What is Power?

Power can mean many things; I went through my previous blog postings to find some posts with descriptions of what power is.

Power is the ability to be more equal or more superior to someone else and to be able to make decisions without outside commands. Speaking of equality I one of my posts I spoke about the differences of sameness and equality; this is a topic that involves different levels of power.

In my “to be an adult” post I talked a bit about what life is like after the transition from teen to adult, in a way this is just about how when you get older you gain responsibility and with that responsibility comes power. And in one of my recent posts I commented on the outsourcing cartoon that showed globalization. The 10 flatteners that are causing the world to be flat are symbols of power in the world today. Outsourcing is a good example of power, it shows that you can expand and have work be done in different areas around the world.

Technology is becoming a growing symbol of power because the world today it pushing towards the future and bigger and better technologies. In one of my older posts I wrote about the most important and least important technologies and I also talked about the importance of new technology in our world today.

The most obvious source of power that has been a huge source of power for thousands of years is money. Money has driven people to be more successful and respected; it has made them able to make a higher status for themselves. Money is power.

Outsourcing Cartoon

the main visual elements are the girl, speech bubble, and the dad. This cartoon covers the issue of globalization and outsourcing. The cartoonist's opinion is that globalization is taking over the world. The girl seems frustrated that she cant get the work outsourced so it shows she is too dependent on outsourcing. The dad seem mad as well because she has probably asked him before which also supports that she is dependent on globalization. This relates to our study of globalization because outsourcing is a flattener that causes globalization. To make this cartoon more persuasive the cartoonist could have made the girl say...but its cheaper.

Positives of the Population Project

Many positives aspects came from the population project:

1. first of all I finally learned to stop procrastinate and do my work early! This is important because in 9th grade I will have more work so if I start early I will have less stress.

2. By finishing this project I have relieved myself of a lot of stress, this is important because I work better when I am not stressed.

3. By finishing this project I now know that I am capable of doing big projects. This is very important because going into OHP i will be more confident that I will succeed.

Sameness, Equality

Sameness means lack of variety while equality means there are a difference to all the people but the laws and how they are treated are the same. However, in the giver, all the people are the same since there is nothing unique about a certain person to separate people apart as their thoughts, actions and their use of language is controlled.

To be an adult

Growing up is a topic that many people will disagree on. One becomes an adult when they begin taking responsibility for their actions; it’s less about maturing physically but maturing mentally.

To be an adult means to not have to depend on others and be totally independent. To connect to that topic to not be helpful to society is when being independent could hurt your health and you need people to take care of you.

UBD plan

Monday: get 2nd graph and do note cards
tuesday: do first data analysis paragraph
wednesday: finish data analysis
thursday: start research paper
friday: finish research paper

The main visual elements are the three members of the family. This cartoon is about the issue of children coming home from school and not wanting to talk to their parents about it.

The cartoonist thinks that kids should talk to their parents about their day and how school went. The evidence of this is that it shows the parents wanting to know what the kid did at school but he told them to just read his blog. This is an ironic cartoon because this cartoon is in a blog posting even though the parents are telling him to tell them what happened today.

technology Feedback

Vonnegut is trying to say that technology is cheating people of what they can become because they don’t let you do things to your full potential. He seems to feel strongly about the issue. He is both right and wrong for several reasons.

He is right because people have given in to technology and have given up on hard work and have just let the machines do everything, for example electrical wheelchairs, and calculators (to a certain point). He is also right because without technology we wouldn’t have nuclear war threats.

He is wrong for a few other reasons, some being that some humans have problems so they need technology to help them through everyday life (wheelchairs). And also because sometimes people have a shortage of time so things like calculators are good because they are efficient.

Technology!

Technology is the practical use of science and innovations to come up with new and helpful things.

I find the use of technology in our school to be amazing for more than one reason, first of all the internet and laptops are reliable and usually work. With the introduction of Smart Boards showing students slide shows and things electronically are much easier to do now. Also having a school store with supplies like pencils and pens makes sure we have what we need to work at school efficiently.

My 5 Most Important Technologies:

• Xbox 360
• Internet/ Computers
• Ipods
• Cars
• HD TV

My 5 Least Important Technologies:

• The Roomba
• Fast Foods
• Remote Controlled Wheelchair
• Clothes (when not needed)
• Japanese toilets

End of Quarter 3 Feedback

This quarter, like last quarter, I have only successfully accomplished one goal. That goal being to stop procrastinating, but I have only succeeded to a point because on week days I get home and start directly on homework but on weekends I always seem to procrastinate until 7:00pm on Sunday and end up rushing myself. My goal for reading 30 pages a night was completely ignored because i ended up reading my AR book on the last night beginning to end. But even though I haven't really put a structure to my schoolwork (goal number 3) I always do my homework a certain way, which gives it a little bit of a structure.

My Three Quarter 4 Goals:

• Stop procrastinating (give structure to when I will work)
• Get a C+ or better on my population project.
• Finish eighth grade with Bs and As.
  

Holly War

Holy war is an oxymoron because holy is attached to religion and most religions are against war. That is why when you put the words holy and war together they means the opposites. The reason so many wars on religious issues are going on is that a lot of religions think that their religion is the only religion so they want to force others into its ways. In some religions not following its practices is a reason for death so killing is accepted. But in some cases it could be that people feel that god is greater than any human so they are willing to sacrifice for the good of their religion.

Cold War Game Debrief

I was the USSR in the Cold War simulation. Coming into this game we were very disorganized an we really didn't even have much of a plan. And as the game progressed we only got more disorganized because of the several times we were attacked by the US. But towards the end we were getting all our land taken and it felt like there was no hope because we had been hit for the third time with nuclear weapons, and with that state of mind any hope of organization and strategy was from realistic.

This game was obviously won by the US because they had taken over most of the miner countries and had wiped out the USSR with nuclear power several times. This made them the most powerful nation in the game. But even though thats what most people today would say about the real Cold War I would have to disagree because out of this war there was power that hadn't lost much, they had both suffered casualties as well as a downfall in their economy. All in all the war finished to be worthless and all but helpful.

VC Reflection

Preproduction:

• Gather information and ideas

• Make a storyboard

Production:

• Design layout for the video
  
• Rehearsing and Recording the video

Post Production:

• Editing video
• Bibliography
• Publish video

The three specific tips about VC that I would give are:

• Since this project was long you should have recorded things separately then put them together.
• Have good lighting in the area.
  
• Be prepared with your script and look straight at the camera.
  

The two best things about the project were being able to use creativity to make our videos better and also being to use VC. The two worst things were having to cite my sources in MLA format and not having Hanna Yin around the first two days so it was hard to get finished.

Movie Critique

The movie made a good adaptation to the book because of several reasons, one being that the story is narrarated by jessie. This gives you a different perspective of the book, because jessie was shown as a wise animal in the movie so it was right for her to be narrarating the story. And since it was a movie Napaleon made films for the animals to watch by bringing the TV to the barn, this way you could get a better look at what was not being narrarated by jessie (Animal Farm Movie). And to make the movie more dramatic the made it so the animals ran away at the end and came back when Napolean had died.

But the movie was also very similar to the book because so of the scenes (like the one where boxer get taken away) were moslty the same (except for the fact that the animals figured out what was going on automatically) (Animal Farm Movie). Overall the morals and themes of the book were also shown clearly in the movie except fot minor changes.

Who I Am from Animal Farm

In Animal Farm I am most like the cat because I am lazy and so is she. And if I can I will try to get my way without having to work much (Orwell, p.3). Another similarity between the cat and myself is that if there is a lot of work to be done I will make an excuse to try to get out of it (Orwell, 19). The last similarity is that when food is involved I always find myself to be the first one there (Orwell, 20).

Citation:
Orwell, George. Animal Farm. 1987. London: Penguin, 1945.

Poem- life in the trenches

BOOM!

“Duck and cover!” yelled the lieutenant

The sky was a sheet of cotton

Layered with smoke and poison gas

The sounds of war were deafening

Explosions crackling left and right

My heart beating furiously

Screams of excruciating pain

My trench feet becoming unbearable

The rain thundered down and blurred my vision

“Line up!” screamed the lieutenant once more

I was sure my life was over

We headed over the top

Rows of soldiers collapsed to the muddy ground

I knew my time was soon

ARMY

My country, the US, has a voluntary military service. There are several different reasons why I would join the army, one circumstance is if I felt very deeply about a situation and I felt that I need to help. Another way I would join the army was if i wasn't going to be shooting guns but being a doctor or technician so i wouldn't have to be shot of shoot people, but besides that i would NEVER join the army.

77% caste groups in MP still marry off children

NEW DELHI: In a shocking revelation, more than 77% of caste and community groups in Madhya Pradesh have been found to still indulge in child marriages with customs and traditions — not poverty — being the main reason for the trend.

Most such marriages, however, are not being reported from the upwardly mobile social groups, but from those who are at the bottom of the caste ladder where either education has not yet made sufficient inroads or much value isn't attached to it.

According to a recent study by the Delhi-based Centre for Social Research (CSR), the proportion of people whose caste/community still practises child marriage is 41% in Rajasthan and only 10% in Uttar Pradesh.

"Enforcement of the Child Marriage Prohibition Act continues to be a major problem," says the study conducted in two districts in each of the three states.

More disturbing is the fact that 71.2% of respondents in the MP districts — Shajapur (80%) and Bhopal (62.4%) — were aware of the illegality of child marriages.

In contrast, only 12% of the respondents in UP (Varanasi and Meerut districts) were aware it was unlawful. The awareness level in Rajasthan, however, was quite high (74% in Tonk; 98% in Jaipur).

The project, supported by the National Institute of Public Cooperation and Child Development, also revealed that the Supreme Court directive on compulsory marriage registration was still an exception, not a norm.

SC has directed all states to frame rules for mandatory marriage registration, besides putting the infrastructure for compliance in place.

"The failing on this count (delay in framing rules) has certainly not helped in checking the high incidence of child marriages," CSR director Ranjana Kumari said.

King Coyle Has Been Overthrown!

There we many similarities between the way that the 13 colonies were ruled and the way King Coyle run things in M1. The major similarity is that the rulers of these two areas were kings, and kings that did not value the peoples opinion. Both of this examples were not self-determined because neither of them were being able to live their lives without tight surveillance or rules. With the 13 colonies the Quartering Act is a good example because people had the British watching their every move, this is also true in King Coyle's kingdom because people had to pay taxes for things that shouldn't have been taxed.

On that same note, being taxed for something that shouldn't be taxed is called injustice (where something is not fair or just but it is done anyway). In the 13 colonies not having the right to run their own government is also an example of injustice. And more obviously they were both forms of tyranny because it was a more powerful person having rule over a weaker group of people, and the threat of violence.

43rd War Absolute Location

The absolute location that the book the 43^rd War takes place in is El Salvador. One piece of evidence to show this is the fact that the country had major civil war problems in the 90s (wikipedia). It also said that the climate is hot and it is as well in the book. And at the fortress the soldiers drink coffee with their meals and in El Salvador coffee is farmed a lot (Moeri, 82). I also found out that the Atlacatl was the name of a ruler in El Salvador may years ago, and maybe that is the reason that the author named the volcano in the book the Atlacatl volcano(Moeri, 60). My third piece of the evidence is that in the Chapter 4 the family goes to a Catholic cathedral and the main religion of El Salvador is Roman Catholic (Wikipedia).

Moeri probably did not mention the name of the country because she didn't want to be confined to curtain historic details and wanted to be able to add a little bit of fiction. When she talks about the war she probably had different examples from different Central American countries put together, so even though she put different experiences together it was all true.

Citations:

moeri, louis. the 43rd war. NY: Hougton miflin, 1989.

"Atlacatl." Wkipedia. 2007. Wikipedia. 28 Jan 2008 .

My Summarization of the Decleration of Independence

When it becomes necessary for a country to be separated from another, they should give their reasons why. The reasons being all men are equal and those men have rights, those rights being life, freedom and the pursuit of happiness. The government gets their power from the people, and if the government makes wrong decisions the people can change or get rid of the government. Even though people are allowed to change a government if bad, if people change the government it can only be done for the better. And if the government is bad it is the people’s duty to change and replace it. King George has done some bad things to the colonies, and these are some of them.

He taxed the colonists without representation. He kept many troops in the colonies without our opinion. He also brought on the quartering act. Then He cut off trades from colonies to all parts of the world. He also wouldn’t let the government pass laws that would help the colonies. And he sometimes sent us over seas to be trilled for crimes that we did not commit. And that is only a short list of his mistakes.

In the times of hardships in the colonies we have asked time and time again for free government of a change in it, but every time we have been met with more and more hardships. We tried to remind them the reason we came to the new world, but they ignored it. Those of us that are gathered here are saying that we are and want to be free! We pledge to work together to make sure this happens!

Franklin Cartoon

The main visual elements for this cartoon are the sliced up snake for one, and the bold letters on the bottom of the page saying “join, or die.” This political cartoon’s issue is about joining Benjamin Franklin political party and to convince (or rather threaten) people to vote for him. The cartoonist thought that Franklin was using threatening tactics to get peoples votes. The cut up snake supports what I said about using threatening tactics and the words join or die are also saying that if you don’t join, there will be consequences. To make this cartoon more persuasive the cartoon could have made the snake look like it was in more pain to bring out fear in the publics eye.

TBAS posting

What we read in TBAS can be trusted for more than one reason. The first reason being that the author (Julius Lester) is a credible source and can be trusted, an example of this is a quotation I took from the back of the book in the “about the author” section:

“Mr. Lester is a professor of black studies at the University of Massachusetts in Amherst…” (Lester, pg. 158)

My second reason being that the quotes Lester took for his book were from slaves that had been there and experienced the lives of a slave, and therefore they know how it feels to be a slave.

“I was here in slavery days. I was here. When I come here, colored people didn’t have their ages. The boss man had it.”

Anonymous

Library of Congress

My final reason is the fact that many of these quotes come from the Library of Congress, and that is a reliable source. This quote is from the others note in the beginning of the book.

“These are the narrative material taken from the Fisk University collection of slave narratives, the Library of Congress…”

Lester, Julius. To Be a Slave. 1968. NY: scholastic inc, 1968.

Great Power Game

For this game I was the USA and at first a few teams had an advantage over the others including the USA, the reason this was so was because the more powerful areas (USA, Great Britain, and France) in that time had more power so therefore we started out with more power in the beginning of the game. In the long run industries and colonies were by far the most important things to buy because nearing the end of the game you wouldn't be able to stock up on army if u didn't have the right amount of industries. That being said, industries and colonies are the the foundation of the countries success. The two things I did well in this game were from the beginning picking strong allies (even if they didn't end up to be trustworthy) so the competition was out of the way. The second thing I did well was buying lots of industry when war hadn't started yet.

My alliances at first were well picked but not too well thought trough, I picked the biggest powers, not necessarily the most trustworthy ones. One of my alliances (with France) was probably the reason our three powers didn't come out on top because he broke our treaty leaving Great Britain and I vulnerable for future attacks from countries who needed revenge but didn't have enough power.

The three most important things I learned in this game were:

1. Treaties are made to be broken.

2. You can't always trust people.

3. A country's wealth and power comes from its industries.

Quarter 3 Goals

1. Become a better reader (more than 30 pages a night if reading for an hour)

2. Stop procrastinating (do all my homework before doing anything else)

3. Organization of my schoolwork (have a plan before randomly doing work)

Quarter 2 Goal Feedback

Only one of my three goals were met, and it was working to my full potential. Last quarter I did my work as best as I could unlike quarter one, but the two goals bellow were the two goals that I failed to succeed at. Evidence to show that I didn't succeed at my first goal was that I only read about 30-45mins a night so I didn't get to read 30 pages a night, evidence to show that I failed at following through with my first goal was that I always did my homework later than I should have because I was either watching T.V. or on the internet.

1. Become a better reader (more than 30 pages a night if reading for an hour)

2. Stop procrastinating (do all my homework before doing anything else)