Roman Questions (pages 124-129)

Please post your two most thoughtful questions by 7 p.m. Sunday
-- but please DO NOT POST HERE.

Pleass post over here on the right under where it says Further Class Discussion -->

Post under YOUR BLOCK (A, B, D or E).

Below is some material we'll look at in class Monday. It's not part of your HW, but
I'm posting it here in case you are interested in learning more about Rome:

I just found a site that looks interesting...

http://www.classicsunveiled.com/romel/html/index.html

Look at where it comes from:

http://www.classicsunveiled.com/romel/html/recog.html

and consider how reliable it is...

It's definitely accessible. But is it accurate???

What sources does it cite?

How does this connect to the web pages you will make???

Two questions about Rome

Post your thoughtful questions (questions only -- keep this short) under your block
over here on the right where it says Further Class Discussion -->

Alexander The Great

Post your thoughtful questions (questions only -- keep this short) under your block
over here on the right where it says Further Class Discussion -->

NOTE ABOUT THE READING FOR TUESDAY:

I forgot to mention that on the website, it says to post your three most thoughtful questions to the class website.

A “thoughtful” question is one that requires some thought, and it’s generally not one that can be answered with a discrete piece of information.

For example, in class I wondered whether ATG had been born when Philip became king in 359 BCE.

I looked it up and found out that ATG was born in 356 BCE, so no, he wasn’t born yet. ATG was born three years into his father's reign as king. ATG never knew his father’s father.

That question is good, in that it shows that I was thinking about Alexander and what it would be like for him to grow up with his father as king.

But it was an easy one to answer.

Similarly, “where is Macedonia” is pretty discrete. Find a map (here’s a link to that map I showed you in class) <http://www.greece-map.net/maps/macedonia-map.gif>

and you’re all set.

These are fine questions, but if these are my most thoughtful questions, I’m probably in trouble…

A more thoughtful question might be:

In paragraph 3 on page 1, it says that Philip “managed to unite all of Macedonia under his leadership.”

Weren’t there any people who opposed him? I understand that he killed his rivals and did his best to subdue all rebellions… but didn’t some people in his kingdom oppose him?

That question would require a bunch of research into Macedonian history. Do NOT undertake such research… but do pose thoughtful questions such as that one that show that as you are reading the material, you are emapthizing with the people you are reading about and that you are thinking about what it would have been like to be Alexander the Great (or, on the first page, what it would be like to be his father, Philip II of Macedon).

Finally, as we've discussed, if you don’t know what a word means, please look it up.

However, you should not include vocabulary questions in your question list
(all of the questions you generate, by the way, will go into your question log for 12-3-07).

So while you may think to yourself: “what does disinterested mean?”,
do not list that as question – use that as a chance to expand your vocabulary.

If you have looked up a word and you still don’t get it, please email me and I’ll try to help.

See you Tuesday.

Ancient Greece

Here's a seven minute video about the Parthenon.

More about Mesopotamia and Egypt

If you learned something additional about the reading, post it here. Put what you learned into your own words and explain briefly why you think it's important and/or how it helps us make more sense of ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia.

For instance, there is a cool decorative wall carving, or frieze, at the U.S. Supreme Court that depicts famous lawgivers such as Menes (of Egypt unification fame) and Hammurabi (from the reading you just did this weekend) and Moses.

Here's a map of the Fertile Crescent (from comment #1).

And here's some more information about women in Egypt (related to comment #2)

Here's a great link to many civilizations that Alex T. found (see comment #9)

One point about the timeline I provided: That timeline says the Hyksos came into Egypt in 1640 BCE, but the reading says the invasion happened in 1730 BCE. How could both be right? Keep in mind that dates are kind of shaky for this long ago. We have limited evidence, and different historians have different interpretations of the evidence. It's safe to say that "around 1700 BCE," the Hyksos invaded. Our book makes this point on p. 80 (p. 126 electronic version) when it says that "nothing in ancient Egyptian chronology is certain."

As we move along in the course, dates will become more certain. For instance, we have tons of evidence that tells us that Charlemagne was crowned emperor by the Pope on Christmas Day in the year 800.

Minoans (Cretans) and Mycenaeans

Here are some links to get you started on some context for Minoans and Mycenaeans.

Here are a few more images.

And here's a 25-second video of what the ruins look like on Crete.

Here's a map that shows the Peloponnesus. Mycenae is a city on the Peloponnesus.

What else can folks find about these civilizations?

And for those interested in military conquests, consider these Plastic Hittite Soldiers.

Any questions as you review for the test?

Please post them here as a comment.

Please focus on questions that lead to knowledge, as opposed to questions in the form of "Will X topic be on the test?"

9-11... six years later

In class on Tuesday, I'd like to take a little time to discuss 9-11-01.

What happened? Why? Why was it significant?

To prepare for class, please watch the first three minutes of this Charlie Rose show from the evening of 9-11-01. You should watch up to the point where Charlie Rose asks:

“How many casualties? Who did it? How will the United States respond? And what will this event do to the nature of American life?”

Think about those last two questions for class tomorrow. How did the United States respond to 9-11? And what has that event done to the nature of American life six years later? You don't have to do any research or write anything - just think about it.

You folks were in the 3rd grade when 9-11 happened, so you may not have been fully aware of what was going on.

There's a little-known event that I think does a good job of capturing the mood of the country about a week after 9-11. President Bush was giving a speech to Congress, and the speech happened at 9 p.m. That happened to be intermission between the second and third periods of a hockey game in Philadelphia.

Read this account of what happened in Philly and how the president's speech led to the end of the game. Then, once you have some context, listen to the first two minutes of this radio broadcast.

For more context, see this report from the NewsHour on PBS.

Again, the questions I'd like to focus on for Tuesday are:

1. How did the United States respond to 9-11?

2. What has that event done to the nature of American life six years later?

Where we've been, where we are and where we're going

Greetings world history students.

As we start a new week of school, I'm thinking about where we've been, academically speaking...

Thus far, we have:

• read Jared Diamond's article about whether farming was a huge mistake


• read some pages in our textbook to get some additional context about the pluses and minuses of the agricultural revolution


• worked on developing a thesis and supporting it with evidence


• read a summary of Gilgamesh and thought about what Mesopotamia might have been like around 2000 BCE


• selected a current event to follow for the first trimester


• learned how to use Google Earth
  

Speaking of Google Earth (you will be on a team soon!) let's think about where we've been in a geographic sense.

Most (though not all) of you have now visited the area around the North Carolina/Virginia border near the Blue Ridge Mountains. We are now back in Cary. When you traveled, did you wonder -- or historia -- about how the "Blue Ridge Mountains" got their name? They didn't look Blue to me. But maybe that's because I didn't see them in the morning:

When we look across to other mountains it is easy to see why they were named the "Blue Ridge Mountains." The early morning air in the distance looks like thick smoke. It makes the color of the mountains a deep ocean blue. This color is caused by the amount of water in the air. It is almost like fog. When the sun rises higher, some of the water in the air will be burned away. Then the mountains will slowly turn dark green.

source: http://www.manythings.org/voa/05/2005-08-16-3.html

Now that we are back at Cary Academy, how did Cary get its name?

We got to the Blue Ridge Mountains by traveling west on Route 40. What's up with routes and numbers? Did you ever notice that interstate highway numbers ending in zero -- such as Route 10, 20, 30, 40, etc. -- go East-West, whereas numbers ending in five -- such as Route 95, 85, 75, etc. -- go North-South? Who set up these highways anyway?

Would it be good for China to develop a similar highway system, so its 1.3 billion people could spread out more? Auto makers would certainly be happy with that decision, but would it be good for the environment to have China develop more and better roads? If cars in the future run on more environmentally-friendly fuels, maybe it won't matter so much. Or will all these roads (and by the way -- do all roads lead to Rome? or is that Persia's Royal Road?) be historical relics in the future when we all fly around like The Jetsons?

There actually was a point to all that question asking (aside from re-introducing you to the concept of historia: to learn by inquiry)

As you prepare for class on Monday, please read actively. Look up words you don't know. Think about what the text is telling you.

We will spend the next few weeks looking at the early river civilizations. The title of chapter three is “The Great River Valleys”. There are four great river valleys that we know about: Egypt, Indus River, Mesopotamia and China.

The section of the chapter you are reading for Monday describes the "Ecology of Civilization". As you read about each river valley, think about how the ecology and the environment shaped the people who lived there. And really try to think about what it would be like to live in an ancient river valley.

picture source: http://www.harappa.com/indus2/gif/oldworld.jpg

For instance, on page 76 (electronic page 122), we learn that China grew a lot of millet on the Yangtze River. An active reader might wonder what millet looks like.

The caption next to the colorful picture on p. 76 (you are reading the captions and looking at the maps, aren't you?) tells us that rice -- the crop often associated with China -- tends to grow better in the moist south of China, on the Yangtze River.

Where do we get our food from today? So many questions...

Speaking of questions, if you have any questions (or thoughts or comments) as you do the reading, please post them as comments to this blog entry.

Gilgamesh Preview

Cast of Characters

Gilgamesh
Enkidu (G's friend)
Harlot
Humbaba (monster in the Cedar Forest)
Gods: Anu (head god), Shamash (likes Gilgamesh), Ishtar
Bull of Heaven
--
Utnapishtim (everlasting life)
Urshanabi (ferry man)
Gods: Ea, Enlil (Enlil is nice to Utnapishtim)

Reading Jared Diamond

A few notes from Mr. Goldberg:

First of all, who is Jared Diamond? Does he have a web page?

Whenever you consider a source think about these questions:

Who wrote it? When? Where? Why? For what purpose?

On the bottom of page 1, Diamond refers to the Parthenon and to the B-minor mass.

Here's a 2-minute segment from a performance of the mass.

At the end of the second paragraph (still on page 1), he uses the term neo-Luddite.

On the seventh line of page 3, he talks about "the end of the ice ages." When were the ice ages? Can anyone find a good simulation of the ice age? This timeline was the best I could find, and it only covers North America (mainly Canada).

--

Where do we get our food from today? Is there a problem if we don't get our food locally?

For context, do you remember the spinach problem from last fall?

Could the use of Genetically Modified Foods be the next biggest mistake?

Here's some more updated information about GMOs.

--

Unrelated follow-up from class:

A Block:
Here's a question that came up in class from the Table of Contents: What is the Axial Age?

D Block:
The Sydney Opera House was nominated as one of the New Seven Wonders of the World.

Feedback on the first homework assignment

Thank you for all turning in your first written assignment. While I enjoyed reading all of your work, some of you were not clear about what I was asking for. Because we're still getting to know each other, I would like you each to take a second chance to make a good first written impression. This entry should clarify what you should do for this assignment.

You were first supposed to read over the Introduction to my web site (the section we previewed in class the first day) for 20 minutes, and then write two paragraphs about what you read.

The purpose of the first paragraph of the assignment was to show me evidence that you had in fact read the whole Introduction to my web site and explored at least a few of the links there. My idea was that you would describe what you found most interesting. I also wanted you to tell me WHY you were interested in each of the topics or ideas that you mentioned. As I think about it more, you might need two paragraphs to do that part of the assignment. That's okay.

The purpose of the final paragraph was to see what topic(s) might be of interest to you this year in World History so that I can tailor the course accordingly. Some of you had some good ideas and we'll talk about them. Some of you didn't do this second part of the assignment, and I'd like you to make sure you do that second part for the re-write.

I should have been more explicit that I was looking for evidence that you read the text of the Introduction and that you followed a few links -- say two or three of them -- to get more information. Some of you wrote that you found the web site "very interesting" and "informative" but you did not provide me with any supporting details. Someone could write "your web site is really interesting and I look forward to studying history with you this year" without ever visiting my web site. To reiterate, you should describe two or three of the things that interested you in the Introduction, and then explain why you found those ideas/topics interesting.

I think there may have been some confusion about whether you were supposed to write about the introduction to me (that is actually the "Who is Mr. G?" link, as opposed to the Introduction link) or the Introduction to the web page. You were supposed to write about the page -- not about me or about what we did in class.

In terms of tone, a number of you wrote such sentences as "Mr. Goldberg's web site was..." Whenever you write, consider your audience. For this assignment, your audience is me, and this is more of a personal communication between you and me, so you can just start with "On your web site, I enjoyed seeing [whatever you enjoyed seeing -- and WHY]." For example, you might have enjoyed seeing the video that shows how world religions spread all over the globe in 90 seconds. And perhaps that video made you wonder about Buddhism and how Buddhism started.

Finally, grammar and spelling seemed to be a challenge for some of you (a few of you even spelled my name wrong -- I'm Mr. Goldberg, not Mr. Goldburg). Be sure that you take the time to proofread your writing for grammar and spelling. For an assignment this short, it's not a bad idea to read your writing out loud to help catch any grammar mistakes.

I have made a few comments on your papers, but I would like you each to revise and re-submit them, now that you have a clearer idea of what I am asking you to do. If you have any questions, please ASK. If you need more than one paragraph to provide enough evidence that you read and thought about several parts of the Introduction, that's okay.

Please re-submit a hard copy of your assignment in class on Friday (in proper format -- i.e., 12-point Times Roman font) and I will only grade the revised assignment.

Also, please make a folder on your computer called "WH Portfolio" and save an electronic copy of both drafts of your paper in that folder. I'd like you to keep a copy of each piece of work you submit over the course of the year, so that we can track your progress.