Western Civilization

Today in Western Civilization we took our test today and I think that I did well on most of it but I think that I mixed up the democracies and that would mean that I probably got the last question about what Greece used as their democracy the only one that I knew was a democracy because it is directly influenced by the people. Another thing that confused me on the test was the question about the sea that was located in between the two places overall though I don't think that I failed. After the test was finished two people forgot to bubble in an answer or two and at the end that was very nice also Mr.Shick also told us how to write one hundred fifty words on test days and he went told us a very detailed way that included buying him things for Easter.

Today in Western Civilization we continued reviewing for our test that we are going to have tomorrow. We need to know a lot about the culture of Ancient Greece and the people in it the thing on the test that I will be the most interested in is philosophy this will also be one of the first grades in the third quarter so I will have to do well. We need to know about the main people in Ancient Greece and who heavily impacted the culture of ancient Greece and the geography of Ancient Greece, unlike the first test this probably will not be an open blog test. The main thing that I will be studying for the test will be the notes that we copied off the board that one of the other Western Civilization classes wrote.

Today in Western Civilization we started reviewing for the test by taking notes we learned that Phillip II dreamed of taking control of Greece and moving against Persia to seize its mass wealth. Macedonia was a place that was located just north of Greece, and it had a rough terrain and cold climate, Alexander the Great was only 20 when he became king which was very rare.  Darius III vowed to crush invaders and he raised a huge army between 50 thousand to 70 thousand. In 359 BC Phillip became the king of Macedonia. Another interesting fact to remember was that Phillip was also Alexanders father and Alexander died at the age of thirty-two however his legacy continued to live on because his army never lost a battle and his army continued to fight strong.

Today in Western Civilization we didn't really do many things because we were getting out early for the snow day but we watched Ryan present his project which he did about Homer and he did a good job, at the end he let all of us vote on if we thought Homer was real or not although I said no most of the class said yes and the reason I don't think Homer is real is because there is no way one person could experience so many adventures I think that a bunch of people came together and they wrote about all of their adventures and made it into one person Homer. We also started the new cell phone policy which is where you have a number and at the beginning of each class you have to put your phone in the back, after these two things we saw Mr.Shicks dogs and his horses in the snow.

1. Alexandria is the foremost center of commerce and the Hellenistic civilization. This is significant because when I was first reading I thought Alexandria was a place also this is a very important place during this time period. Euclid was a highly regarded mathematician who taught in Alexandria. This is significant because back then not many people were smart so for somebody to a math teacher you had to be very smart and present carefully. Archimedes was a scientist. Again just like Euclid, there weren't many smart people so in order to be a teacher or a most scient you have to know what you're doing. Colossus of Rhodes was a bronze statue that stood more than 100 feet high. This was very important because this statue was like a beacon and prized possession of the island of Rhodes. 2. The Hellenistic achievement that had the greatest impact was philosophy because it started to change the way that people were thinking and even now philosophy still exists...

Today in Western Civilization my group and Dylan got to present our project Dylan presented his project on democracy and we presented our project on triremes. After we had all presented we started to read out of the big textbook. The pages were talking about what Hellenistic culture was and what this is was the popular spoken language used in Hellenistic cities. It also talked about the trade and culture diversity during this time period. There is a page on Alexandria which is not a person but it is a city in Egypt, these pages also discussed the science and technology which had a lot to with astronomy and that lead to some of the people being very good at mathematics and physics. These pages also talked a lot about philosophy and art they painted so many things and they sculpted a lot of things as well.

Today in Western Civilization we almost finished presenting our projects today we saw a group that had a pot and we also saw a group the made a whole map of Ancient Greece and they included mini triremes which my group did but our project is all about triremes. Because my group is one of the last groups presenting we have an advantage because we could see what all of the other groups did right and what some of the groups did wrong so we can hopefully get a very good grade. We also got to see the project rubric so we are able to see how the projects are going to be graded and we can see what we need to have in order to have a good grade.

Today in Western Civilization we watched the first few groups present their projects, unfortunately, my group didn't have enough time to present today so we will be presenting tomorrow. Out of the projects that we watched the best was the food project not only for the fact that the group brought in food but the way that they tried to keep us engaged was something that the other groups lacked. Also it looked like they put the most time and effort into their project because the Lego empire although it looked fine it looked like that didn't take the group more than ten minutes and the group did their project on the weapons was good but when they were presenting they were just reading large paragraphs to us and it didn't feel like they were trying to keep the audience engaged.

Today in Western Civilization we continued working on our Greece projects. My group also started to figure out what materials we will use to build our trireme. My group is going to cut out a piece of cardboard into the shape of a trireme then we are going to glue the popsicle sticks to the cardboard cut out of the trireme. We have also been thinking about trying to somehow bring in a bucket of water to see if the trireme would float but right now we don't really have a way of doing that. We also finished the powerpoint and our essay on the Greek trireme the powerpoint was a lot easier than writing the paper but that's usually how it works. My group is also going to out picture of us building the trireme onto the essay or the powerpoint which could possibly help the people realize how an actual Greek trireme was built.

Today in Western Civilization we started taking notes out of the textbook and they focused on Alexander the Great. There was a place called Macedonia and it was located just north of Greece and it had a rough terrain with a very cold climate. In 359 BC Philip became the king of Macedonia, Demosthenes the Athenian orator tried to warn the Greeks of that threat Phillip and his army posed. Alexander The Great was a 20 year old man who became king which is why his name was Alexander the Great because its very rare somebody will become king at the age of twenty. With Greece secure Alexander wanted to carry out his father's plan and conquer Persia and it worked After the defeat Darius the king of Persia tried to negotiate peace Alexander accepted and then a long time after he died and his army still battles and his legacy lives on.

Today in Western Civilization we finished the video that we have been watching on philosophy and the main thing that I took from the video is that philosophy is actually a very interesting topic because you re thinking about the answers to the questions that you have already answered which is something that most people don't normally do. After we finished the video we started to work on our ancient Greece project and my group is going to build a trireme out of popsicle sticks and we think that the main challenge we will face when doing our project is when we are trying to make it look like an oval and we will have to bend the popsicle sticks on the side without breaking them. We also talked about trying to bring in a little bit of water and trying to see if the trireme would float and we could try and make waves in the tub of water and see if it would keep floating.