Slumdog Millionaire

Today we watched slumdog millionaire again and learned more about the Indian culture. Some of the things I learned are things about their wealth and how the kids act. The people don't have lots of money and they have to do many things to get it. In America, if kids don't have parents they are put in an orphanage. In India, if they don't have parents they have to support themselves. The kids steal things and get away with it very easily. They sell things for very little money and they even killed someone without getting caught. The movie is teaching me how difficult life is in India.

Movie

Today in class we watched a video about in India. There were many differences between their life and culture and ours. Everything is very crowded and they don't have lots of food or nice things. The kids run around and are punished in harsh ways like being slapped and hit with books. Most everyone in America has what they need and some people are more poor than others but there are few people who are poor like these people. We are used to having food, clothes, a house, internet and much more. In America harsh punishment is not allowed. The people in India got beaten with sticks and set on fire just for being Muslim. America is a free country and people can practice religion however they want for the most part. Another main difference is that the kids have to do terrible things to get by. The kids sell their possessions for small amounts of money but here, money is given to us by our parents like it's no big deal. To the people in India this is normal but we aren't used to it because America is very different.

Substitute

Today in class, Mr.Schick wasn't there so we had a sub. We had to check his blog for our assignment. We worked on what we did in class yesterday which was finding songs that relate moving and push/pull factors. I found some things that might work out but I haven't decide whether or not to use them yet. We spent the whole class looking for songs and if we already did the assignment we could work on our homework. I didn't find definite songs but I'm going to keep looking.

National anthem

This is the United Kingdom national anthem

Cultural geography

To start off class, we got our tests back from the other day. After that, we started a new lesson about cultural geography. We learned that cultural characteristics are lessons and traditions you were taught by your parents and other family members. Examples are religion, language, and ethnic heritage. We looked at a picture of the united states that told us what different states called soda. Some call it coke, others call it pop, and we just call it soda. We also talked about how in Maryland, we eat crabs in big groups and think its completely normal because we grew up doing it but in other places it's rare which I thought was cool.

Test

Today we had a test about the countries and all the power points that were presented. I studied last night but I don't think I did as well as I wanted to. Some people probably didn't think it was that hard but I thought some parts of it were difficult. Most of the questions had to do with the countries, their leaders, and what type of government they had. I knew the leaders because I studied those but I had some trouble with the types of government and some of the facts about the leaders. Overall I think I did an okay job but not as good as I wanted.

Russia, Brazil, and Mexico

Today we finished up class with these notes
Russia:

• Dmitry Medevdev is in the United Russia party
• There are 3 braches of government: Legislative, Executive, and Judicial
• The Legislative branch adopts federal law, declares war, approves treaties, has federal power, and can impeach the president
• The Executive branch is the president and appoints government
• The main political party is called United Russia it was founded in 2001
• Countries are afraid to attack Russia because of Putin and his nuclear weapons
• Putin improved the Russian military
• Dmitry Medevdev is the prime minister who previously served as the 3rd Russian president

Brazil:

• Brazil has a Federal Republic
• Dilma Rousseff is the President
• Leaders are elected by the people
• The president has a 4 year term
• Can only be re-elected twice in a row but can be elected as many times as they want as long as there is another president in between
• Dilma Rousseff was elected in 2011 and was re-elected in 2014
• In 1970, Dilma Rousseff was arrested for participating in Political Guerilla
• She was captured and tortured for 3 years before she got involved in politics
• To remove the president, they can Impeach, re-elect, or assassinate them

Mexico:

• Enrique Pena Nieto is the Governor
• He is a member of the Institutional Revolutionary Party
• The can impeach, re-elect, or assassinate
• Mexico has a Federal Republic
• A big thing in Mexico is the Mexican Drug war

Test tomorrow

Today Mr.Schick had to leave so he came and told us that he made a powerpoint for us to study and it was on his blog. We had a sub and we could work with partners if we wanted to. I studied with Leigh and Kacey and we quizzed each other. At first, I got lots of things wrong because I didn't memorize anything but with practice from looking over the powerpoint, quizzing Leigh, and being quizzed, I got the hang of it. I think I still need to study because I don't think I could do a good job otherwise but with some studying I think I can get a pretty good grade.

Syria, Germany, The US, and Russia

Syria:

• Republic under an authoritarian regime
• They don't have many rights that keep them safe from the government
• Bashar al-Assad is the president
• Syria has been a republic under and authoritarian regime for 73 years
• They are a republic but the government still controls everything
• They ways the get rid of the president are assassination, the country being taken over, and a revolutionary war
• The voting for Bashar al-Assad is rigged for him to win
• The leader in Syria serves a term of 7 years
• Bashar al-Assad is expected to be in office until at least 2021

Germany:

• Federal republic
• The government has been in place since 1990
• After world war II, Germany was broken into East Germany and West Germany
• The president is Joachim Gauck who has been in office since 2012
• The chancellor is Angela Merkel and has been in office since 2000
• The President can be impeached or the people can decide not to elect him again
• The chancellor can be re-chosen by the President or the Bundestag can kick the chancellor out of office
• The bundestag elects the president and can kick them out
• The president was first established after World War I
• The chancellor first entered the political world in 1989, after the Berlin wall fell
• Offices in Germany are elected by the Bundestag
• Disabled people aren't allowed to vote
• 18 is the legal voting age
• There are 5 political parties (CDU, SPD, CSU, LINKE, and GRUNE)

The United States:

• The leader is president Barack Obama
• America has a constitution based federal republic with a strong democratic tradition
• Democrats and Republicans
• Obama won the election in 2008 and can only serve 2 terms of 4 years each
• Obama will be in office for 2 more years
• He  is the first African American president
• To change the leadership, we can re-elect, overthrow the leader, impeach the leader, or assasinate him
• Impeachable offenses include treason, bribery, and more

Russia:

• They have a federation
• The official name for Russia is Russian Federation
• Russia became Russian Federation in 1991
• Used to be the Soviet Union (USSR)
• Vladimir Putin has been president since 2012
• He was the Prime Minister from 1999-2000
• They have 6 year terms
• Vladimir is not allowed to serve another term or be re-elected
• Russians like Putin as the president
• He's in the United Russia party
• Used to be in the KGB

Canada and Japan

These are the notes we took yesterday in class:

Canada:

• A parliamentary government: a democratic form of government which the party with the greatest representation in the parliament forms the government
• Has had a parliamentary government since 1867
• A federation
• There are 5 political parties
• The leader is Stephan Harper
• The head of state is Queen Elizabeth II
• Anyone can be elected as the prime minister as long as they're over 18 years old
• Prime minister can stay the prime minister as long as the people vote for him ; no term limit
• The longest term served has been 21 years
• Stephan Harper has been the prime minister for 8 years
• The prime minister is in office until he/she resigns, is dismissed, or dies
• They have elections every 4 years. The next election is in 2015

Japan:

• Shinzo Abe is the leader
• Parliamentary system and am constitutional monarchy
• They are a unitary state
• The prime minister has more power than the emperor
• Japan does not elect a prime minister directly
• No term limit
• They can impeach or re-elect to get rid of a leader
• The emperor is Akihito
• Shinzo Abe will stay in power as long as he is doing his job well

France and China

Today in class, these are the notes I took when we saw the powerpoint about France and China.

France : 

• Has a republic government and a semi-presidential system (has a president and a prime minister)
• President Francois Hollande and Prime minister Manuel Valls are the leaders
• Government of France is divided into executive, legislature, and judicial branches
• Francois Hollande is part of the socialist party. He's going to run again in 2017
• The prime minister is appointed by the President
• Manuel Valls was born in Spain and obtained French nationality when he was 20
• A republic is a state where the majority of the power is in the people who vote and are represented by the people they choose
• France's present government has existed for 56 years
• To get rid of their leader they can throw them out of office but they have to prove that the leader did something wrong
• The socialist party is the first most popular party in France and the Union for a popular movement (the UMP) is the second
• The leader of the UMP is Jean-Francois Cope
• Nicolas Sarkozy was elected as the president but was defeated by Francois Hollande
• The next election is in 2017
• Hollande , Sarkozy and many others are potential runners for the next election

China :

• Is a communist state (the government controls the economy)
• The president is Xi Jinping 
• He's the son of revolutionary veteran Xi Zhongxun, one of the communists party's founding fathers
• A president in China serves for 10 years and Xi Jinping has been in office for 2 years 
• They can impeach, assassinate, or re-elect to get rid of a leader
• Impeachment is when an official is accused of unlawful activity
• Assassination is the action of killing someone 
• Re-election is to elect for another term in office
• Xi Jingping got a total of 2,937 votes

Cancer Awareness

Today in class, we went to the front of the school for Cancer Awareness day. There was a line of booths set up where we could listen to the people talk or pick up brochures about different types of cancer. The first booth was about skin cancer. The man talked about the sun and how you should always wear sunscreen even when it's not hot outside. The second booth was about about breast cancer and people came that go to the houses of people with cancer and clean them for free. The fourth booth had a machine where you could put your head inside and see if you had sun damage, dry skin, or were dehydrated. The final table, had two sets of pig lungs. One was healthy and one wasn't from smoking. It talked about lung cancer and the danger of smoking.