Katie

**Biography** Hi my name is Katie. I am going to share with you my geographical biography. To start I live in Conrad, Iowa and have for all of my life. I live on a farm 8 miles north of Conrad. Places I have visited are New York City, North Carolina's Outer Banks, Washington D.C., Colorado Springs, Phoenix Arizona (twice), Minneapolis, Missouri, Kentucky, Tennessee, Indianapolis, Chicago, West Virginia, Maryland, South Dakota, and many more! I am not very fluent in geography, but am anxious to learn more. I know that when I get older I want to live in Colorado. And everyone knows that they have gorgeous mountains (that sure has a lot to do with geography).

**Reflection of South America: **
**My reflection on this project was made up of mixed feelings. I felt that it was a good learning experience. It took a long time to actually know what we were supposed to do. At first my group members and I didn't know what country or needs to select since there are so many. We all brainstormed together and built off of each others ideas. We researched what countries in South America were most impoverished. After we agreed on a country (Venezuela) we brainstormed over ideas that would help their people, local economy, provide a substantial impact on the citizen's lives, and would stick around for years to come. My group and I researched that Venezuela is a big producer of corn. Their seasons are opposite of ours, so that means that we would be raising corn all year round. This is a great benefit for our company. Out program is called "Grow A Dream," and it was implemented for the purpose of making us money, helping the underprivileged or unemployed with job opportunities, and encourage the growth of a plant that has many uses. In the end it was stressful to get everyone involved and all of our info turned in on time. In general I liked the project.** **While researching I learned that different parts of Venezuela have either a rich, middle class, poor, or deeply impoverished. The areas that were poor and impoverished were the ones that we directed our help towards. Yes we used the characteristics and uses of geographic technologies, and the impact of changing global patterns of trade and commerce on the local community and predict the future impact of these patterns. I played a fairly important role in the group setting up everything on my computer. I would not have messes around in class so much watching funny youtube videos with Kate. Having everyone do a specific task could improve our groups sufficiency.**

**Middle East Reflection:**
**My reflection on this project was better than the last. This time I pretty much knew what I was doing. Researching all of this information about the Middle East was VERY interesting. This part of the world is so different from our customs and traditions. Like the last research project we all brainstormed and collaborated all of our ideas together. I liked that Mr. Ehn had a topic pick out for us. It was a very good topic and would apply to the real world. Kate, Shaun, Collin, and I all divided up the topics evenly and researched our own.** **During my research I learned so much. Different parts of the Middle East are different from each other yet alike. Their governments are different from country to country along with the language, the way their people dress, their religion, and social behaviors. A few things that stuck out the most to me were that you couldn't use your left hand at all because is considered unclean. Another is that giving them the thumbs up signal is equivalent to us flipping them off!! :) The Iowa Core standards that we completed were to understand the causes of boundary conflicts and internal disputes between culture groups (meaning the differences between cultural groups and how that causes conflict). The other was to understand social, cultural and economic processes shape the features of places (that information if on our keynote). The role I played in my group was the same as last time. I played a fairly important role in the group with Kate's help setting up and finishing the presentation. What I would have done different is devoted more time to this project instead of trying to finish it in study halls. We improved upon our success from last time. We could have communicated more effectively.**

=﻿Asia Reflection: = My reflection on this project was so far the best of all of them. This time I knew EXACTLY what I was doing, and I hope that the project shows it. Learning about Asia and a lot of the countries that occupy the continent was very interesting. The country that we chose to help was North Korea. They had many problems. They have such a strong dictatorship that people are not trusted to leave the country or even allowed to visit neighboring towns. To start on this project I was really frustrated because I couldn't find anything to research. After a long time spent on google I came across North Korea and their human rights issue of citizens crossing the border and not having any travel freedom. While researching North Korea more in depth I learned that the have a very strong dictator, Kim Jong-il, he is very mean to the people of his country and if there is any misconduct you were either banished, put into a correction camp, put into jail, tortured, or executed. If I lived in this country I would try to flee also. The North Korean refugees are fleeing to China where Chinese officials are bringing them back. After they get brought back they are tortured, beaten, and executed. THAT IS HORRIBLE! North Korean people are told what to believe in, who to follow, what their jobs are, how many kids they will have, and many more. Their lives are being controlled by a man who doesn't even know them. The Iowa Core Geography standard we will be meeting is to understand diverse cultural responses to persistent human issues. By respecting their culture and ways we will be able to do business and help them travel. One of their most common human rights issues is freedom of movement 'travel' so we will be improving human issues in that way by implementing our taxi service. I played the same role I always do. I put everything together on my computer with peoples help and input. Something I would do differently is to e-mail the people who were gone and relay information to them about our project. The process is improving along the way as we are completing more and more projects.

=Africa Reflection: =

My reflection on this project was not as good as the last. I felt that we weren't as organized as previous projects. Learning about Africa was very interesting to me. Living in a third would country would be very difficult. I cannot imagine what those people live like. I consider my life to be of great value. I have so many more opportunities than they do. I also learned that there is a large population of orphaned kids that live on the street because they simply have no choice. The Iowa Geography Core Standard that we met was Understand diverse cultural responses to persistent human issues. We will meet this standard by providing orphanages for these kids to live in. This is one of the most prevalent human issues in Africa. The role I played in my group was the same as all previous projects. I was not here one day due to a class I had at MCC. Things that I would consider doing differently are organizing our information better. Communicating more effectively would have prevented us from maybe doing repetitive tasks. I felt that we did well on this last project. As expected everyone's morale winds down towards the end of the year. We put a lot of effort into this project for how busy everyone is. We could improve our process by using better communication and effectiveness. All in all I am very proud of my group and of their effort they put into it. :)