Virtual Hangout

Prior to the chat, with our new friends in Britain, we did some in class preparation. We started by checking out the website of the Museum of Science and Industry (MOSI). Then we by watching a video that they sent over to us as a preview for the video chat. We defined all of the terms Jamie used when describing the process of spinning the wool. Once we had the new vocab defined we created some possible questions that we could ask during the video chat. We tried to use as much of our new vocab as possible in the questions. 

I got a lot of information from the chat. For instance, I learned that cleaning under the threads was the most dangerous job. Often owners took in orphans and had them do that job. They fed them and gave them a place to sleep in exchange for their work. Due to poor conditions and lots of cotton dust, many women got sick. Unsanitary practices also helped to spread disease around the mills faster. These were the downsides to an increase in speed and production of spun cotton. Originally men had to manually push the loom in order to get weaving done, but now it is mechanized. The mechanization made it so that women could now do this job instead of men. This was advantageous to owners because they could pay women less. These poor conditions led to shorter life expectancies. Also, women could have trouble giving birth to children because their pelvis was pushed in from standing at the mill all day. One thing I learned about being a curator was that people ask you a lot of weird things if you wear a shirt that says "Ask me a question". I hadn't realized how much the explainers had to know in order to get their job. 

Overall, I think having an outside source who knew what they were talking about definitely helped me to learn more. It was nice to talk with someone who specialized in this era/topic. The one thing I didn't like was that he was hard to understand. I personally felt like he had a Scottish or Irish accent rather than a British one... Other than that, I thought everything went really well. I think it would be a good idea to do this again at another point in the school year. It can be very beneficial to hear someone who specializes on a topic's opinion.

Spinning a Blog Post

The analysis of our document was very important to the overall success of the project. It helped us to reach a deeper understanding of the documents that we had been given. the analysis made it easier for us to the the connection between the documents and create a good presentation. In the end, our exhibit consisted of a graph, quotes from our excerpt, a picture of John Almond's handloom, a picture of the spinning jenny, a picture of a woman spinning at home and a picture of the textile mills. There was also some yarn connecting the pictures and their summaries to a point n the graph. Our group came up with the title of our exhibit by thinking about puns we could make about cities and spinning wool. Through our presentation and creative title we hope that a visitor will learn about the evolution of the spinning wheel and how it affected the amount of people in the city.

I learned a lot from the other exhibits as well. From group B's poster I learned that the steam powered engine was invented during the Industrial Revolution. The Great increase in speed allowed for more efficient trading and faster transportation. From Group C's poster I learned That a lot of waste from the factories and mills were being dumped into rivers and streams. I knew that there was some that had been dumped, but this poster really helped me to see the extant of what had been going on. Group D's poster was about child labor. I learned that a lot of children were being forced to work. The conditions that they were working in were not pleasant and should not have been allowed, but it was. I also learned about the increase in the number of slaves in the U.S. during the Industrial Revolution form Group E's poster. I was surprised to see that there was an increase during this time. The increase was caused by the need for more cotton for the new mills. Overall, I learned a lot of new information from each of the groups' posters. 

A Piece of Cake

In History we are learning about the Industrial Revolution. Our essential question is: What was 'revolutionary' about industrialization? This post will answer this question.

For people, industrialization was very revolutionary. Before the Industrial Revolution, crops were scattered around the land and were not creating a lot of usable crops. During the Industrial Revolution, people started to farm domestic animals, created more efficient ways to plant seeds, started to rotate crops, and use their land to its full potential. Now they are able to produce more crops that are larger than before and could feed more people. Along with having better crops, they needed to protect their land. In order to do this they enclosed their land. This means that they fenced off their land. However, all of the land was previously shared between peasant farmers so this caused some problems. These peasants were kicked off of the land, and had to move to the city to find work. They were the labor force of the Industrial Revolution. If the Industrial Revolution hadn't come around, then the output of crops would have been lower and fewer people would have been working in the city.

Farm Fence. Digital image. Fenceworks. Fenceworks Co., n.d. Web. 10 Sept. 2014. <http://www.fenceworks.net/farm-fence-sales-installation.html>.

Along with the people, the technology was also revolutionary. John Kay invented the flying shuttle which increased the speed of weavers. After that, the Spinning Jenny was invented in order to spin many threads at the same time. The water frame was the next big step in the textile and used water to further increase the speed of spinning. In the cities, there were large power mills that were used to spin threads. These sheds led to factories that ran on the steam engine. These factories needed workers and increased the amount of available jobs. With their new work team, and increase of goods, the factories were making a lot of money and the workers had enough. With enough money the workers were able to survive and live a more comfortable life.

A New Type of Literacy

Recently in my high school history class, we have been learning about media literacy. We learned how to search for information on Google and use online resources through an activity called A Google A Day. It is a fun activity in which you are asked a question that you can't just Google to find the answer. You have to try many different searches and try many different answers until you find the right one. At times it was frustrating because no matter how many different answers we found none of them were correct. Google would only accept one answer so it was hard to figure out which one it wanted when there were many. Through this experience I learned that there is not always going to be a straightforward answer and sometimes it may take multiple searches in order to find the right one. The questions also got harder to answer as the activity went on.




Reading, Mike. Google Chrome. Digital image. Google Apps for Education Tips & Tricks. Google, 21 Jan. 2013. Web. 6 Sept. 2014. 
 

Authenticity, reliability and accuracy are key components in deciding whether or not a website can be used for school. Authenticity is how genuine the information and the source is. If the information matches up with what you already have and the source is a well known or dependable then the website can be deemed authentic. Reliability is how trustworthy a website is. If you can not trust the source then it should not be used in school. Accuracy is how correct the information you are receiving is. In order to test these, we used the Pacific Northwest Tree Octopus website. After analyzing the website, I deemed that it was not an appropriate source to use in school. It is not appropriate because the author is not a reliable source and the information given is not accurate or real. At first glance, the website looks like an authentic website, because of the web address, layout, fonts, phrasing, images and links. As it turns out, this website is just another internet hoax. 

Opposites Attract Me

I am a high school student who created this blog for History class.


What makes a teacher great is their attitude towards the curriculum and the students. A great teacher has so much enthusiasm that the students can't help but to get excited. A great teacher is strict when the time comes, but is also someone I would be willing to come to if I had any type of problem.  All of my favorite teachers have had qualities like these. One was very strict, but I got a lot out of the class and still enjoyed my time while the other was happy and friendly while still managing to get information across. They both were great, but in different ways. One way that a teacher could support me would be to encourage me, but not let me become a control freak (which I sometimes do become).

After watching John Green's video(to the right), I feel like as a society we need to work on getting more people educated. There are people out there who could cure cancer, but can't because they could not get the proper education. It makes me feel lucky that I live in a town with such a nice school system.
One of my goals this year is to be more organized, whether it be with my binders// notebooks or my locker, I need to conquer the problem that is disorganization. This is going to be a real challenge for me because I find that if I become crunched for time and start putting papers wherever, it all goes downhill from there. I guess then that this is also a sort of time management goal, but mainly its just taking the time I need to make sure everything is nice and neat. :)