John Carroll Blogs

Today Mr. Schick showed us the C.I.A. website where we can find out about any country's population, birth rate, death rate, and FTR. This was  very cool website because we have access to the world's information and we can find out which countries are having a decreasing population and which ones have increasing populations. This is also a very useful tool for projects in religion class for example because we can also find out the religions that are dominant in that country. This website is very helpful and I'm sure I'll be using it for projects later in the year.

Today we got a new person in the honors human geography class. His name is Aleck and I already knew him from Saint Margarets because we both went there last year. I was there since 6th grade and he came there in 8th. Anyway class today was pretty funny because one of the students had to switch places with Mr. Schick and become the teacher to present the slides we took notes from yesterday for Aleck. She was very nervous and she kept laughing which made all of us laugh but all in all I really enjoyed class today and to be honest I really enjoy Human Geo.

Today we learned about the mass amount of people we have on the planet Earth. We have about 7 billion people on the world at this moment which is just such a hard number its insane to even think about. The only views of Earth that we have are pictures from space and comparisons on globes and they are pretty tiny which makes it very hard to imagine that many people on a very tiny Earth. One thing about population that does bug me a little bit is that the people who can afford to have kids sometimes don't. I understand that it's a big decision but sometimes it's just based on the money put into the kids and that is just ridiculously greedy that I can't stand it. There are people in 3rd world countries having about 5 kids per family hoping that one or two may survive to adulthood when we sure know that in America they will survive if they have parents who provide for them.

Today we went over our tests in Human Geography and we also talked about how and why we got some of the answers that we did. I also found out that one of my questions that the teacher marked wrong turned out to be correct and it helped my grade out by 4 points. I'm really glad that I decided to speak up about it because it helped my grade. Later on we also talked about our interpretation on Socrates' saying of the unexamined life is not worth living and some people had some very interesting points that made me reconsider how I wrote my answer and how I thought about it as well. Todays class really wasn't all that difficult though and I wound up learning a lot about the way he gives us tests.

Today in Human Geo we did a round discussion on the topic of self-driving cars. Everyone had some good opinions on the matter and a few that I would like to point out are terrorists attacking the connection of the cars and people not being able to afford the cars. Both of these were very good points and first I would like to talk about the cost of the cars, see things in this day and age are so overpriced that when those new cars come out in full swing they will be so insanely up there that only the 1%ers can afford them. Next would be the terrorists hacking into the system that drives us to our destination, see I liked this point because it also brought up the idea of a manual override on the cars incase anything like that were to happen. This would mean that even when you have a self-driving car you would still need to know how to drive a car yourself just incase anything went awry.

Today at school has honestly been one of my worst days so far. I had literally 4 tests to take. I had a biology test, a Spanish test, an algebra test, and a religion test. Honestly I didn't even know about the biology one until I walked into school but I still got an A+. It was really rough and I'm glad that I was able to have a free period during Human Geo today to study because it really helped me to do better on my tests. I also didn't even get to use my actual free mod today because I had to take an algebra test during it so I didn't have any time to myself until the end of the day. All in all though I think I did pretty well for as much of a load that I had.

Today I took my first test in Human Geography and I have to admit that I think I got at least a B+ because I know there were some questions that went straight over my head. I do know that I did fairly well on my essay questions because I could formulate the sentences with ease after reading the questions. I definitely did have some trouble with the question about the polis because I could not remember what a polis was and I don't even remember writing it down in my notes  but I probably did and just forgot because teachers don't put questions on a quiz that we didn't learn. At lest most teachers don't anyway. I believe I did very well on the multiple choice questions and the fill in the blanks but I do think I missed a few like the day when A Message To Garcia was written because I have a lot of trouble remembering dates for tests. All in all though I think I did do well on my first test and I'm very proud of myself.

Yesterday I didn't blog due to the fact that I was very nauseous and whenever I tried to look down at anything like my phone, my computer, or even a book I would get sick.

See Socrates was a living in a very stable time in Athens. Many people from around the world were coming over to share knowledge about medicine and building and ect. See Socrates would question these people to try and get them to learn new things as he did with his students. With this said though Socrates made his students think outside the box so much that they started having doubts about the Greek gods and Socrates was put on trial for not believing in them and for poisoning the minds of the youth of Athens. Now what I find interesting about this trial is that Socrates defended himself, he was his own lawyer. Instead of defending himself though he just flat out said yeah I did teach them this but I should be rewarded for making them think. Now that takes a lot of guts to say that during a trial where you know if your found guilty you will die. Socrates wound up being found guilty by the jury of 500 but it was a very close vote and he was sentenced to death. Socrates was give...

Today in human bio I learned how to use this website correctly. Before I was very unsure about whether or not I was doing things right because this website was new and foreign to me. Today though I learned that my blogs looked good and that my blog was somehow in pacific time instead of eastern. I found out that I could customize the back round of my blogs so they will look better and I learned a bit of information about Mr. Schick. Apparently he taught my sister Lauren when she went here and he is very happy to find out that she now is a journalism major just like his daughter. Finally I found out that blogger can be a very useful tool for finding out information and just learning about the way people think in general.

Today in Human Geography I learned of a very interesting way of teaching. A very interesting style per say. It was all based off of questions. The teacher would question you just to make you think and in a way off of the thinking you do you could possible teach yourself. Its basically a method to self teaching because for example if the teacher asked you about your thought on the presidential election and who you would vote for you would pick your candidate. Then he would bring it further and ask if you had a specific reason for choosing that one. You could possibly come up with a legitimate answer or realize that you picked him/her because everybody else was to which makes you a person that runs with the largest crowd. When giving deep thought to this way of questioning it makes you realize that life can truly be more then what you make of it and you just have to ask the right questions to figure out the information that you want out of it.

What I learned today in human geography is that a lot of people try to take shortcuts and they won't pay off for you later in life. As Mr. Schick was saying earlier that if you take shortcuts in school your grades won't be as good as you want them to be. He was also talking about how Socrates was definitely ahead of his time because he wanted people to think for themselves and not depend on something else like we do now on computers. Socrates also was killed for what he believed in which made a lot of people upset due to his wise teachings.

My 5 Point Plan For Freshman Year 1. Maintain a straight a average while balancing it with sports 2. Have a great year in JV football 3. I would like to try and make some new friends 4. I am thinking about trying out for the play or maybe just helping out with stage crew 5. I would like to have a better year than any of my middle school years

Greece and A Message To Garcia      Greece is similar to a message to Garcia because since the Greeks sentenced Socrates to death due to him asking questions it is similar because Hubbard was annoyed by people asking questions as well. But Socrates was related to me because the questions he asked were for information and to learn like me asking a teacher a question in class. Hubbard was annoyed by people asking dumb questions. The Greeks also valued loyalty and skill like Hubbard did because he despised any slackers that existed. He thought that everyone should be doing there jobs with maximum effort which they should be doing in my opinion. Finally it talks about how Socrates participated in a war and during the story the message to Garcia was delivered during war times

My Thoughts on a Letter to Garcia      After reading a message to Garcia it really made me reconsider some things in life. Do people really put out as much effort as it seems or are they just putting out the bare minimum to get by as easy as it can be? It also made me think about my standards as well. I know I strive to get good grades in school but am I maybe not trying hard enough. Last year I didn't get the grades I wanted I didn't get straight A's and after reading this essay it makes me feel like I was slaking because I didn't live up to my full potential. This also makes me think about the way I play football. I know I try my hardest but after reading the essay it also makes me feel like it isn't enough.  It makes me feel like I should be giving more than I can provide. If my  limit is 100 I should be giving 110. Last year I got two major injuries that prevented me from playing and now I feel like I should have powered through the pain because ...