Seventh grade has been an exciting year filled with many surprises. I have made a lot of new friends and have learned a lot about being organized and time management and all that stuff. Moving in to middle school from elementary school, was an exciting change, but I feel like I adjusted pretty well to having eight teachers and needing to keep up with so much. The best experience I had this year was the Zion field trip where we got to drive to Utah and go to Zion national Park and Bryce Canyon. That was so much fun and I wish I could do it again. Also, I have enjoyed having P.E. as a class, especially since I do Aquatics P.E which is very fun. I can't wait for what eighth grade has in store for me next year.
I think the worst experiences I have had this year were all the late nights doing homework. Sometimes there is a lot of homework, and if you are involved in things outside of school, it gets hard to keep up with school at times. I learned that I need to manage my time very well to get through middle school. Sort of at least.
The Columbian Exchange is a time period that went along with the Age of Exploration. It happened when European explorers traveled to the Americas and came in contact with Native Peoples of that region. There were positive and negative things that came out this though. One positive effect of the Columbian Exchange was all the different animals, plants, and vegetables that were exchanged. The Eastern world was introduced to things like pineapples, corn, beans, and turkeys. The Americas were introduced bananas, citruses, horses, chickens, and lots of other things. All of these things were positive effects of the Columbian Exchange.
There were also a few negative things that were exchanged during the Columbian Exchange though. The worst effect of the Columbian Exchange was disease. Diseases such as smallpox, measles, malaria, typhus, and influenza traveled with to the Americas with the Europeans. The Natives were not immune to these like the Europeans were, and millions died because of this. As you can see, the Columbian Exchange had a lot of positive and negative effects.
On Tuesday our school's seventh graders got to go to the zoo to see our animals that we did our zoo project on. There were a lot of new things at the zoo that were added since the last time I was there, so it was a lot of fun. My favorite part of the zoo was the tropical rain forest, which is where my animal, the Keel-Billed Toucan was. It was cool to get to see my animal.
I like the rain forest exhibit because when you walk in, it really feels like you are in the rain forest because it is really big and the animals are out walking around instead of all being in cages. It was funny though because when we were inside the exhibit, a big branch from a tree broke of and many zoo workers had to come help get it out. This brought a lot of brief excitement in my group. There was a lot of cool exhibits at the zoo, but the rain forest was my favorite.
The Inca and Aztec Empires were both great civilizations, who thrived in modern day Mexico (Aztecs) and all the way down the Andes mountains in South America (Incas). These empires had a lot of similarities, but one thing about them that was very alike was how each of them fell.
The Aztecs and Inca were both conquered by the Spanish, but that isn't what really made their falls similar. Before the Spanish came, each of them had internal conflicts which weakened them and their army. Also, in both cases, the Spanish acted nice to them, and once they got inside their main cities, they attacked. One other way that these two falls were alike, was that both of the empires couldn't fight against the Spanish guns and horses, with their stone and wood weapons. There was definitely a lot that caused both the fall of the Inca and Aztec Empires.
Seventh grade has been a challenging, but very fun school year for me. I have had a lot of great experiences, and have met many new friends this year. My favorite thing all year has been being in aquatics P.E. Water polo and swim were really fun and I learned a ton of stuff about those two new sports. It is also where I have met a whole new group of friends, that have been my closest friends all year. I can't wait for being in the class again next year.
Another thing that happened this year was the Zion National Park field trip with Mr. Kirste. I think I was very lucky to get to go on that trip. It was fun because I got to spend a lot of time with my friends, and the park was amazing. I really like the hike we did called the narrows. It was cold and wet, but nevertheless very fun. I have a lot of memories from that trip. I hope I can do something like that again soon.
Ever since I was born my people have been traveling south down the coast of this new land following herds of animals that are our main source of food. This has been a rough and demanding lifestyle and some people want to find a new place to settle down in permanently. I think that would be great, but we have not come to a place that is abundant in animals to hunt or warm temperatures where plants are.
Lately my clan has been realizing that the temperature is getting warmer and there are more and more new plants every day. There also seem to be animals that live here too. Some people believe that this is a good place to settle down permanently, but others think we should keep going. I think we should stay here. There is an abundance of plants and animals for us to eat, and the weather is not to hot or cold. I am certainly tired of traveling, living in makeshift homes, and eating whatever we can find. I vote that we stay in this new land!
This year I have read a lot of books that I really liked. I also liked all of the books that we read as a class such as Crispin. For most of the year I have been reading one series called Redwall by Brian Jacques, which I started sometime last year. I really like this series which is why I have stuck with it for a long time. In the Redwall series, there are a ton of books, so I could be reading it for a really long time. Anyways, this year I think I have gotten through four or five of the books in the series, and am now on book seven or eight I think.
The reason I like Redwall is because each book is alike, but also very different. The books are also very exciting, and have great conflicts. There is a lot of suspense as well and great characters. Redwall books are about animals, but in kind of a medieval setting which I think is kind of cool. So the books from Redwall are my favorite books that I have read this year.
The Scientific Revolution was period of time between around 1500 and 1700. During this period scientists made some huge discoveries, and wrote all the ideas that shaped modern science. Take Sir Isaac Newton for example: he created the laws of gravity and motion. The biggest thing that caused the Scientific Revolution to happen was that people began thinking for themselves instead of only listening to the church, or other major powers of the Middle ages and Renaissance. The people began observing the world for themselves and coming up with theories of how things worked.
A great example of this is in Nicolas Copernicus. Copernicus believed that the universe was heliocentric, instead of the common Catholic teaching that it was geocentric. Later, Galileo backed up his ideas with even more observation thinking. Galileo made the heliocentric view more popular in Europe, but was later forced by the Inquisition to recant all his teachings and was put under house arrest for the rest of his life. As you can see these big ideas were not very widely accepted back then, but over time more people came to believe them, but are now known to be the truth because of people like Sir Issac Newton and Galileo.
Martin Luther was a very famous religious reformer of the early/mid 1500s. He openly defied the Catholic Church with his 95 theses that he wrote and nailed to the door of the church in his town. Martin Luther was mainly against the selling of indulgences. Well, the 95 theses was considered heresy by the pope and the penalty for a heretic is death. Instead of being scared though, Martin Luther just continued what he was doing even more passionately, even though he was sent a bull of excommunication from the Church in Rome, which he promptly burned in a bonfire.
Here are my five theses for Computech Middle School:
1. School should be the same length as most other FUSD schools
2. Jeans should be allowed in the dress code
3. Break should be longer than ten minutes
4. Lunch should be earlier in the day
5. The grace period for library books must be longer
Between Michelangelo and Leonardo da Vinci I think I would rather meet da Vinci. I think that would be really cool because he had so many different talents and interests. This is different than Michelangelo because Michelangelo is best known for his art, whereas Leonardo da VInci made well known accomplishments in many areas. That is why he is considered a true renaissance man!
Leonardo da Vinci painted famous art such as the Mona Lisa and the Last Supper, and he also made big discoveries and achievements in areas such as anatomy, architecture, maths, geology, and so much more! Modern people have uncovered some of da Vinci's journals, and what they have found is surely astonishing. Most of his ideas were kept to himself within his own journals, but his discoveries would have changed the way people thought about many things in that time. Also, I bet you didn't know that Leonardo wrote his journals in mirror writing, so people couldn't read them! This is why I think it would be very cool to meet Leonardo da Vinci.
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