quito, Ecuador- 0.1807 S, 78.4678 W.
• Taveuni, an island in Fiji- 16.8414 S, 179.9813 W. 
• Christchurch, New Zealand- 43.5321 S, 172.6362  E.
• Juneau, Alaska- 58.3019 N, 134.4197 W.  

Antipodes: 

• Geographic Antipode- In geography, the antipode of any spot on Earth is the point on Earth's surface diametrically opposite to it; the antipodes of a region similarly represent the area opposite it. 

Finding the Antipode locations: 

• Beijing, China- Departamento Conesa, RN, Argentina.
• Bermuda- Most likely the ocean.
• My house- Most likely the ocean.

Dimitri was the teacher for today!

Today, in class one of the students, Dimitri, taught us instead of Mr. Schick. I thought that this was a creative and yet humerous idea from you. I had a great time in class, because it was unique than any other class that we had so far! Also, I took a lot of notes that will postiveley affect me for studying for  the test. We took notes on 'Regions of Culture', culture is the body of customary beliefs, material traits, and social forms that together constitute the distinct tradition of a group of people. Orgin of word, culture, is the Latin cultus, which means "to care for". It has two meanings: to care for, and to care about. Geographers study both definitions of culture. Culture: What people care about. Important cultural values derive from a group's language, religion, and ethnicity. Culture: What people take care of. The second element of culture of interest is production of material wealth, such as food, clothing, and shelter that humans need in order to survive and thrive. Also, we talked about why different places are similar. Scale, space, and connections help geographers explain why similarities among places and regions do not result from coincidence. Scale is the relationship between the portion of the Earth being studied and Earth as a whole. Globalization is a force or process that involves the entire world and results in making something worldwide in space. That is all we talked about in class today.

Discussion on religions and culture

Today, we discussed more on religions and culture. We talked about ancient maps, the orgins of them (Eratosthenes, Ptolemy, Chinese, Islamic, Age of Exploration). Some types of ancient maps are (Mercator, Peters, Robinson). There are round globes v.s flat maps, problems with projection purposes. Navigation (getting from point A to B). Refrence tools (relative and absolute locations). Geographic chracteristics of places.Toponym, site, and situation. We also talked about map features, some of the features are the scale, latitude and longtitude, equator, Prime Meridian, Tropics of Cancer and Capricorn. Degrees, minutes, and seconds. We talked about the GPS, which stands for the 'Global Positioning System'. We discussed what its good for, how it works, and the possible disadvantages. Lastly, we talked about regions, the cultural landscape, the types of regions (formal, functional, and vernacular). Overall, we got caught up on our notebooks and saw if we had everything up to date.

Missing class again

I missed class today due to being sick.

I missed class on Wednesday due to being sick

I am sad to inform you that I wasn't in class on Wednesday, due to being sick. I know that blogs are still due the night of class, but I really couldn't write my blog, because I was very tired, nauseaous, and dizzy. I hope that you understand what I am trying to tell you, and that you don't take points off for it. I started feeling sick about a couple days ago, but at first, it was just a fever, now it is worse, hopefully I should be back to school by Friday! I checked your blog recently for any information about homework, classwork, etc. I have to take my 'returned' test from you, and study from my mistakes I made on it. Apparently, we also have recieved new seats which I think is good, so that some of us can focus better in class, and achieve excellence! Again, I really hope that you don't take points off for not having my blog on time, like I said I was really sick.

New Maps!

Today we recieved new maps to fill out, but we didn't fill out the same essentials that we did last time. Some of the objectives that we had to fill out last time were the 'Prime Meridian', the 'Equator', and our 'Orgin of Place'. Instead, this time we need to fill out objectives like the 'John Carroll School', Chicago, San Francisco, London, Moscow, Berlin, Beijing, Seoul, Honolulu, and Aluja. We also had to find these objectives on three different 'Time Zone' maps, which were pretty easy to find. I think that we are turning the new maps as a grade though, instead for our reference. Although, I dislike doing these maps becausen I find it boring and dull. But I guess it is somewhat resourceful to us for studying for tests. We also took more notes on the slide that we are currently on. Some notes were on the 'GPS', which is a Global Postioning System. It accurately determines the precise postion of something on Earth. The 'GPS' includes three elements: Satellites, tracking stations to monitor and control satellites. A reciever that can locate at least four satellites, for figuring out its distance from one another. The applications of a 'GPS' are 'Tum-By-Tum' which is directions in vehicles. A navigation aid that pilots and ships captains. Provides location for social media applications. We talked about why each point on Earth is unique. A place is a specific point on Earth distinguished by a particular chracteristic. Describing the features of a place is an essential building block for geographers to explain similarities, differences, and changes, across the Earth. Geographers describe a features place on Earth by identifying its location, the position that something occupies on Earths surface. I hope that we get to learn more about other things besides maps, and study more of the history side of 'Human Geography'.