March 27

Today in class we worked on our project once again because Mr. Schick was not here today because he had some type of appointment, so he was not able to come. I'm going to be completely honest my group mates are just ruining our project. We were supposed to do the videos yesterday but one of my partners made up some random excuse that made us not able to take the videos. Then today we were supposed to do the videos after school but someone did not mention he had an appointment and then my other partners just don’t care about grades, so they left or they just don’t want to do them at all. So, I'm just super mad because it wouldn’t take us long anyway and so I'm thinking I'll just do the ones that I can do by myself and then they can figure it out themselves. Overall today has been a stressful day due to this so that’s good.

March 25

today we took our test on Greece. I don't feel super confident considering I study half the wrong stuff. I don't think it will stay that way but I need to have high hopes. I'm really proud of myself and how I've done freshmen year and hope I can stick it out from the last quarter

March 20

• Hippias was a tyrant who ruled from 527 to 510 BCE
• Cleisthenes' supporters- and the ordinary Athenian citizens- revolt against Isagoras' tyranny
• they trap Isagoras on the acropolis for two days- on the 3rd day he fled and was banished 
• 508 BCE
• Cleisthenes was a member of the elite, very rich, insulated from the "hoi polloi", and saw craft politician
• saw value in tapping the intelligence, talents, and energies of non- aristocrats (middle class)
• didn’t realize the value of women
• citizens could participate- but only one fifth of Athenians were citizens (free, adult, male, property owners born in Athens)
• after several years, Athens practiced a direct democracy
• Direct democracy:
• where the state is rule by its citizens
• rule is based on citizenship
• majority rule decides vote
• in the agora, citizens argued, made speeches, then voted with white stones (yes)/ black stones (no)
• first practiced in Athens under Cleisthenes by around 500 BCE
• what is unique with the Greek relationship with their gods is the interaction with humans
• Poseidon (sea God) interfered with Odysseus trying to return home
• Aphrodite (love goddess) had lovers of both gods and men
• Dionysus (wine God0 was son of Zeus (a god) and of Semele (human princess)
• Zeus- ruler of heaven and earth; father of Athena; god of sky, weather, thunder, lightning, law, order, and justice. had a temper and threw thunder bolts
• Athena goddess of wisdom, skill, warfare, and peace, intelligence, battle strategy and handicrafts. Born from Zeus' head fully formed and armored. Patron of Athens
• Greeks were war like people- especially the Spartans
• Spartans were known for their tough, ruthless infantry: soldiers who fought on land
• spartan boys trained from the time they were seven 
• Athens had a great infantry, but nothing could compare with their navy
• Most effective weapon was the trireme:
• technological marvel
• fastest ship in the world at the time
• rowed by up to 170 men on three levels
• used as a battering ram agile, fast
• Phalanx:
• close-rank defense grouping of warriors
• armed with long spears and interlocking shields
• soldiers advanced slowly toward enemies

March 19

Today in class we met with our groups and started to think of our ideas for our project. My group is doing the Olympics in Greece which is a pretty cool topic. So far, we've done some of the PowerPoint and talked a little bit about what else we were going to do. I am praying that my group does good just so I start of strong for the last quarter. Besides all of that we have a lacrosse game against Curley today at 5 which should be pretty exciting because we won against them last year. Hopefully we do as good as last year, and I hope I get a good amount of playing time because I want to score my first goal of my high school career. Overall today has been a pretty good day and I cannot wait for the weekend just like everyone else so I can relax and maybe hang with my friends.

March 15

Today in class, we discussed what will be coming up for our Western Civilization class. In the future, we will be having at least one more quiz, one more test, and a two hundred point project that's going to be due right after the quarter ends. We discussed what our project will be on and how we are going to accomplish our end goal. My group consists of Demetri, Maddie, and me. We are going to build the Acropolis and make greek food. We will spend a day at one of our houses and work on it together. We are going to build a model of the Acropolis out of craft materials and make a powerpoint about it. We feel really confident about it. We are going to focus on the architecture and artistic features of Ancient Greece.

March 14

homer composed the Iliad and the Odyssey in the eighth century BCE, centuries after the events it describes happened

they were the only ones to survive the burning of the library of Alexandria

metis: skill, cunning

Odysseus announces his real name while sailing away from the Cyclops island, and the Cyclops calls down curses on him which gets all of his men killed

greek meaning of heroism: extraordinary attribute or ability

Odysseus executes all the housemaids for sleeping with the suitors and he's not even married to them

"and so she too rejoiced, her gaze upon her husband, her white arms around him pressed as though forever

the Iliad is a poem of war, the Odyssey is a poem of peacetime

Kleos: glory, renown achieved on the battlefield that guarantees  immortality because of your deeds are so amazing

weren't werent for diving intervention the humans in the Odyssey would have continued that cycle of violence

March 13

March 11

Polis: a fundamental political unit
Monarchy: rule by a single person
Aristocracy: rule by a small group of nobles
Oligarchy: wealthy groups
Tyrant: powerful individuals who seized control by appealing to the common people for support
Epic: stories and or legends
Myths: traditional stories
Homer: the greatest storyteller who was blind 
Dorians: people who moved to the war-torn countryside
Mycenaens: people who settled in the Greek mainland 

March 7

• 2000 B.C. Minoan civilization prospers on crete
• 1780 B.C. Hammurabi issues code of laws
• 1500 B.C. Mycenaean culture thrives on Greek mainland
• 1472 B.C. Hatshepsut, women Pharaoh begins her reign
• 1200 B.C. trojan war takes place
• 1027 B.C. Zhou dynasty begins in China
• 850 B.C. assyrias expand their empire
• 750 B.C. Greek city-states flourish

March 6

• in the Greek city-states of Athens, a new form of government developed - democracy - in which citizens exercised power
• Alexander the Great spread Greek culture throughout much of Asia, Greek, Egyptian, and Asian cultures then blended to create Hellenistic culture
• Athens assumed control of a defense league and eventually built it into an empire, later Alexander conquered the Persian empire and beyond to create a vast new empire of his own
• 2000 B.C. Minoan civilization prospers on crete
• 1780 B.C. Hammurabi issues code of laws
• 1500 B.C. Mycenaean culture thrives on Greek mainland
• 1472 B.C. Hatshepsut, women Pharaoh begins her reign
• 1200 B.C. trojan war takes place
• 1027 B.C. Zhou dynasty begins in China
• 850 B.C. assyrias expand their empire
• 750 B.C. Greek city-states flourish

March 4

• the Nile and the two lands
• upper Egypt was a 500-mile long strip of fertile land along the Nile
• lower egypt was a wide land of the nile delta emptying into the mediterranean sea
• around 3100 B.C. the two lands were united under a single king or pharaoh (narmer)
• the nile flows north, upper to lower egypt
• egyptians relied on harmony and balance of the universe which they called maat
• pharaohs had multiple wives and all routes to financial and soical success were through the palace
• women could inherit money and land and divorce their husbands though only a tiny few ever wielded real political power
• gods were often portrayed with animal heads or bodies
• egyptians believed in an afterlife (ka) and they mummified bodies to preserve them for this post-death journey
• all souls would need to justify themselves at the point of death and be either sent to an after world paradise or the jaws of a monster
• earliest egyptian writing formed 3100 B.C. and were small pictures know as hieroglypics
• the Egyptian script was usually written in ink on papyrus which was made by mashed Nile reeds
• papyrus was stored in scrolls and these scrolls were the books of anicent egypt
• egyptian astronomers created a calendar with 12 months and 365 days to make sense of seasons
• due to their excellent knowledge of human anatomy, Egyptian doctors wrote extensively on health issues and created potions and cures