Review, or something like that

   Today we went over the format of the test that is scheduled for around Tuesday next week. We were told that we would be given fifteen minuets to find random facts on www.cia.gov. In class we did some practice and we managed to find one of the answers in eleven seconds. The questions ranged from percentage of christians in a country to availability of electricity to people in the world. One of the questions was about a country's military budget and compared to a person's salary. We also had a shadow in class today who was home schooled, but wanted to come to John Carroll. Mr. Schick made a few jokes about wishing he didn't have to deal with us, but we all know he has to deal with us for a while. Not much happened today, so I'm just going to end the blog at exactly one hundred and fifty words.

Eeeeehhh Blog on Stuff

    Today we did very little in class. We went over our Veracross grades, to see if we needed to fix and mistakes. Except veracross wasn't working for the first ten minutes of class, so I just browsed the internet. When it finally loaded, I saw that there were no mistakes with my grade, so I just kept browsing. One interesting thing about today's class was that we had an exchange student named Claus from Uzbekistan. After everybody was happy with their grades we went over our homework, which was doing our previous blog. Some interesting facts were about the average age of women giving birth to their first child in different countries. Not much happened today, but I am glad that I got to see some of my friends in class. 

5 Facts That I Find Relatively Interesting

   So we were assigned to find five pieces of information from the CIA world fact book, so here we go. The first fact that I found interesting was that sadly 37 million people suffer from HIV, and that 940,000 people die per year due to it. This was interesting to me since I thought that HIV was a nonexistent issue, but it turns out that it is still a problem. This fact relates to our studies of the death rate in the world and the cause of some of these deaths. The second interesting fact is that the literacy rate in Vietnam is 94%. This fact surprised me because I thought that there wasn't very much education there, but it turns out that their literacy rate is higher than the Unites States. Fact number three is that in the Dominican Republic people in the armed forces are not allowed to vote by law. I find this idea interesting, but I'm not 100% sure why this is a law, I'll have to do some more research, but this still surprised me. The fourth fact is that in the U.K. you only have to be 16 years old to serve in the military (with parental permission). This was interesting since this may contribute to the death rate of teenagers in the U.K., or it may not. The final interesting fact is in Bosnia unemployment from the ages of 15-24 is 64%. This is an insanely high statistic and is probably caused by the high number of people living in such a small area. All of these facts were very interesting to me, and I hope whoever reads this finds them interesting too.

Could it be... more notes from Human Geography? Dear God!

    You guys know the drill on slow Wednesdays like these. Insular basically means to be proud of one's culture, and not willing to leave their country of origin no matter what. Total Fertility rate is the average number of children born per woman. For a population to remain relatively the same, the total fertility rate must be 2.1. If its above 2.1 the population will rise, and if its below 2.1 the population will fall. The world total fertility rate is 2.42, the U.S. 2.01, Nigeria 6.89, and Japan 1.4. The reason Nigeria's total fertility rate is so high is because some children will die very early on, so the mothers have more babies. In Japan the rate is so low because there are many more elderly people than young people, and the young people don't have that many children either.

Notes and Stuff from a class I don't Necessarily Remember What Happened in

     I hope you guys are prepared for all the notes that I'm going to regurgitate onto this webpage. Crude birth rate is the number of births per 1,000 of the population. Crude death rate is the number of deaths per 1,000 of the population. Rate of natural increase is produced by subtracting the death rate from the birth rate. This gives the annual natural growth rate this is given in a percent for a specific country or region. Net migration rate is the difference between the number of persons entering and leaving a country per year. An excess of people entering the country is net immigration, which is represented by a positive number. Canada has 5.65 migrants per 1,000 population, and the U.S. has 2.45 per 1,000. An excess of people leaving the country is net immigration. Mexico has a net emigration of -1.38 per 1,000.

New Lesson on Population and Settlement

     Today in Honors Human Geography we started a new lesson about Population and Settlement. Some key issues are where the world's population is distributed, why the global population is increasing, why population growth varies among different regions, and why some regions face health threats. Here's a list of some facts about population and settlement: There are currently over 7.5 billion people on the Earth. The population is increasing by 73 million every year. 200,000 people are born a day (8,377 per hour, 149 per minuet, 2.5 per second). 90% of the population growth takes place in developing countries like those in Africa, South and East Asia, and Latin America. Life expectancy is the average number of years to be lived by a group of people born in the same year. The country with the highest life expectancy is Monaco with an average of 89. The U.S. average is 79, and the lowest is in Chad 49.

Test Day

  Today we took a test on some basic Geography terms and facts. Before we started this test we talked amongst ourselves and were told to settle down by Mr. Schick. We had a shadow named Carly in our class, so us being the people we are, we sang the iCarly theme song out of tune. This was an excellent way to prepare for our test, it stimulated our memories, and may have helped us to remember what we may or may not have studied. I studied the night before for fifteen minuets, and at the end of Health class I read over my blogs. I'm pretty sure that I did enough studying, but I'll only know for sure when I get my test back. The test itself had a few challenging questions, but I felt relatively prepared. When I finished my test I sat there and messed around, so that I wouldn't be too bored. When everyone finished their test I went on my computer, and stared at a website for the last couple of minuets, while talking to other people. I have to say this was a pretty good test day.

Wednesday Shenanagins

     Today, we reviewed for our test tomorrow. We went over time zones, map scale, distortions, and some vocab words. I really have no idea what else to write so I'm just going to write the notes I took today. If its 7am in Bel Air, MD then its 6am in Chicago, Il. The sun rises in the east and sets in the west, so the west is going to be earlier than the east. The Earth is divided into 24 time zones, and each time zone is 15° longitude. The globe is 360° and the prime meridian is at 0° longitude. At 180° longitude there is the international date line, and the prime meridian goes through the town of Greenwich, UK. The town was named after the Royal Observatory that was located there. Map scale includes ratio, written scale, and drawn scale. The four types of distortions are shape, direction, distance, and relative size. Cartography is the science and/or art of making maps. A 2d scale of the Earth is a map. Antipodes are a place on the Earth where if you dig straight through the Earth you will reach land when you come out the other side. All time zones converge on the south pole, and the scientists there decide what time it is.

Today's Discussion

      Today we had a discussion about culture. We started our discussion by looking at the difference between Christianity and Catholicism. Some of the main differences are that Christians don't believe in purgatory or confession. I learned that other forms of Christianity aren't allowed to receive communion at Catholic masses, yet Catholics are allowed to receive communion at other forms of Christianity's masses. We talked about how some schools do confession differently. For example, Grace's school did confession in a dark room, and Saint Margarets did it in an open church in a corner. One topic we brought up was the separation of church and state in America and in Saudi Arabia. In America our court system is based off of the states' laws, and in Saudi Arabia it is based on the Quran. I love having these discussions, but I always have a hard time remembering what we talked about. I can't wait to talk about more issues our society faces!

Friday's Notes

     We took quite a few notes Friday, so I'm just going to paraphrase what I wrote. Geographers study why customary ideas, beliefs, and values of a people produce a distinct culture in a particular place. A culture's values derive from language, religion, and ethnicity. The second element of culture is the production of material wealth, such as food, clothing, and shelter needed to survive and thrive. Scale, space, and connections help geographers explain why similarities among places and regions don't result from coincidence. Scale is the relationship between the portion of the Earth being studied and the Earth as a whole. Globalization is a force that involves the world and results in making something worldwide in scope. Globalization of economy was created by transnational corporations, called multinational corporations. These corporations research, operate facilities, and sell products in multiple countries. Recession began in 2008 this involved home buyers in the U.S. to store clerks in Japan, and they all were caught in a web of falling demand and lack of credit (as in credit score).

Review and Some Notes

       Today we did a review of all that we learned about geography so far. We also talked about tracking devices and the benefits and disadvantages of putting them in people. Last of all we took some more notes on region. We reviewed how geographers describe where things are, how each point on Earth is unique, and how different places can be similar. Our discussion about tracking devices included how they could help strict parents and law enforcement, but could harm everyone's privacy and basic human rights. I personally believe that no human should have tracking devices in them unless they are on active duty in the military, and the chip be removed after the operation. Even though tracking devices could help solve crimes, they would violate every fiber of our privacy, at least whats left of it. Notes: Regions of Culture are the body of a customary belief, material traits, and social forms that constitute the traditions of a group of people. Cultus is the latin word for to care for/about.

Pop Quiz and Notes

    Today we took a pop quiz on parts of a map and some vocabulary terms. I don't really enjoy having pop quizzes, because I need to study before any kind of test where we learned the content more than two days ago. I believe that I at least got a six out of ten on the test, and if I had time to go over my answers then I would definitely gotten a higher score. We discussed this in class and talked about how this type of test put extra pressure on some of the students including me. We also took some notes on some of the types of regions. The first type is the functional region which is an area organized around a focal point. The second type of region is the vernacular region which is an area believed to exist because of the peoples' cultural identity. Next time we have a quiz, please give us a heads up Mr. Schick.

Places and the Reason for Their Names and Other Shenanigans

    Today we learned about how locations get their names, and Patrick also gave us some insight. A place is a specific point on Earth distinguished by particular characteristics. A location can be identified by a name, site, and situation. Names are toponyms that derive from people, religion, physical features, ect. Site derives from climate, water, topography, soil, vegetation, and elevation. Situation is the location relative to other places. Region is defined by one or more characteristics spanning political states. A region derives from cultural landscape which is culture, religion, and physical features. Also, we voted to have Patrick teach some of the lesson, and he did a pretty good job. I appreciate Mr. Schick's approach to this, since instead of immediately getting rid of Patrick, he took a vote to see if we still wanted him to teach. We voted yes and continued the class. I feel like we should do this more often. 

GPS and Being Stalked by AI

   Today we did a quick lesson on GPS and their uses. GPS stands for global positioning system, and it accurately determines the precise location of something on Earth. Satellites are positioned, and tracking stations use up to four satellites to determine an object position. A receiver can figure out the distances between the four satellites, and calculate their precise positions in space. GPS technology is used in cars, by pilots of airplanes, and by captains of ships. We got on to the discussion of companies constantly knowing where you are, and where that data goes. Then, we talked about Alexa and Google Home, and how they are constantly listening to us. We ended the class talking about sites like Ancestry. com and how they have your DNA and can do whatever they want with it. They could even... make clones of us!

Test Review and Map Work

      Today we went over our tests and read the answers aloud. We took the test around 2 weeks ago, and I was curious to see what I got. Mr. Schick explained his "bell system", where he rings the bell for any score above a 90%. Like always we got a little sidetracked, but I believe that getting sidetracked can lead to learning more than you usually would. The test review gave me some new information, and new ways to look at the problems and their solutions. We also were given three more maps and were told to mark some locations. I only got one map done, and half of the other. I like to do these map activities, because it gives me a chance to know the people that I sit next to better. Some of the people I know from middle school, but I'm just starting to learn more about other people who sit near me. These more relaxed classes are great to have in a day where you have no off mods.