Ashleigh's Blog

Today in class we took our Greece test. I think I did well, but I don't think I got an 100%. There were about 2-3 questions that I didn't know and guessed on. One of the questions was about the dactylic hexameter . I didn't  know what that was. Another question I didn't know was about the democracy with land owning nobility and the next one was about wealthy groups and the military. I didn't know which one was oligarchy or aristocracy. After looking at the PowerPoint, I think I got them wrong, I think I will still get a good grade. The way I studied helped me while I was taking the test. To study I just looked through the PowerPoint every chance I got yesterday and today. This really helped me to remember things. I think I probably could have looked at my notes more. I was going to look at m quiz, but I couldn’t find it. Next time I will study a little more for the test. 

Today in class we reviewed more for our test tomorrow. Today we talked about how Cleisthenes was part of the elite class and very rich. He got regular people involved in government, it had limits. Only citizens could be involved. A citizen was  free adult male property owners born in Athens, but only  one-fifth of Athenians were citizens. Soon after that they started practicing direct democracy. Direct democracy is where the state (or city-state) is ruled by its citizens. The majority rule decides the vote. In the agora, citizens argued, made speeches, then voted with white stones (which meant their answer was yes) and black stones (which meant their answer was no). This  was first practiced in Athens under Cleisthenes by around 500 BCE. For the test tomorrow I will look over my notes (from the textbook, PowerPoint, and allegory of the cave), the quiz we took recently, the western civ blog, and my blogs.  

Today in class we reviewed for our test. To review we went over the parts of the PowerPoint we have learned. For the test we will need to know where the  Aegean Sea, Ionian Sea, Adriatic Sea, Peloponnesus, Athens, Sparta, Crete, Asia Minor, and  Macedonia are on a map. We also need to know the geography of Greece, the Greek diet, and their climate for farming. WE also need to know about the Myceneans, Minoans, and the Dorians. Also, when each culture dominated Greece. I will probably review our notes about Homer and his 2 epics (Iliad and Odyssey). The Iliad is about the Trojan War and the Odessa is about a man trying to get home from the War. From 1150 - 750 BCE the Dorians took over. Tis was also called the Dark Ages. The Dorians didn't write down anything, so there is no written record of them. Another thing we need to know is the Homeric question which is if Homer actually existed or was, he just a myth like his stories. We also need to know the government terms like polis, mo

Today in class we took notes on Democracy and the Greek Golden Age. The Golden Age of Athens was from 477-431 B.C. Pericles led Athens during the Golden Age for 32 years. He dominated life in Athens from 461-429 B.C. This was also called the Age of Pericles. His three goals were to strengthen the Athenian democracy, to hold and strengthen the empire, and to glorify Athens. Direct democracy is the form of government which citizens rule directly and not through representatives. The parathion is architecture's noblest works. It has 23,000 square feet, its honored Athena, and set standards for artists around the world. Phidias was who Pericles entrusted a lot of the work on the Parthenon. Greeks invented drama and built the first theaters in the world. They had two kinds of drama which were tragedy and comedy. Tragedy was a serious drama about common themes such as love, hate, war, or betrayal. Comedy was contained scenes filled with slapstick situations and crude humor. 

Today in class we took more notes from the PowerPoint. In this part of the PowerPoint we talked about the terms polis (a fundamental political unit made up of a city and surrounding country side), monarchy (rule by a single person), aristocracy (rule by a small group of noble, very rich, landowning families, (oligarchy (wealthy groups, dissatisfied with aristocratic rule, who seized power, and a tyrant (powerful individual who seized control by appealing to the common people for support). Aristocrats were members of the ruling class. They attended symposiums which were meetings where elite men would enjoy wine and poetry. They would also watch performances by dancers and acrobats. Hetaeras (courtesans) were women that entertained the men while they discussed politics. No women, middle class, slaves, or even some other aristocrats were allowed to discuss politics. We also learned about Draco and the set of laws. That all Athenians (rich and poor) are equal, death is a punishment for ma

Today in class we took more notes on the PowerPoint. This part of the PowerPoint talked about the Mycenaeans, the Trojan War, the Dorians, and Homer. The Mycenaeans were located in Peloponnesus. They dominated Greece from 1600-1100 B.C. They invaded Crete and absorbed the Minoan culture in 1400 BC. The Trojan War was important time in history, but some people did not believe it happened, but evidence was found that proved that it did happen. In 1200 BC the mysterious sea people invaded Mycenae. Then the Dorians moved into the war-torn region and dominated from 1150-750 BC. They were less advanced, the trade-based economy collapsed, writing disappeared for 400 years, the economy declined. Homer was an old, blind, storyteller. he led in the Greek Dark Ages. he composed epics about the Trojan War. Some of his most famous epics are the Iliad and the Odyssey. Some people don't believe that Homer existed, but other believe he existed. 

Today in class we watched a video about the allegory of the cave. I thought that the video explained the allegory of the cave well because we were able to put the words to pictures and get the full idea of what Plato meant. Plato was trying to show that the cave people believed that if you paid attention to the shadows on the walls, you will succeed. This relates to school because if we study what we are taught, we will get better grades. He shows how people are told what to believe, instead of doing what they think is right. To compare to life, the shadows on the walls were like the internet. The internet doesn't show the full reality of the world, just like how the shadows were not showing the full reality of the world until one man stepped outside the cave and saw the real world for the first time. The allegory of the cave can have many meanings. I think this allegory really makes you have a whole new perspective on life. 

Today in class we took notes on an Ancient Greece PowerPoint. We didn't do all of the PowerPoint, we mostly learned about the geography of Greece. Greece had many mountains, actually 3/4 of Greece is covered by mountains. Greece is also a peninsula surrounded by water. This makes trade easier because they could sail. There was about 2,000 islands in the Ionian and Aegean Sea. This required many skilled sailors and shipbuilders. The temperatures of Greece provided good weather for farming, but only 20% of Greece was farmable. Another thing we learned about was the separation between the communities. Unlike the U.S., where we consider ourselves as united Americans no matter what state we live in, the Greeks did not. Spartans would consider themselves Spartans more than Greeks. This left Greek divided among the communities and hard to unite. We also looked at maps and had to identify which where the places were because it would be on our test. We practiced identifying the Aegean Sea,

Today in class we listened to the Allegory of the cave. The Allegory of the cave is about a group of people who have been shackled to a wall since childhood. Since they are shackled, they cannot turn around, they can only look at the wall in front of them. They were not alone in their though. There was a wall behind them with people behind the wall carrying statues. This wall was like a wall used in puppet shows. People would carry these statues and the people shackled to the wall in from of them, would see the shadows on the wall. They were told that these statues were human beings. the only knowledge the shackled people had about the world was seeing these statues and listening to the people behind them. Finally, one day, one man was unshackled, and taken outside in the world. The man's eyes were not adjusted to the light because he had been in a cave is whole life. The man was only able to see reflections in the water. The man was then forced to look at the sun which caused him

Today in class we read and took more notes on pages 120-126. I finished taking notes. When we were done with our notes, we had to do questions, 3, 4, and 5 from our textbook. 1. Mycenaean - The Mycenaean culture settled in Greece around 2000 B.C. and dominated Greece.      Trojan War - a war fought around 1200 B.C. when the army, led by the Mycenaean King, attacked the city of Troy     Dorian - a group of people who migrated into the mainland Greece after the destruction of the Mycenean civilization, and after their arrival, trade began to stop. The Greeks also had no written records during the Dorian Age.      Homer - was the greatest storyteller and he was blind. He wrote many great things.      Epic - a long narrative poem celebrating the deeds of legendary or traditional heroes      Myth - a traditional story about Gods, ancestors, or heroes, told t. explain the nature world or the customs and beliefs of a society.  3. The impact of nearness to the sea had on the

Today in class we took our test. I thought I was well prepared for the test, but I did not do very well. I got a 56/75 (74%). I didn't think I did that bad after I took it, but I wasn't sure about 1/2 of my answers. Since we haven't got our tests back, I don't know what problems I got wrong, but I think I might know which ones they are. I was unsure about one of the questions that I answered with Gilgamesh and I think I think I answered cascade instead of cataract for the rapids question. After we took the test, we took notes and read pages 120-126 in our textbook. This section is about Greece. I wasn't able to finish all the pages, but I did most of it. So far, this section has talked about the land, the climate, the water, and the temperatures. It also talked about the Mycenaeans in Greece. Hopefully I will do well on our test for this section. 

Today in class we reviewed for our test tomorrow on Egypt. We started by going over the PowerPoint and talking about important things we will need to know for tomorrow. We talked about how the Nile flows from South to North and from Upper to lower Egypt. Also, how Narmer was the 1st king to unite Upper and Lower Egypt. We also talked about how the Egyptians believed in the afterlife called Ka. We also talked about hieroglyphics and how they wrote on papyrus. I wrote down most things we talked about so I could study them. After that we decided to watch a video on the process of mummification. It was very interesting and very impressive that they figured out how to do this the long ago. Then we watched king tut song. Then we watched another song about Egypt and pharaohs to the song moves like Jagger. I think I am prepared for this test tomorrow. 

Today in class we got to do whatever we wanted for about 15 mins while someone finished their Mesopotamia test. Thankfully this was the last person who needed to make up test in our class. After that we were told that we were going to have a pop quiz. It was only 7 questions because we didn't need to do the extended response question. I think I did good, but I think I got one question wring because I wasn't sure about the papyrus question. I put cuneiform, but I also thought it might have been a different answer. Hopefully I didn't get that wrong because out of 7 points, one wrong can still give you a low grade. I am ok with that though. After that we went over the quiz and I got 2 questions wrong. We talked about a good day to have our Egypt test, and we are taking it on Friday. After that we finished taking notes on the PowerPoint.

Today in class, due to all the sickness, we got to finish working on reading and taking notes on pages 35 - 43 in our textbook. I am glad we were able to do his because I was not finished, but I finished today. Since I also had some extra time, I decided to write down all the definitions from the section. I did this with the other section we did, and it really helped me a lot. In this section of notes, it talked about Egypt getting invaded by the Hyksos in 1640 B.C. They ruled most of Egypt from 1630 - 1523 B.C. Another topic that this section talked about was how the Egyptians entertained themselves. Games were very popular in Egypt. Another thing that they did was make cosmetics. I was very impressed that the Egyptians used kohl on their eyes for makeup and for protection from the sun. They also soaked flowers to make oil that they put on themselves for their skin the dry air. I was surprised that they developed these things the early on in time.