Snow day

I'm not sure whether or not we needed to do a blog this evening because we did not have class because school was closed, but it is better safe than sorry.  For me today was mostly studying for exams.  I completed extra practice work that was distributed, I read notes and old powerpoints and used all of the material that I had to study.  Today I went over all of the subjects that I needed to study like I would have done if I were at school today for the review day.  From here on out I will study for the exams that I have the next day.  I feel well prepared for my exams after having a day to my self, studying at my own pace, and studying the topics that I thought I needed to work on the most.  I hope we have no more bad weather this week that will disturb the exam schedule.

Writing the essay

Today in human geo we wrote our essay for the exam.  I used the notecard with the ideas from my practice essay to help me remember all of the main information on the essay that I wanted to write.  I feel like I did fairly well on my essay, although  I wrote fairly long paragraphs.  I will continue to study for the exam to prepare my self for the main part of the exam.  I feel like I was well prepared for this exam after I wrote a practice essay and prepared a notecard where I did not even really need to look at the notecard.  I have done well in the class thus far, and I will use the old tests that I have taken in this class to help prepare for the mid term.

Continuing to prepare for the essay

Today in honors human geo we continued to prepare for the essay by receiving a notecard.  this notecard is to be used to put notes on that will help us to write a better essay that helps us get a better grade.  I wrote a rough essay that helped me to get the Ideas that I wanted to put in my essay down on paper. I will then condense this information into the main points that I plan to put into my essay.  I'll use these main Ideas to help make sure that I do not forget any main points that I need to put in my essay. Overall I feel like I should do fairly well on this essay because I will have a notecard, and I have written a practice essay.  I will also continue to study for the rest of the exam as well. I feel confident about this exam.

Essay

Around the world, there are many countries that are at vastly different points in their developmental stages.  These different stages are affected by these countries’ health care and economic positions. Some countries on both ends of the spectrum can face problems due to their population position.  Problems are not only faced by countries that are at the beginning of the model, where their economies are weak, and death rates are high, but there are problems with the population where there is good healthcare and the economy is powerful.  Two examples of this would be countries A and B. Both of these countries are on opposite sides of the population pyramid, and they both face problems, and there are possible solutions to the problems that they may face.  

Country A’s population pyramid shows a large pre-reproductive population with a smaller aging population.  This population pyramid shows that this country may be in stage two. This is because of the fact that they have very high birth rates in their nation, but the deaths are starting to decrease because there is a slightly larger elderly population.  There are several problems that can be faced by this country with the state that it is in. One of these could be overpopulation. Overpopulation could be a problem for this nation depending on the amount of land and resources that it has available to it.  Overpopulation will continue to happen in this country as more people live longer, and move into their reproductive years to begin to have children of their own.

Country B’s population pyramid shows it to begin to be in stage 4 or be at the beginning of stage 5.  This is shown through the fact that there are nearly as many young people as old people. In this stage of the model, the quality of living has gone way up, as has education and health care.  This allows people to become higher educated, and become more interested and committed to leading a career than building a family. This can also cause problems for a country based on its population.  This can cause an underpopulation of young people. It is necessary for a country to have a fair amount of young people because a nation that contains only elderly people, or people of a retiring age cannot do the grunt work of building roads.  Also, the country may not have enough young people to take care of the elderly. There is an equal amount of problems with having a population that increases too rapidly as well as one that begins to decrease.

There are solutions to these problems, although they are not instant fixes they could eventually help to fix these country’s population issues.  A fix to begin to slow down the population growth of country A would perhaps be to institute a law that only allows each family to have one or maybe two children.  Another solution that could help Nation A would be a strong urbanization movement or getting people to move into more urban areas. This could help the country to decrease its population growth because more people would have smaller living areas and it would not be necessary to have large families to work the farm, also more women could get in the workforce when they live closer to the urbanized area closer to education sources.  These solutions to attempt to slow down the population growth of nation A.

Similar to Nation A there are several fixes to the country that could help to raise the population growth over time.  These include offering incentives to families to have more children. These could include large tax breaks or other government help until the population got back to where it needs to be.  This solution would only help to grow the population with its RNI. the population could also be grown through immigration. The country could go to other nations and attempt to influence them to send young able-bodied people and their families to help do more of the grunt work that the country’s own aging population cannot do.  

These two countries are distinctly different although they both face problems regarding there population.  Country A has exponential growth and country B can be facing a declining population. Although there are not instant fixes there are some fixes that could help to get these nations under control.  For country A a law could be instituted, and an urbanization movement could be started. For country B, with a declining population, An immigration movement or government incentives to people could help to move the population up. These countries can be helped to get there populations back on track. 

Quiz on the demographic Transition

Today in class we took a quiz on the demographic transition.  I fell like I did fairly well on it, but I think I got the question on the equation incorrect.  I think that a wrote the incorrect equation.  then on the part of the quiz that asked what moved many countries to stage 2 in the late 19th century, I put the medical revolution because I thought that I had heard that somewhere, but I am not sure that that I correct.  Other than those two questions I feel like I did fairly well on this quiz.  I think that I got most of the rest of the questions on the rest of the quiz correct.

Demographic transition

Today in class we continued to discuss the demographic transition and demographic transition model.  We did this by first drawing the model in our notebooks then we rewatched the Kahn academy video.  This video covered how the demographic transitions change from stage  1 to stage 5.  In stage 1 the country has a high birthrate and deathrate this stage occurs before there are any advances in technology that can raise the life expectancy, and better the quality of life. Then stage 2 occurs often when a country has an industrial revolution this causes the death rate to go down, but the birthrate stays the same which causes the population to grow exponentially.  then in stage three as the country continues to develop it reaches stage 3 which is when the birth rate decreases which leads to a smaller increase in the population.  Then when the country continues to develop more women can enter the workforce then fewer children are born which allows the deaths to begin to outnumber the births which cause the population to decrease.  Then there is a possible stage 5 where the country's population continues to decrease.  After this, we do not know what will happen next.

Demographic Transition Video Assignment

Kahn Academy Video
1. demographic transition shows the changing of a country's population growth rate as the country develops.
2. To get the population growth rate you take the new number minus the initial number, then divide it by the initial number then multiply that by 100 to get a percentage.
3.things that can cause a population to grow include the government offering incentives to people for having children, their faith-promoting large families to increase the number of followers it has and passing down the morals and ideas to your children which have a certain prestige that goes along with it.
Video From Dr. Kim Smith Ph.D.
1. We experience the same population growth that was experienced per year in the 1600s every 6 hours because our fertility rates are so high especially in developing nations.
2. In the times of stage 1 women and children were seen as property, and defined the wealth of men based on how many children they had.  The more children that they had, the higher the status of the family, and the more help that they had.
 3. In stage 2 the population starts to increase sharply because the mortality rates go down because of bettering in technology that helps the economy although the birth rates stay high.  this is called a cultural lag because even though the mortality decreases people still have large amounts of children.  this is because the technology changed faster than the culture's ability to adapt
Why populations grow
1. One way that we can measure population growth is by measuring the doubling time, or how long it will take a country to double its population.  this can be calculated by dividing 70 by the growth rate.
2. In the third stage of the demographic change model, the death rates continue to decrease as do the birth rates which allows the population to increase but at a slower rate. This can be caused by increased living standards, better health care, and a movement towards urban life making it unnecessary to have large families.
3. In the 4th stage of the model booth birth and death rates are low which causes the population to equal out.  this is seen in most of the economically advanced nations around the world.  this is because these countries have better health care, more education, and more women in the workforce.

I think that the video by Dr. Kim Smith Ph.D. was the most helpful to me. This is because she was easier to understand than the other videos, and she offered supplementary information that helped to make the data easier to apply and understand.

The Demographic transitions hand out

Today we read a hand out on the demographic transition.  reading this hand out mad a lot of sense with what we talked about with the population pyramids and NRI, CDR, CBR and other ways to describe the population of a place.  this change in the demographics of a place is split into 4 categories.  Category 1 is when there has not been much growth in a nation.  Both the Birth Rate and death rates are very high which leads to a very small increase in population.  then in stage two, the country undergoes a change economically or medically which causes the death rate to go down, but the birthrate remains the same causing the population to grow fairly quickly.  then in stage three the country continues to grow which causes people to move into cities where it is less necessary to have large families.  This decreases the birth rate which allows the population to increase slowly.  In stage 4 the majority of people are in the workforce, and may not have time for having children wich causes the birthrate to decrease.  As the population in stage 4 begins to age the population can stop increasing, or decrease such as in the case of Japan.

going over the 5 major religions test

Today we went over our test on the 5 major religions of the world.  I got a 100% on this test.  this is better than I thought I did on this test.  I knew that I did well, but I still thought that I had made a careless mistake that I overlooked, but I did as well as I could.  I studied for this test by going over the powerpoint that Mr. Schick posted on his blog.  I did this for the two nights before the test, and still got a100% because writing down the information about theses religions in class was a major help.  There were only two questions that I was unsure of in this test, but I used the reasoning of the knowledge that I had to answer them, and even though they were not on the powerpoint we still talked about them.  I believe that this test brought my grade up a bit.

Quiz on the 5 major religions

Today we had a 25 question quiz on the 5 major religions of the world.  this quiz was structured in a way that each country was given a letter as an answer on the test.  these 25 questions used the information about each of these religions that we went over in class, there was nothing on this test that was surprising.  I feel like I prepared well for this test by studying the powerpoint several times.  Overall I feel like I did well.  there was only really one question that I was unsure about and it said, What religion is 87% of Indonesia.  The correct answer to this question was Islam.  I checked this on the CIA world factbook.  I knew this because there is a large amount of Muslims in Indonesia.  the only other question that I was a bit unsure about was, what religion was founded in the 7th century.  This was also Islam, and I knew it because this was the newest religion.

continuing with the 5 Major regions of the world

     Today in honors human geo we continued to go over the 5 major religions of the world.  Today we covered Buddhism and Judaism.  Buddhism they are the 4th largest religion in the world with 500 million to 1.5 billion followers. This is a major approximation because in many areas of the world where there are Buddhists they are not closely counted.  the majority of these people that call themselves Buddhists live in Southeast Asia, China, Nepal, and Japan.  Their founder is Siddhartha Gautama.  there are several denominations of Buddhists.  These include Tibetan, Zen, Theravada, and Amadist. these people believe in 4 Nobel truths.  These truths are there is suffering, attachment to desire causes suffering, there is a cessation to suffering, and the eightfold path can lead to the cessation of suffering.  This eightfold path says in order to live an enlightened life one must have right views, right intention, right speech, right action, right livelihood, right effort, right mindfulness, and right dedication.
     We also went over Judaism today in class.  There are about 14-18 million Jews around the world.  6.4 million of them live in Jerusalem, and 5.3-7 million of them live in the US.  They were founded by Abraham.  their holy book is called the Torah and includes the first 5 books of the old testament.  They believe in ethical monotheism and the 10 commandments.
 

Beginning the major religions of the world

Today In human geo, we began to go over the 5 major religions of the world.  The first of these religions that we discussed, which happens to be the most predominant religion in the world is Christianity.  This religion was easier to comprehend because I am a practicing catholic, which made this section easier to understand.  One thing that I did find interesting was how vastly the catholic church has changed in the last 50 years, and how there are still churches that did not follow that change. Also, there are more than 2.2 billion people that are Christians the next religion that we discussed was Islam.  I learned a small amount about this religion in the 6th grade, but I still learned a lot.  This religion is more like Christianity than not.  this is because it is an Abrahamic religion.  Their holy book is called the Qur'an.  there are more than 1.5 billion Muslims that fall into the denominations of Sunni (75-90%) and Shiite (10-20%). Most of these people live in Indonesia, the middle east, and North Africa.  They were founded by Muhamad, and they are monotheistic and follow five pillars to ensure that they are living a life in tough with God or Allah.  these 5 pillars are Testimony, prayer, almsgiving, fasting, and pilgrimage.  The third most prevalent religion in the world is Hinduism.  This religion isn't even always classified as a religion and more as a way of life.  They are mostly found in India and Nepal with around 1.1 billion followers.  Their holy book is not truly a book, but rather eternal truth revealed by ancient sages, this is called the Vedas.  there is no distinct founder, but rather many intellectual philosophers. they believe in many ideas such as reincarnation.

getting our tests back

Today in human Geo we got our test back from last week.  I got a 95% on this test.  I got two questions wrong on this test.  one of these questions was matching a population pyramid to its country.  the correct answer to this question was Japan, but I chose Mexico because I forgot that Mexico's population was growing.  the other question that I got wrong was a question about which country had the highest birth and death rates.  the correct answer was Nigeria, but I chose India.  Overall I scored above average on this test and I will use this test to study for the midterm exam which is only 29 days away. I think that I will do well on the tests to come, and the midterm because I will continue to study, and take notes in class.  I am looking forward to what we do next in human geo.

The test

Today in honors human geo we took a test.  I feel like I did fairly well on this test because we had already been tested on most of the material.  The main thing that was different from the last test was that we were tested on a population pyramid.  examples of the types of questions that we had to answer were to pick what country each pyramid went with.  there were also several questions in which we had to use prior knowledge from our last test to answer questions on which of the countries that were given to us had he highest TFR, NRI, birth rate, or death rate.  I know that I got one of these questions incorrect.  This question asked which country had the highest birth and death rate and I selected India because it is soon to be the world's highest population, but the correct answer was Nigeria because Nigeria has a higher birth and death rate than India. Overall I feel like I did fairly well on this test

The fiunal presentation

Today we listened to the final presentation in the groups.  this final presentation was on an extremely crippled nation, Somalia.  this country suffers from large amounts of piracy, and other things that seriously hurt their economy.  It was very interesting to me to hear about the ships that are getting hijacked and boarded by people on small motorized rafts that can take entire ships and hold them for ransom at incredibly high rates.  It seems that all that would need to be done is have soldiers posted around a ship with long-distance rifles to sink the pirate boat.  Their other nation was Japan.  The problem that they identified with this nation was that there are not enough young people to do strenuous labor like construction.  Their method for fixing this problem was to give tax breaks, and spread pro children propaganda.  this was essentially the opposite of what China did to stop people from having too many children which shows that it might work.

The Presentation

Today in class we presented our presentations on a post-industrial and a developing nation.  Overall I feel like our group did very well in this presentation. We all were able to speak and make eye contact with our class.  We also were familiar with our information.  I feel like I could have done better with my presenting skills.  Eye contact was not a problem for me, and I remember to look around the room, but my main problem is that I say "um" too many times.  I attempt to make myself remember to not say this. 
     For our presentation, I opened and closed the presentation, and I went over the solutions to the problems that Afghanistan faces.  Then after we presented the information about Afghanistan we moved onto the information and problems in the US.  This led to a lively discussion because all of this information was so close to home and relatable.

Preparing further for the presntation

      At the beginning of the class, we decided that we would get an extra day to prepare for this presentation.  We used this time to establish who had each slide in our presentation on the US and Afghanistan.  I am opening the slide show, and I am giving the solutions to the problems that Afghanistan faces.  with the information that I am giving to the class, there are also statistics regarding the two nations, the problems that each nation faces, and the solutions for the US. 
     For Afghanistan, we identified many problems.  These problems include a lack of basic necessities, a lack of education, and the fact that they cause many pother countries in the world to become their enemies.  for solutions, we came up with the fact that classroom supplies could be sent to Afghanistan to assist in the teaching of both male and female students.  This can only be done once the relations have been healed between Afghanistan and other nations.  The relations can be repaired by offering oil at a reduced rate to other nations.

Human geo presentation

Today we finished our presentations that are going to be shared on Tuesday of next week. For this project, we have the US and Afghanistan.  For each of these nations, we had to identify the problems with them and come up with a way to help these problems.  For Afghanistan, we discovered that they are extremely lacking in education, and they are good at making enemies.  for this problem, they would first need to heal relations between them and other nations.  They could do this by offering oil to other nations at a reduced price.  Then after this to combat their lack of education the US could send the necessary materials to make a proper learning environment.  We could only offer to do this if they offered these learning services to males and females so that they will not be missing out on half of the brainpower in their nation.  then for the US the major problems that we identified were the abuse of drugs in massive quantities and domestic violence.  To combat these ideas instead of focusing solely on the Mexican border we would place drug patrols on the major seaports, and airports.  We would also open up low-cost mental health clinics to attempt to help people that are going to use drugs or commit violence for psychological reasons. 

Oral presentation

Today in honors human geo we began working on our oral presentations.  wee began the class by picking groups in an unconventional way.  Captains were picked and then we wrote the names of the people that we wanted to work with on a sheet of paper until the entire class was chosen.  Then once we were placed into our groups we each chose a post-industrial nation, and a developing nation.  For our developing nation we chose Afganistan which is an extremely problematic nation.  for our post-industrialized nation, we chose the USA.  For this project, we have to find the problems with this developing nation and attempt to come up with solutions to assist them in their problem.  we are figuring out these problems through the CIA World Factbook.  Then we are using the statistics that we find about each nation that will help us to compare them to our post-industrial nation.

going over questions on the exam

Today in human geo we went over questions that are going to be on our semester exam.  This was a helpful review of the information that we went over in class on this unit.  These questions included vocabulary where we were given the definition.  Then there were other questions that asked about the general population, imports, and exports of certain nations.  We also went over how the essay questions on the test are going to work. For the essay, we will be given 5 possible questions to answer for the exam, then we will answer two questions on an essay before the test.  Writing an essay before the test is a good way to study for the test because you are reviewing the information that will be on the rest of the test, including the multiple-choice.

population facts 11/4/19

1.  The TFR of Afghanistan is 5.02 children born per mother.  This is very high, meaning that the population is to be growing at a relatively high rate.

2. The TFR of India is only 2.4 which is bearly over the replacement rate of the population.

3. The government of Syria calls itself a republic but is an authoritarian regime in comparison.

4. In 2017 the inflation rate of Venezuela exceded 2000% which means it is nearly impossible for the people of Venezuela that are in the working class to buy many essentials.

5.  The exact population growth of Japan is -.24% meaning the population is decreasing steadily which will cause Japan to lose people to do many of the hard, or menial tasks in their nation because of the lack of young people.

Because of the shape of Italy's population pyramid, the population is scheduled to slowly increase.

The population pyramid of Iran shows that the population of Iran will grow slowly because of the number of people in their reproductive years.

The population pyramid of Zimbabwe shows that the small population should grow at a moderate rate because of the large number of people in their reproductive years, and a large amount of people moving to their reproductive years.

Belarus's population  pyramid shows that the population will grow slowly because the majority of the population is in the middle of their lives

The population of Monaco will grow slowly if at all because the majority of people are in their post-reproductive years


Italy pop. growth rate - 0.16%
Iran pop. growth rate - 1.19% 
zimbabwe pop growth rate - 1.68%
Belarus pop. growth rate - -0.24% 
Monaco pop. growth rate - 0.3% 

200 years in 4 min

Today in honors human geo we started the class by discussing how to help the African nations that still occupy the sick and poor part of the graph.  one way that we discussed on how to help these nations was by sending in American oil companies to assist these nations in their economy.  the American oil companies would go in and show these countries how to use the technology that they possess to drill for and collect oil.  then once they left these countries economies would prosper, and the US oil companies could gain money from this deal.  There were many pros to this including, we could earn a new trade partner, these countries would prosper economically, and with their health system.  then there were also several cons, for example, these countries do not have the best democracies, and their governments are quite corrupt, because of this, the governments might just keep the money for themselves, and the Oil companies could only sign with countries that have stable democracies.  then after this, we took a quiz on the 200 years in 4 min.  This quiz was quite easy, and I believe that I got full marks on it.  These questions focused on main points in the video such as what brought the countries up or down on the graph, and where the US, China, and Ghana

Hans Rosling 200 years in four minuits

Today in honors human geo we watched a video by Hans Rosling that showed the difference between the nations of the world in both their life expectancy, and their GDP per capita over the last 200 hundred years.  This video was about 10 years old so it started in 1810.  At this time all of the countries were in the poor and sick corner of the graph  with a life expectancy of at max 40.  at this point all of the countries were near the same with some deviation, and England with the Netherlands only slightly ahead economically and with life expectancy.  Then after that the Industrial revolution began to spread to the rest of the western world.  this caused a large amount of European nations and America.  This rate of growth continued until the early 20th century then at this point the Spanish flu and WWI hit.  both of these things claimed massive amounts of casualties.  then the countries started to rebuild, and even through the great depression the countries continued to grow.  then once WWII began many countries like Japan and Russia suffered miserably.  Then by 1948 the greatest deviation between the richest country, and the poorest country showed.  As time went on many of the Asian countries that hold large amounts of power began to grow in economic strength.  today the countries are getting closer together, and with new things such as green energy it is suspected that other nations can start to move to the rich and healthy corner of the graph.

Population pyramids

Today in honors human geo we started our discussion of population pyramids.  Population pyramids are graphs that are turned on their side, and they show the amount men and women in each 5 year increment that live in a population.  These population pyramids are split into 3 parts. Pre-reproductive years(0-14),reproductive years(15-45),and post-reproductive years (45-100+).  We watched a TED Ed video that explained these graphs.  We looked at three main examples.  One of these examples was a developing pre-industrial African nation.  This graph was pyramid shaped, with the most amount of pre-reproductive years, and the least in the post reproductive years.  This shape of pop. Pyramid shows that the population of a country is supposed to grow because there are many people in their reproductive years,and about to reach their reproductive years.  Another type of graph was one where it is almost flat down the sides, but narrower on the bottom.  This configuration of graph shows that the population is supposed to grow slowly.  This is because there are less people moving towards,or in their child baring years.  The final configuration of pop..pyramid that we looked at was a graph in which the bottom is narrower than the top. This means that the population is aging, less people are born, and the population should be decreasing.

Going over the test.

Today we got our tests back from Mr. Schick.  Overall I feel like I did fairly well on this test minus a few mistakes that I could have avoided.  One of these mistakes as the question, what country has the the 20th highest net migration rate, and I wrote Switzerland, but the correct answer was Canada.  Another that I got incorrect was when I was supposed to put down NRI, but I put down Total fertility rate in the Fill in the blank section.  then Another mistake I made was the fact that I did not think that we could use the words in multiple blanks instead of just one.  I was supposed to use GDP twice.  then I got the two extra credit points to add to my total score, making my total score, a 95%.  I believe that This score brought my grade up some, and now I have a fairly good grade to finish the quarter.

Population and settlement test

Today in Human geo we had our population and settlement test.  The first 20 minutes of the test were spent looking up the answers to the first 15 questions using the CIA world factbook. I feel confident that I did well on this section of the test. then the second section of the test was fill in the blank.  I think that I did well on this section as well.  I knew the answers to all of the questions except one.  this question was __________  is the economic output of a nation, accounting for all of its people(or something similar to that).  For the question, I put what I thought was the most logical answer, Unemployment rate, but this still does not feel correct.  Then the section of do the math this covered migration rate,  and growth rate.  I feel like I did well on this section as well.  then there was the section in which we had to list pull and push forces and describe countries that were examples of these.  Then finally there were two bonus questions that I hope I got correct to account for any other mistakes.

reviewing for the test

Today in class we spent time going over the powerpoint to help us review.  I find days like this very useful.   We went over the types of questions that are going to be on the test.  there are going to be 15 questions on the test that we use the CIA world factbook to answer.  The classwork/homework that we did the night before last was very useful.  This homework helped to familiarize us with the website, and that will help us to answer the questions within the allotted 20 minutes.  Then the next section of the is short answer.  This section of the test will have questions like when was the first billion people on earth reached, what is the fertility rate that will ensure a stable population, what is the earth's population, what is the crude death rate, what is crude birth rate, what is the difference between immigration and emigration, or how do you find that natural rate of increase.  then the final section of the test will be push forces vs. pull forces, examples of them, and the relationships of countries that these forces might apply to.

Reviewing the Answers from last nights homework

Today in human geo we spent all of the class going over the questions from last nights homework.  I thought that the source that we used to answer our question for homework last night was a very interesting source.  this source rally showed how similar or different the whole rest of the world is to the United States.  An example of this is Mexico.  We, The United States, want to build a wall with a nation that the greater part of attends catholic mass just like the United States.  A major difference that we saw with the world was the population of China and India.  You could remove 1 BILLION people from China's population, and they would still have a larger population than the US.  We also spent a large part of the class talking about the GDP and the factors that influence and change the different parts of it.  For example, in Luxembourg, their GDP per capita is far larger than ours simply because they have fewer people than we do.  On the other hand, a country like Nigeria has 10% of the GDP per capita of the US.  Also for the test on Friday, we will have a portion of the test that is 20 minutes long in which we will have to use  The World Factbook to answer that part of the test.

CIA fact book

1. The population of China is 1,384,688,986, and the population of India is 1,296,834,042.
2. The total fertility rate in Japan is 1.42 children per woman.
3. The death rate in El Salvador is 5.8 deaths per 1000 people.
4. 23%-28% of French people identify their religion as none.
5. 82.7% of Mexicans are Roman Catholic.
6. The GDP per capita in the USis $59,800.
7. The GDP per capita of Nigeria is $5,900.
8. The GDP per capita in Luxembourg is $105,100.
9. 76.2% of US people are internet users.
10. In the United States, there are 13,513 airports, and in Russia, there are 1,218.
11. 1.201 billion people in the world do not have electricity.
12. The infant mortality rate in Canada is 4.5 deaths per live births, in Cuba, it is 4.4 live births per deaths, and in the United States, it is 5.7 deaths per thousand born.
13. In Afganistan, 52% of men can read and 24.2% of women can read.
14. Monaco, Japan, and Singapore have the highest life expectancy 
15. Afganistan has the lowest life expectancy followed by Zambia and Lesotho
16. Monaco has the sixteenth highest net migration rate.
17. in Vietnam 2.2% of people are unemployed, it is 3.7% in South Korea, and in the United States, it is 4.4%.
18. In the US 3.16% is spent, China spends 1.8% of its GDP on defense, and Germany spends 1.24%
19. The US produces 10,962,000 BBL for the top spot, in second Russia produces 10,759,000 BBL, and in third Saudia Arabia 10,425,000 BBL/
20. 12.3% of the world speaks Chinese, 6% speak Spanish, and 5.1% speak English.  

Birth rate measurements

Today we went over how to measure the growth (or decline) of the population in certain parts of the globe.  the way that you measure birth rate is with Crude Birth Rate,  this helps to make the amount of growth that occurs more comparable to other places.  the crude birth rate is measured by the number of births per 1000 of the population.  then to measure the growth of a population the death count must be taken into account.  This is measured in Crude Death Rate, like the crude birth rate it is measured in deaths per thousand of the population to make the change in population more comparable.  both of these things are combined to find the Rate of Natural Increase.  this is found by subtracting the deaths from the births.  A population can also grow through Migration, or the people moving into or out of a place.  The Net Migration Rate is measured through the difference in people coming into or leaving the nation in the course of one year.  There are many different reasons that a person would leave their home to go to a new home.  some factors that would push a person from their home would be a civil war, environmental degradation, Unemployment or underemployment, and religious prosecution.  there are also factors that would draw a person to a place such as the United States.  These factors include religious freedom, better health care, a stronger economy, and political freedom.

life expectancy

Today In honors human geo we went over life expectancy.  we talked about how Monaco has the highest life expectancy ant an average total of 89.52 including men and women.  The average life expectancy for men in Monaco 85.63 and the average for women is 93.58.  this high life expectancy is due to the high quality of life in Monaco, one of the richest places on earth.  then we talked about how the US has a slightly lower life expectancy at an average of  79.68.  The life expectancy for men in the US is 77.32, and the life expectancy for women in the US is 81.97.  Then we also talked about how the country of Chad has the lowest life expectancy at 49.81 average.  48.64 for men, and 51.03 for women.  Like the highest life expectancy is in one of the wealthiest places on earth, the lowest one is in one of the poorest places on earth.  then we also talked about why men have a lower life expectancy than women. this is because Women more regularly visit th doctor, and men often work more dangerous jobs.  This blog is for 10/15/19.

Revcieving the test

Today in class we got our tests back after they were graded.   I did not do well on this test.  I did fine on most of the questions about latitude and longitude and maps, but I tripped up on the absolute and relative location part of the test.  I should have spent more time on each question and thought it through further.  We went through most of the test in class today and got the correct answers to the test so I know what I did wrong on my test and I will keep these points in mind when I take my midterm and finals fir Honors human Geo.  The classes were very short today so we did not have time for anything else.  Even though I did not do well on this test I feel that I learned something more about absolute and relative location, and Mr. Schick is giving us all 2 extra points to help us to improve our grades.

Population

Today In honors Huamn Geo. we began our discussion on population.  With this, we looked at a large number of statistics.  We talked about how the population of the world was documented and how every second there are 2.5 people born in the world.   That is a massive number.  We also looked at the world population clock that showed us how net gain works.  There are places in the world where the population is steadily going down and places where population steadily goes up.  the majority of population growth occurs in developing nations or places were the sensus and other infrastructure that helps to keep track of people are not nearly as honed in as the United States.  Then we looked at when the populations of the world grew by a billion people.  Statistics show the first time that the world population reached one million people was around 1804.  This means that it took over 10,000 years to reach one billion. Then from there, it took progressively less time to reach the next billion as healthcare and the amount of people grew.

The Second Test.

Today we had our second unit test of the year.  I felt well prepared for this test because I studied from the powerpoint and Mr. Schick's blog.  Due to the fact that I studied there were no surprises, although I do not feel like I did as well on this test as I did on the last test.  This is because of the absolute and relative location questions.  I was not sure what some of the locations that we were given qualified as. overall all of the other questions about maps and latitude and longitude seemed fairly easy.  I was surprised not to see site and situation questions on the test though.  The test overall seemed fairly easy, although I tend not to do as well on scantron test papers.  I believe that I am filling in one test question, and I fill in the wrong one.  I took my time on this test and feel like I did well.

Test Review.

Today we reviewed for the test even further.  we reviewed for the test by going over the powerpoint again.  This was a useful way to review for the test because Mr. Schick showed us many things that were definitely questions on the test, such as what a map maker is called or what the most important tools of geographers is called. We also spent some time going over what the main lines of latitude are called and where they are located.  We also took some time to go over whether or not daylight savings time was necessary and the fact that it could be abolished by the time that I am an adult. We also talked about whether or not it is more or less useful to have timezones. When we took the practice pop quiz on Thursday I was one of the only members of our class to score 100% on this quiz.  I then further studied using the powerpoint and Mr. Schick's blog.  Overall I feel well prepared for this test and will continue to review tonight.

pop quiz

Today in class we looked at Joy's questions which did not have the answers filled in.  These questions made a great way to study.  then we looked at David's map which happened to be in french.  Although this map was in french it was a helpful tool because french is a Romance language eaning that it has a similar root other languages.  The word in french for the map is carte which has the same root as a cartographer.  After we looked at these practice questions we took a practice quiz.  I got all of the questions on the practice pop quiz correct.  All of these questions were about maps, timezones, and site and situation.  To continue to study I will go over the PPT and MR. Schick's blog. I feel well prepared for the test on Monday. 

test questions

Geography is _______________

1. The study of maps
2. The Study of the location of things on the earth’s surface, and the reason for them being there
3. The study of why people move around the globe
4. The study of the concentration of populations in certain places

The art and science of map-making is called __________

1. Map-sketching
2. Geography
3. Social mapping
4. Cartography

The location that is expressed through degrees, minutes and seconds of latitude and longitude is called _________________

1. Absolute location 
2. Relative location 
3. Geographical location 
4. Coordinates

Relative location is found through 

1. A map
2. Degrees of longitude and latitude
3. A place’s location in reference to a more familiar place’s location
4. A compass

____________ is measured in imaginary lines that run east to west and measure the distance of a place north or south from the equator 

1. Longitude 
2. Latitude 
3. Degrees 
4. Borders

What line is at 0 degrees north or south?

1. Prime meridian 
2. Arctic circle
3. The tropic of Capricorn
4. The tropic of cancer 
5. The Equator

___________ is the imaginary lines that run north and south, converge at the poles, and measure a places distance east or west from the prime meridian.

1. Latitude 
2. Longitude 
3. Meridians 
4. B and C 

The Prime Meridian runs through which English town?

1. London 
2. Liverpool 
3. Greenwich 
4. None of the above

A ________ is a section of the globe that observes a standard time in order to make it more convenience of legal, commercial, or social reasons  

1. Time zone 
2. Time section 
3. UTC
4. GMT

Each timezone is about _____ degrees.

1. 30 
2. 24
3. 15
4. 60

_____ and _____ are synonyms for the main time that all of the world clocks work off of.

Correct answer: UTC (Coordinated Universal Time)&GMT(Greenwich Mean Time)

Some temperate zone countries use _____________ by adjusting their local clocks by one hour

1. Light saving time 
2. Sunlight time 
3. Noontime 
4. Daylight savings time 

Bonus: Bel Air is found at ______ degrees north.

Answer: 39

LInes of longitude

Today in class we started talking about the lines of longitude.  these lines are called meridians, and they run north to south and are used to measure the degrees east or west of the prime meridian. the prime meridian is 0 degrees east or west.  all of these lines converge at the north and south poles.  then because lines of longitude and time zones are closely related we moved onto to talking about timezones.  Each timezone is about 15 degrees of longitude in size,  but it often caters to the borders of nations or states for convenience of legal, commercial, or social purposes.  these timezones are counted from the prime meridian which runs through Greenwich England.  The time in Greenwich is the standard time of the world and the western hemisphere is negative compared to Greenwich, and the eastern hemisphere counts forwards.  The time in Greenwich is also known as UTC or Coordinated universal time this is the standard time that the rest of the world counts off of.

Lines of latitude

today in class we went over the lines of latitude.  we started class by talking about geography and what geography is, and how we can use the maps to learn a lot about human activities.  We also looked at an early Greek map that showed us one of the earliest maps that people had made of what they thought was the entire world.  These lines of longitude are organized into 360 degrees then there are 60 minutes inside arch degree.Then inside each minute there is 60 seconds.  This extreme precision helps us to find a very exact location of a place using these measurements.  Then on a map we can also find relative location which is finding the location based on other places.

Situation

Today we went over the situation.  This is the other way that a place's location can be described.  Situation describes a place's location based on its location in relation to other places.  It does this by describing the location of an unfamiliar place by using the location of a place that is familiar to people.  the importance of a place can also be determined through this method.  For example, they may be more important because the places can be reached by other places.  an example of this that we used in class was Chicago.  this place's importance was raised because it is accessible by the St. Lawrence seaway that made it the furthest inland point that people could easily go to prior to railroads.  this method of describing where places are based on the location of other places is very useful and can be used to on  the macro, or world level, or on the micro, or local level, to easily help people locate other places

Site

Today in honors human geo we had a very interesting class.  today we talked about site.  Site is the physical characteristics of a place.  there are many aspects that go into a site such as water sources, latitude, weather, landforms, etc.   then we talked about who two places on the same latitude can have very similar climates.  after that, we talked about who site has caused many people to chose where to settle.  In most cases in the US, the water sources caused the settlements to take place and now they have become the country's largest cities.  after that, we talked about how it is very possible for humans to change their site.  one example that we gave was Manhatten and how it is currently 2 times larger than in 1626.  Then we talked about how changing site can both have positive and negative repercussions on the environment and economy.

Learning the countries of south and central america

Today in class Mr. Schick was not present.  He left us an assignment to do on his blog.  this assignment was to play a game that helped to teach us the countries of South America and Central America.  I was already fairly familiar with these nations because we had to learn their locations in Spanish class last year.

I attempted each of these games several times and screenshotted the progression of my attempts.

Central america

The test results.

Today in honors human geo we got our unit one, excellence, test back.  I got 100% on this test.  From the beginning, I thought that I did fairly well on this test, but I did not think that I did as well as I did.  I got all of the multiple-choice and true-false correctly, but I did not get the bonus question correct.  the bonus question was What was the tallest mountain in North America renamed in 2015.  the answer was  Denali.  If this is on the midterm then I will need to study it, but other than that the short section of the test was very easy.  Then on the essay part of the test, I did well too.  I got a 20/20 on both essays.  The first essay was on the trial of Socrates.  I got a 100 on this part by going into great detail on this in all aspects of the trial.  the nthe second one was on whether or not we would find socrates guilty.  I said that I would find him guilty at that time, and not now. 

The Difference Between Mercator and Peter's Projection maps

Mercator map

• Was created by the Flemish cartographer Gerardus Mercator in the 16th century
• it became the standard map for navigation because it showed everything because it allows the ship to sail at a constant compass direction.
• the lines of longitude and latitude are constant at any point on the map
• one flaw of the map is that it wildly misrepresents the size of landmasses by making the landmasses farther from the equator larger.
• used for most street maps and marine navigation
• in most cases size is associated with importance
• this map makes the countries of North America and Europe seem far larger than the third world countries around the equator  thereby making them seem far more important

Peter's Projection Map

• this is a rectangular map that shows the more accurate sizes of the places in relation to the other places around the globe
• it achieves this goal by distorting the shapes f some places
• this map shows is part of a family of maps and the places at 45* north and south have no distortion
• it is named after James Gall and Arno Peters because Gall presented this idea at a science convention in the 1850s and then Peter brought this idea to a wider audience in the 1970s
• maps based on or using this projection are widely promoted by UNESCO (The United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization.) and is used in most British schools
• Although in the US only Massachusets and the Boston School District became the first school district to use these maps in March of 2017
• this map gained notoriety in the late 1900s and began to raise controversy about the creation of maps. 

All in all, I believe that the Peters projection Map should be used in most schools due to the fact that it represents the size of the landmasses more accurately.