Monday, April 29, 2013

Class Recap 4/26, 4/29

On Friday in class we had pretended to do something like Shark Tank the TV show. I don't know much about it and I also was not part of any of the process so I just took notes and observed. Today we watched a movie and tried to teach each other Scratch, which is highly unsuccessful and frustrating.

Thursday, April 25, 2013

Class Recap 4/23, 4/24

Yesterday in class, we spend the entire time trying to see what it would be like living in a soddie on the prairie. I was in a group made up entirely of boys, so my soddie life was rather interesting. Our first station was "stand," where we had to pretend we were living in the cramped area of a soddie. It was easy to create our floor plan because there was not much we had to fit in, and then all we had to do was sit around. It became boring very quickly. I could never imagine living in such a small sparse place with five boys. The next station was "sit," where each kid sat in a chair and was time lapse-d for a minute to stimulate the act of taking a "picture." Back when cameras were just starting to be used, the exposure time was much longer so we had to sit for quite a long time. After sitting, we had to "smell," which consisted of Caleb sticking his head into a plastic bag full of sod. I think we were supposed to take away from the experience the understanding that life was hard on the prairie and that it was terrible and smelly and boring, but to be honest I think it could be cozy and a nice place to be with people you love.
I was only in school for 10 minutes of today's class because I went on a field trip. Laurel and I just hung out until the bell.

Monday, April 22, 2013

Class Recap 4/12, 4/22

On Friday before the vacation, we had a "discussion" about the push and pull factors that affected the massive move Westward. Eventually the discussion turned into a debate. We started class by watching the Sophia that did not upload on the Thursday that it should have uploaded on. After we watched them and took down some questions that came to mind as the videos went on, we split into two groups that formed two circles, an outer one and a smaller inner circle. The inner circle had 10 minutes to discuss the push factors until they had to switch places with the outer circle. The outer circle then had 10 minutes to discuss the pull factors. The first group had a really hard time coming up with good questions and their discussion pilfered out quickly. When we switched places, Caleb got heated and he led the debate. It was a great way to end the last day of school before vacation because I love having discussions, especially with Caleb.

Today, we went to the computer lab and signed up to a website set up by the Smithsonian. The point is to basically do a project on something that interests us. I am excited for it, but I am just not sure what it has to do with history, and if we are wasting our time doing something that does not relate to what we are learning in school. Laurel had a really hard time picking a subject, but I decided to analyze portraits. I read a book called The Girl With The Pearl Earring and it gave insight on both the painter and the sitter, so I am looking forward to doing a more in depth learning curve on it. It was a relaxing way to end the day.

Thursday, April 11, 2013

Class Recap, 4/10, 4/11

Yesterday in class, we talked about the Erie Canal and its positive and negative effects on America. I made a blog post about the Erie Canal last night so there is not too much to say about it in my class recap. I was in a group with Sarah Ganz, Camille and Laurel and we all took on a persona and read a different part that exposed an effect, whether it was positive or negative.
Today, we were immediately paired with someone of our choosing and discussed a few questions regarding Manifest Destiny that were projected on the board at the beginning of class. Everyone should have already known a little bit about Manifest Destiny because of the Sophia last night. After we talked about the five questions with Mr. Boyle, we looked at two different works of art that shared the same idea about Manifest Destiny and encouraging the move westward. The paintings were impressive. They were colorful and expressed a great number of ideas in one image. After we talked about the paintings, Mr. Boyle told us that we were to come up with a short skit with our partner. I have to say that the script Laurel was quite meritorious, unlike any other group's script. Most people acted out their skits to end the class. It was a busy period, but an overall interesting one

Wednesday, April 10, 2013

The Erie Canal: An Overall Positive Investment

From a purely economically- and socially- inclined point of view, the Erie Canal was, overall, had a positive effect on America. The construction of the Canal opened up trade with the west as well as an easier way to move people who wanted to contribute to the expansion of American settlements. The migration numbers grew exponentially after the Canal was dug and more people settled in the west than ever before. Without the Canal, America would not have become the trans-continental nation that we are today. Transporting their supplies from their homes in the east to their new stretch of land became so much easier and faster and cheaper thanks to the Canal. 
Economically, the Erie Canal created jobs and improved the economy of tons of towns beside the Canal. It is hard to deny the fact that the Erie Canal paid for itself almost immediately, in 6 or 7 years. The concept of paying less to move west became much more popular, so more people wanted to travel on the Canal. Economically and socially, the Erie Canal created substantial benefits for America.

Monday, April 8, 2013

Class Recap 4/5, 4/8

Friday was a half day, so we did not have class. We did have a pep rally which was pretty fun except when the sophomores did not participate in the festivities at first. As soon as people were bribed with T-shirts, they got right into it really quick.
Today, Mrs. Jones was our substitute. She handed out a multitude of papers regarding the Oregon Trail and the boom of Americans moving westward in the 1800s. We had to fill in boxes with the most important material and then write three journal entries that corresponded with the journey the pioneers took. The Oregon Trail is an interesting topic. We have not covered the westward expansion that much in any previous history classes, so I like learning about this so far. Mrs. Jones gives us a really hard time during class and pretty much everyone hates her, but she is funny and deep down, I think most kids enjoy her. If not, we have to appreciate the fact that she always tells the teachers the class was really well behaved and nice.

P.S. I just played the Oregon Trail game at the end of the Sophia (the bad version, not the one where you have to download an App) and I died of starvation. "Your party died of starvation. It's been a wild ride but now everyone is dead. Thanks a lot, jerk." I did not think that was very nice. 

Thursday, April 4, 2013

Class Recap 4/3, 4/4

Yesterday, we did not have class because I, among other sophomores, had to spend E and F period in the computer lab taking the Accuplacer Test. In my opinion, it was pretty easy and a waste of time. The test was reading comprehension, an essay, and testing sentence structure. The essay took 50 minutes and the other two parts took much less. I did not much like taking a test on the computer. I like to go back and check my answers once I am done, so I did not like the face that we could not review our work. The essay was not hard at all, but I would rather write it out on paper instead of typing it. The most amusing part of the entire experience was the tutorial teaching people how to use a mouse and keyboard. The irony is that in order to have gotten to that point in the test, one would have had to use the keyboard and mouse.
Today in class, we split up into groups according to a letter, which represented a certain group involved in the War of 1812. My group had the Amerindians. After watching a short clip about slogans, we were told to create a slogan, icon and poem from the perspective of our specific group involved in the War of 1812. It was pretty interesting to get creative and try to walk around in the shoes of our specific group. The best was Caleb's. His group were all the Americans opposed to the warhawks and the war in general. Their poem and slogan were great.

Tuesday, April 2, 2013

Snap Debate Overview

In class today, there were four different causes that were argued to be the main cause of the war. Each group prepared a 2 to 3 minutes debate trying to prove that their cause was the one that caused the War of 1812. The four causes were as follows:

1. Impressment- Impressment was when British ships invaded American ships and forcibly took American sailors to be part of the British navy. The British were not technically on American soil, but they ended up capturing some odd 140,000 American sailors. They justified their intentions by going by the phrase "Once a British citizen always a British citizen."

2. Chesapeake Affair- The Chesapeake Affair was like impressment, except the British commenced to shoot at the ships. This became the first form of a battle in the War of 1812. As a result, Thomas Jefferson signed an Embargo Act that prevented Americans from exporting or even leaving the ports. It brought trade to a near zero.

3. Orders in Council- The Orders in Council was a response to Napolean's seize of power. Te Americans restricted trade from France, which did not help the trade situation.

4. Incitement- Incitement was when war hawks from the south west had evidence that the British were giving the Amerindians weapons and preparing them for war against American colonists. They bribed them with clothing and other items, and helped them to learn how to use the weapons they were given. The Americans saw this as a threat considering it was right on their own land and were worried that the Amerindians would be provoked to start a war.

My group was Incitement. While we discussed what incitement really meant, it was pretty obvious that it was the only cause that presented the most of a threat towards America. It was easy to write a debate because none of the other groups could argue that they affected the actual homeland of America. We could argue that the Amerindians were already unhappy with the Americans, and as soon as the British gave them guns and told them how to shoot, they would want to start a war.

Three people came to our group after the debate and they all said that incitement affected America directly while the others affected seamen and mostly Europe. Snap debates are really interesting and I hope we do more of them in the future.

Class Recap 4/1, 4/2

Yesterday in class, we were in the computer lab for the entire period. We did an online exploration that was mimicking Lewis and Clark's expedition into the Great Unknown, or in other words, the uncharted western territory. It was interesting to decide what to do, but it felt a little bit strange to sit at in front of a screen and pretend to do what a group of people did as an actual adventure. Their experience, though a bit more dangerous, was so much more exciting. We wrote diary entries like they did along the way and we had to try not to die. It was pretty cool.
Today in class, we had a snap debate. We were separated into groups according to our poll that we supposed to fill out after we did the sophia work. I did the sophia work but I did not even notice the poll at the bottom. Luckily, I was randomly put into Incitement, which was clearly the best argumentative group. Neal spoke for us and three people joined our group after we put in the debate. I am glad that we had such a great subject but it stinks that I did not complete the sophia like I should have.