sick

i was absent again today but feeling much better i am coming in tomorrow

sick

i was also absent from school today

sick

today I was absent from class.

The test and paper!

Today in human geography we took a test.  The test was based on the lessons we have had on political geography. We learned about leaders and the countries that they rule, and some interesting facts about them and also their contributions to their country. The layout of the test was: on the front there was a matching of the leaders to their country, and on the back there were maps and pictures and some other facts that you had to match with the leaders.  Also today we handed in our papers that were written over the weekend. The papers had to be double spaced and at least 500 words or more, we had to write about the relationship between two countries with America. After we took the test, we just had some free time to do what we wanted for the rest of the class, we could study or just talk to our friends. 

War

Today in human geography we talked about recent events such as the war going on between Israel and Palestine.  Palestine started shooting rockets at Israel because they hate each other. Then we watched a video on how badly the civilians are affected by this war, many people have died from the bombs hitting their homes. The new leader of China is XI Jinping and Hu Jintao is out.  We also talked about the test that we have to take Monday; this test will be on the world leaders and some facts about them and what countries they run.  

Papers!

Today we talked about the paper we will be writing. The paper must be at least 500 words and you have to talk about two different countries and how they interact with America and if you want to you can add how they act with each other. The paper will be due this Monday and we are allowed to write the paper with a partner if we would prefer to. Another thing we talked about besides the paper was that Texas wants to secede from the union. This was the first that I had heard of it, we also talked about if the people of Texas voted on it they wouldn't break away from us because a lot of people want to come to America and be Americans, so who wouldn't want to be a part of that. Also they would have to spend a lot of money on other things that they already have now with us.

Absent

today i was absent from class because i was sick.

Nuclear war

Today we went over our pop quizzes that we took on Friday. We started going over the answers and we really got to talking about how Benjamin Netanyahu wanted to order a pre-emptive strike against Iran and how Mahmoud Ahmadinejad wants to also order a nuclear strike against Israel.  Also we said some things about Fidel Castro, who is a communist, has been in power for over 50 years and he has passed his power to his brother in law. Ever since he took power in Cuba we have not been able to trade with them, we cannot even buy cigars from them because it is illegal. There has also been a lot of drug dealing going on between Cuba and us because most of the people in our country have a bad habit of doing drugs and we can’t stop buying them from other countries. The last thing we talked about was how there are a lot of nuclear power plants near people’s home and they are always testing bombs in that vicinity.

Time for a pop quiz!!!

Today in human geography class we took a pop quiz! This quiz was based basically on everything that we have been talking about for pretty much the whole entire week which was the world leaders and some interesting facts about them. Before we talked about these leaders and what kind of a role they play, I had pretty much no prior knowledge of these leaders except maybe a few things about Barack Obama. These leaders have worked very hard to get to where they are today, and now I know how much it takes to achieve something great, but you have to go after it and work hard. I am inspired by these people, but especially the leaders that are women. Angela Merkel kept on fighting for what she believed in even though she was punished for her beliefs at first, and now she is the chancellor of Germany and one of the most powerful people in the world. Also Dilma Rousseff, she is the very first woman to be elected as president in Brazil, she is also the first economist to be elected president of Brazil. Now I don’t know if I would want to be the head of a country, but this lesson on the world leaders gets all of the students who learn it inspired to follow their dream of being who they want to be and to never give up on their dream.

The President of the United States

In today’s class we talked about some more of the leaders that we have been studying, we went back to get some other info on the people that we had already talked about yesterday. Hu Jintao became of the young communist youth league, and in 1982 he turned thirty nine and became the youngest member of the central committee, he was made vice president at the age of fifty six in 1998- he was the youngest person in modern history to have this job- after, he was made vice chairman of china's state central military commission, and he is also the head of the communist party in China, he will not become leader of China anymore because the people in this country do not vote, someone else decides for them. Next we moved onto David Cameron and that when he was a child he received an amazing education and eventually graduated from Oxford with a degree in philosophy, politics and economics, Queen Elizabeth doesn’t really do anything, and she is just a figurehead. One other thing we talked about briefly was how before Hamid Karzai became the leader of Afghanistan the Taliban was pretty much in control.  Now onto Obama and some things that have shaped him into a leader: Barack had a very good education; he graduated from the Colombia University and Harvard Law School. He was a civil rights attorney in Chicago and taught constitutional law. He served three terms for the 13^th district of Illinois from 1997 to 2004, he also won the senate election in 2004, and he resigned when he won the position of being our president in 2008 when he ran against Hilary Clinton and John McCain. After serving for four years he has just won the election again against Mitt Romney and will continue to be our president for another term. 

country leaders

In today’s class we talked about some of the different leaders of the countries we have just recently researched. First we started talking a little about the Taliban and what they are, the Taliban is a group of terrorists that kill people who the think are wrong. There was a girl named Malala who was protesting for women’s rights to get the same education as men in her country, the Taliban thought that this was wrong so they shot her in the head. She went to the hospital and has to receive reconstructive surgery on her head, this story instantly became famous.  We went on to talk about the leader of Iran; Mahmud and how he was against women’s rights and then we talked a little about coup d’état, this term means trying to overthrow the government and trying to take over. Probably the most interesting person we talked about today was Angela Merkel, the leader of Germany. Angela was arrested for coup d’état and she was tortured while a prisoner, they would hang her upside down and torture he with electrical shocks to her body, this method was called the bird perch. Even through all these terrible events she still fought for what she wanted, she did not back down and she became the first woman to become a chancellor of Germany. Another thing we talked about was how some leaders want to form a coalition government, which means they do not believe in women’s rights, we kind of skimmed through a couple more leaders, not really getting into much detail but we tossed around Mr. Schick’s Globe and pointed out the country that we talked about, and that was the ending of today’s class.   

Leaders

Mexico:
Leader: Enrique Pena Nieto

• has not yet taken his role as president but will be taking office in December
• he was governor of Mexico for six years before running for president 
• people cheat on ballots when voting for him, people's lives are threatened unless they vote for him

China
Leader: Hu Jintao

• became a local leader of the Young Communist Youth League, in 1982 he turned thirty nine and became the youngest member of the central committee
• he was made vice president at the age of fifty six in 1998- he was the youngest person in modern history to have this job- after, he was made vice chairman of china's state central military commission.
• head of the entire communist party of China
• they don't vote-hu jintao is not going to be president anymore 

India
Leader: President Pranab Mukherjee

• President of the unit of congress since 1985 but resigned in July, 2010
• 1969 was when he got a break to be in politics from prime minister Indira Gandhi - he helped Pranab get elected into the upper house in India's parliament.

Afghanistan
leader: Hamid Karzai

• Chosen for a two year term as Interim president during the 2002 grand assembly
• In 2004 he was elected president and he won a second five year term in 2009
• before he ran this country the Taliban ran it 

Iran:
Leader: Mahmud

• He was an engineer and a teacher from a very poor background, he joined the office for strengthening unity after the Islamic revolution.
• when he ran for president, his campaign received 62% of the election runoff votes and he became president- this was in 2005, his second term ends on august third 2013

Israel:
Leader:   prime minister Binyamin netanyahu

• He formed a coalition government 
• The first Israeli prime minister born in Israel after the founding of the state

Germany:
Leader: Angela Merkel

• She is the First woman to become a chancellor of Germany
• She is seen to play a very crucial role in managing the financial crisis (referred to as the decider) she also plays a major role in the problems that concern health care reform and future energy development 

United Kingdom:
Leader: David Cameron

• He earned his first honors degree at oxford- philosophy, politics and economics
• when he was little he got an amazing education
• At age 43 he became the youngest British prime minister  since earl of Liverpool 198 years later
• the queen speaks fluent french, she has a lot of awards, she has been in power for the longest time- she is just a figurehead 

France:

Leader: Francois Hollande

• On the 16th of October he won the socialist and Radical left party nomination with more than 56% of the votes
• On May sixth he defeated his opponent in the second runoff becoming the president of France

Brazil:

Leader: Dilma Rousseff 

• First woman to hold office, she was also the first woman to become chief of staff to the president of Brazil
• She was elected in a runoff on October 31, 2010- She is the first female elected president of Brazil, she is also the first economist to hold office

Venezuela:

Leader: President Hugo Chavez

• he has held the position of president since 1999
• He has focused on implementing socialist reforms in his country as a part of his project which is called Bolivarian Revolution 

 Saudi Arabia:

Leader: king and prime minister abdullah bin abdulaziz al saud

• he became king on August 1, 2005 on account of his half brother king Fahd's death
• he held important political positions during his life, one of them being that he was the mayor of Mecca as a young man, he is the sixth king of Saudi Arabia