Today in Human Geo, we didn't do anything today. Mr. Schick, let us do this PowerPoint with the class. It is this one program, where if you are invited to it, you can work on the document. So my whole class did together. It was pretty annoying, because anytime you would type something, someone would come right behind you and delete it. Then people were putting pictures of themselves on to and claiming that it was there slide. In the end we did get work done, and we had some nice slides, that were decorated and fancy. Other than that it was a normal class. 

In Human Geo today, we didn't do anything different. Mr. Schick wasn't here, so we had 2 different subs. All we did was play that game again, which I still think is kind of confusing. We also filled out the paper that we were supposed to. Other than that we didn't do anything else. We got into our groups once we walked in, so we got to work right away. Other than that we actually didn't do anything. So I am not sure what else to say in this blog because we didn't do anything too fun in class today.

Today in Human Geo, we just got into our groups and played that Peace Corp game again. I personally think the game is super confusing. Like I listen to the people when they talk, and it just very hard to understand how to play. But we also answered questions about the game. It is pretty hard to find the doctor that you had to find. Then for a while in class we were playing music. I really like this class because it is one of the only classes where we can be pretty much free, and just chill out for a little, instead of doing tons of boring work. Today’s class was pretty fun.

Today in human geo, we just checked our tests that we took. I didn’t do as well as I wanted to on this test, and I even had every single not in my blog. I think that it was just because we didn’t have much time and I was a little rushed so I kind of had to guess, instead of looking them up. Then I had a mess up in my grade so I emailed, Mr. Schick, and he changed it for me. That was basically all we did, it was a pretty hard test, so I don’t mind that I didn’t get an a. But I am kind of sad of that grade I got. 

Today in Human Geo, we got into groups, and played a game on the computer. I was pretty confused of what game this was, but it was kind of fun. It all tied in because we are doing a project on the Peace Corps or something, so this game kind of went along with it. I liked how you could play games in the game, because it made it a fun way to learn. I think Mr. Schick was smart to let us play this game as a project, because it is teaching us, but it is actually fun. But other than that we didn't do much. 

Today in Human Geo we took a test. It was the big test on the presidents, that we took a good week or so going over. I think i did pretty well on the test. I had like all the information on my blog and we were allowed to use our blogs, so that made it ten times easier, because with ought it i think i would have failed. The test was pretty long i finished with like one minute left in class. Mostly everyone finished before me, but that is just because i was stuck on some problems. I am just so happy and thankful that Mr. Schick let us use our blogs. It was a good thing i updated mine, because if i didn't i would not have done to good on it. The whole class we took the test, so we didn't do much else today in Human Geo.

Today in Human Geo, we went over the Presidents again. I was happy we did this because we have a huge test or quiz on it tomorrow and it is a lot to understand and study. I am not sure how I am going to do on that test, but I studied a lot for it. I think I know it but then I will go in tomorrow and take it and get a bad grade, it happens all the time. But anyway we just went over the presidents and finished talking about them and how they were important, and important facts about each one. It was like how their past made them important today. It was basically notes on their family’s and things they did before they went into office. Today was an alright class nothing to exciting.

Monday november 11, 2013

Today in Human Geo we went over the president thing again. We also found out that we were having a test in all of this stuff on Wednesday. I am not excited for the test because it is going to be really hard and i already know that it will. We had some good discussions even though it was a Wednesday which is really surprising. Class wasn't that interesting today, it was pretty boring. I honestly don't even know what to say anymore because we just basically did what we have been doing.

On Friday, we didn't really do much in class. We went over the last test we took. We basically just reviewed the questions, and went over our answers. Then after that we just looked at the world leader’s topic again. Mr. Schick basically just went over the world leaders, and different facts he though we should put in our blogs. Other than that we didn't do much. We had an hour delay that day, so class was cut a little shorter than usual. It was also a Friday class, so we had 2 mods of human Geo class. Also on Wednesday, we switched seats. I am not sure if I mention that but we did and I was so happy we did. Friday was a pretty boring class. 

Afghanistan is an Islamic republic headed by

President Hamid Karzai

He emerged as a resistance leader under Taliban rule and worked to undermine the regime.

He is well versed in several languages, including his native Peshto, Persian, Hindi, French and English.

Several times in 2001, Karzai warned the United States that the Taliban were connected with al Qaeda and that there was a plot for an imminent attack on the United States, but his warnings went unheeded.

source: Biography.com

Brazil is a federal republic headed by President Dilma Rousseff

She opposed Brazil’s military dictatorship of the 1960s and ‘70s, and served three years in prison, where she was repeatedly tortured.

She has been divorced twice.

She has a degree in economics, and now rules the country with the eighth-biggest economy in the world.

She underwent chemotherapy for lymphoma in 2009, and is now in remission.

 source: NYTimes

China is a communist state, ruled by President Xi Jinping

Xi Jinping is the son of revolutionary veteran Xi Zhongxun, one of the Communist Party's founding fathers.

He married folk singer Peng Liyuan, who also holds the rank of army general, in 1987. To many in China, Ms. Peng was the better-known half of the couple before Xi Jinping became leader of the Communist Party.

The couple have a daughter named Xi Mingze, who is studying at Harvard University in the US.

France is a republic headed by Francois Hollande

Hollande has no previous experience in a national government position.

The mother of his four children is Ségolène Royal, with whom he shared a 30-year relationship.

He was born in 1954 in the city of Rouen to an extreme-right physician father and progressive social worker mother. 

Germany is a federal republic headed by

President Joachim Gauck and Chancellor Angela Merkel

Graduated from University of Leipzig in 1978 with a degree in physics and physical chemistry; earned a PhD in quantum chemistry from the German Academy of Sciences in Berlin in 1986

Has been Chancellor since November 2005

Merkel has earned the top spot on the FORBES list of Most Powerful Women In The World for eight of the past 10 years.

sources: Forbes, Christian Science Monitor

India is a federal republic headed by

President Pranab Mukherjee

He taught Political Science at the Vidiyanagar College, and worked as a journalist before entering politics.

Mukherjee was rated as one of the best finance ministers of the world in 1984 and was adjudged the best parliamentarian in 1997.

He had a conflict with Rajiv Gandhi (who took over as Prime Minister from his mother Indira after she was assassinated in 1984) and started his own party – Rashtriya Samajwadi Congress.

source: The Indian Times

Iran is a theocratic republic, ruled by Supreme Leader Ali Hoseini-Khamenei, and President Hasan Fereidun Ruhani

In 1963, took part in street protests against the U.S.-backed Shah of Iran. After the uprising was quashed, Khamenei was exiled. Khamenei was imprisoned multiple times and, in 1975, was internally exiled to a remote region in southeastern Iran.

Was elected President of Iran in 1981 and re-elected in 1985.  Became Iran’s Supreme Leader in 1989.

source: Time magazine

Mr Rouhani has held several parliamentary posts, including deputy speaker and has also served on the Supreme National Security Council.

Was just elected President of Iran - June 2013

He has been openly critical of the outgoing president, saying Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's "careless, uncalculated and unstudied remarks" have cost the country dearly.

source:  BBC News

Israel is a parliamentary democracy,

headed by President Shimon Peres and Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu

Shimon Peres was born in Belarus. To escape the persecution of Jews there, the family fled to Palestine in 1934.

When Arab forces launched their attack on the new state of Israel in 1948, Peres was given the chief responsibility for securing military equipment for Israel from abroad.

Later he organized Israel's nuclear program and is regarded as the father of Israel's atomic bomb.

As Israel's Minister of Foreign Affairs Shimon Peres was in charge of the Israeli negotiations during peace talks with the Palestinians.  In the autumn of 1994 he shared the Nobel Peace Prize with his own Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and the Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat.

source:  Nobelprize.org

As a child and youth he lived with his family in the US in the years 1956-58 and again in 1963-67

After his brother Jonathan (Yonni) was killed, in July 1976, in the course of the Entebbe Operation, of which he was one of the commanders, Netanyahu returned to Israel and started to advocate international cooperation in fighting terrorism.

Quote: "There are those who say that if the Holocaust had not occurred, the State of Israel would never have been established. But I say that if the State of Israel would have been established earlier, the Holocaust would not have occurred."

S

Mexico is a federal republic

headed by President Enrique Pena Pieto.

He was the eldest of four siblings in a middle-class family; his father, Gilberto Enrique Peña del Mazo, was an engineer for the electric company and his mother, María del Socorro Nieto, a schoolteacher.

Reports that he fathered two children in extramarital affairs while his wife Monica raised the couple’s 3 children, plus the investigation into the sudden death of his wife at home in 2007, have prompted many to call him the Teflon candidate because trouble seems to slide off him.

Two years later he announced his engagement to soap opera actor Angelica Rivera.  Rivera became his wife in a star-studded wedding ceremony two years ago and is now the first lady of Mexico.

sources:  New York Times, NBCLatino.com

Saudi Arabia is a kingdom ruled by

Abdallah bin Abd al-Aziz Al Saud,

who is both King and Prime Minister

He has fathered 22 children, the youngest when he was 79.

He is worth approximately 21 billion dollars.

He was appointed commander of the Saudi Arabian National Guard, a post he was still holding when he became king.

In November 2007, King Abdullah visited Pope Benedict in the Apostolic Palace. He is the first Saudi monarch to visit the Pope.  In March 2008, he called for a “brotherly and sincere dialogue between believers from all religions.”

In 2011 he granted women the right to vote and run in future municipal elections, the biggest change in a decade for women in a puritanical kingdom that practices strict separation of the sexes, including banning women from driving (the only country in the world with such a ban).

sources: NYTimes, Saudi Gazette

The United Kingdom is a constitutional monarchy and Commonwealth realm,

ruled by Prime Minister David Cameron and Queen Elizabeth II

At the age of seven, the young Cameron was packed off to Heatherdown, a highly exclusive preparatory school, which counted Princes Edward and Andrew among its pupils. Then, following in the family tradition, came Eton, Britain’s top private school.

His first child, Ivan, who was born profoundly disabled and needed round the clock care, died in February 2009.

The experience of caring for Ivan and witnessing at first hand the dedication of NHS hospital staff, is said by friends to have broadened Mr Cameron's horizons. He had, friends say, led an almost charmed life to that point.

Cameron is the youngest Prime Minister (43 when he took office) in over 200 years.

Elizabeth became queen on February 6, 1952, and was crowned on June 2, 1953.  Her reign has lasted 60 years - and counting.

source: BBC

Venezuela is a federal republic headed by President Nicolas Maduro Moros

Nicolás Maduro Moros worked as a bus driver before becoming politically active in the early 1990s.

Maduro was introduced to Hugo Chávez in 1992, after Chávez and other disenchanted members of the military were imprisoned for an attempted coup and Maduro began campaigning for  Chávez's release. (Chávez was released in 1994 and won election to the presidency four years later.)

After President Chávez won a third term in October 2012, he selected Maduro to serve as vice president. Maduro worked alongside the outspoken president, serving as one of his closest advisers as well as a loyal spokesman, until Chávez's death at 58 on March 5, 2013, from cancer.

source: Biography.com

Political Geography

           Germany 

 Mexico

Federal republic

President Enrique Pena Nieto                                

                                                          

Federal republic

President Joachim Gauck  

                     

                                                                                             

China

Communist state

President XI Jinping

Afganistan
Islamic Republic
President Hamid Karzai

India

Federal Republic

President Pranab Mukherje 

United Kingdom

constitutional monarchy and Commonwealth realm

Queen Elizabeth II

France

Republic

 President Francois Hollande

Brazil

federal republic

President Dilma Rousseff

Saudi Arabia

Monarchy

King and Prime Minister Abdallah bin Abd al-Aziz Al Saud

Venezuela

federal republic

President Nicolas Maduro Moros

Isreal

Democracy, Parliamentary system

Shimon Peres

Iran

Theocratic republic

Supreme Leader Ali Hoseini-Khamenei

Today in Human Geo we retook our 5 religions test. I was so happy got to retake it because on the first one I got a pretty awful grade. I am pretty confident that on this test I got an A. But saying that now I will probably fail it. Anytime I think I do well I end up doing not so good. I know I got a much better grade then last time though. It is a Monday class which is never fun, but I wasn't too tired today. Then I found out what I got and it was so much better than my last test. Then we took notes and watched a video which was pretty boring. It was kind of funny because the man in the video was trying to be funny, but it wasn't funny and people were not laughing. But we did learn that Country

an identifiable land area (look at a map!)

a nation which has the same borders as a State

Nation

a population (group of people) with a common culture

State (with a capital “S”)

a population under a single government

synonymous with “country”

Nation-State

a single culture under a single government