Wednesday, April 25, 2007

9th Grade Review - Neolithic Revolution


Explain the Neolithic Revolution and its significance. (You learned this over a year ago and it will probably be on the Regents Exam).


Information On The Neolithic Revolution:

The Neolithic Revolution was a major turning point in the world because before this event, humans would hunt animals and gather food in order to survive. They would migrate to deferment places and never get settled in one area because of the climate and food supply. Later on these humans got better skills at cropping and had better techniques.

The Neolithic Revolution had an immense influence to society from the period after 9000 BCE when ground and polished stone tools were mostly used, through the Great Leap Forward, to the foundation of civilization. During the Neolithic Revolution, families had more leisure time then they did before because, they started to harness nature by planting crops and domesticating animals for food, instead of always going out and hunting for food. In the process of shifting from hunting and gathering to farming, people laid the foundations of a centralized government, religion, and the development of writing. The formation of civilization in this world would have been unattainable without farming.

The European Union




Briefly explain the European Union and respond to the following: Why is it a good thing? What will it prevent?




Some Information About The European Union:


After the World War II, economic unity became a very appealing concept. The Western European countries were no longer a great power; France and England lost most of their African and Asian Colonies and Germany was divided in two. As this was all taking place, the United States and Soviet Union quickly emerged as the world?s leading powers causing the European countries to be economically dependent on them. In order to promote economic stability after World War II, ten European countries set up the Council of Europe in 1949. This council did not focus on national defense or military activities but instead attempted to unify the members in order to improve their economic well being. As time passed, more countries joined bringing the number up to twenty-three. In 1950, a French statesman named Jean Monnet, promoted the idea of unification based on economic needs of European countries. Monnet approached France?s foreign minister, Robert Schuman, with an idea of uniting France and Germany?s coal and steel resources. Schuman liked the idea and had him draft a document known as the schuman Declaration. As of this day their is up to 27 countries united with the European Union.


So was this a good thing?


This was a good thing because now traveling to Europe is more easier and effective due to this developement. It is more easy to travel around the world like the U.S. this means that they don't have to stop everytime to show them their passport and just keep going. Now many people who live in the EU nations can freely now work in any part of the EU nations without any problems. The 27 European nations have a lot of citizens even more then what the U.S. has but it won't be much of a problem getting around anything more.


What will it prevent?


This will prevent another war, because they are united economically, politically, and socially. So this means that the chance that these countries would want to start war is very small

Sunday, April 15, 2007

Film Lesson- "The Right Stuff"


How were the US and the USSR competing in the film "The Right Stuff"? Explain who was winning the competition. What scenes from the film will help you remember this Cold War event.


In the Film "The Right Stuff" there was two kind of countries competing against each other. They were the U.S. and the USSR (Soviet Union), they were trying compete by seeing which of them had the best astronuants and rockets. They did everything they needed too, so they can get their best results. The U.S. send a monkey to go out of space and go around the earth of servel times before they can send a human, this helped them because a monkey has traits close to a human. Later on about a few weeks later the USSR (Soviet Union) send a human instead of a monkey to go out of space and it made the U.S. look bad because they got to send a person out before America did. But even if the USSR (Soviet Union) were ahead of us we still got to win the competition because we had better technology that was expanding more and we had some of the best trained astronuants working for us which did a better job then them, plus we went even farther than them in space. That made our abilities greater then theirs.


Cuban Missile Crisis


Explain the Cuban Missile Crisis. What happened and why is it considered “the hottest moment in the Cold War”? What did Kennedy do to combat the crisis?
The Cuban Missile Crisis was the closest the world ever came to nuclear war. The United States armed forces were at their highest state of readiness and Soviet forces in Cuba were prepared to use nuclear weapons deployed on Cuban beaches to defend the island if it was invaded. What have happened was that After WWII, only two major superpowers existed. These two powers were, the United States and the Soviet Union. At the end of WWI Germany which had been the major superpower, along with the U.S. was destroyed. Therefore the Soviet Union took over. The Cold War was a period in which the Soviet Union and the U.S. were competing for power. This war was not really a war it was more like a competition. The U.S. and the Soviet Union started to figure out how nuclear weapons worked, and how to use them. Although these two nations were competing for power they had to realize that if either of them shot a nuclear weapon at the other, they would achieve mutual nuclear destruction. That was why the U.S. and the USSR came to a conclusion. They decided that instead of focusing on each other, they would point some of the missiles to other parts of the world. The Soviet Union did not want the U.S. to become the only superpower, so the government decided to install missiles in Cuba. As allies with the USSR Cuba agreed. With Fidel Castro under power things just became more complicated. In the year of 1961, Fidel Castro kicked out of Cuba all the rebels that were against communism. All of these people went to Florida. What president John F. Kennedy did to combat the crisis was that he announced a naval blockade to prevent the arrival of more missiles. He demanded that the USSR dismantle and remove the weapons and declared a quarantine zone around Cuba. For several tense days Soviet vessels avoided the quarantine zone, and Khrushchev and Kennedy communicated through diplomatic channels. Khrushchev finally agreed to dismantle and remove the weapons from Cuba and offered the United States on-site inspection.


NATO and The Warsaw Pact


What were NATO and the Warsaw Pact? Who formed these alliances and why?


The Warsaw Pact was a military alliance of the Soviet Union, Albania (until 1968), Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, East Germany, Hungary, Poland, and Romania. NATO stands for The North Atlantic Treaty Organisation. It was formed in 1955 in response to West Germany's entry into NATO. Its terms included a unified military command and the stationing of Soviet troops in the other member states. Warsaw Pact troops were called into action to suppress uprisings in Poland (1956), Hungary (1956), and Czechoslovakia (1968). The alliance was dissolved in 1991 after the collapse of the Soviet bloc, and Soviet troops departed. Several Warsaw Pact members later joined NATO.