Titanic: The Unsinkable Ship

This week we are learning about the Titanic. The Titanic was the name of a popular food court in Brazil and served excellent teriaki chicken. Hee Hee Hee. Just kidding! The Titanic was a luxury cruise ship that unfortunately sunk because it hit an ice berg. More than 1,550 lives were lost and only 32% of the people on the ship survived. The ship is now in the ocean and can only be seen with a submarine. There was not enough life boats to hold every one and a lot of people died. Back then it was like a 9/11. I bet it sunk a lot of peoples attitudes.

Stuff on My Mind Right Now

A lot of stuff has happened to me and I want to put it all in one post so it won't take as long...

1. This week I finished The Work and the Glory: Pillar of Light By: Gerald Lund. It was a really good book that talks about Joseph Smith getting the Gold Plates and the Steed family and their own affairs. It talks about the McBride family and Oliver Cowdry, William Harris, and the Smith family. About how Joshua Steed moves out of the family and tries to steal the Gold Plates with the Murdock brothers. I learned a lot about the church and I can't wait to read the next one.

2. Last month I made a book club and invited a bunch of people, friends, family, neighbors and other homeschoolers. At the beginning we handed out papers that you're supposed to fill out your favorite books and any you recommend. Then we played outside for a while and waited for the others to come. When everyone was there told the our names and talked about what the name of the book club should be. I said we should name it "Lights, Camera, Jaxon!" My friend Wyatt said we should just call it "The Book Club book Worms" or "Jaxon's Book Club". But the my Dad said we should name it "The Papyrus Pirates of Words" and everyone agreed on that. We then discussed what books we should read, so we said the names of the books we liked and put them in a bowl and drew the books we would read. We decided on these books:

May: Holes by: Louis Sacher

June: Wayside Stories from Wayside School by: Louis Sacher

July: Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince by: J.K Rowling

August: The Hobbit by: J.R.R Tolkien

September: Summer of the Monkeys by: Wilson Rawls

October: Old Yeller by: Fred Gipson

November: Lord of the Rings #1

December: Marley and Me by John Grogan

January: Into the Wild by Eric Hunter

February: Great American Warriors

March: Artemis Fowl by Eoin Colfer

April: Pillage by Obert Sky

3. Next weekend is the Father's and son's Outing for my ward and we have to go on the day of my green belt graduation. We're going to go camping and fishing there. The plan is that if I pass testing I can just get it the next day. When I graduate I will get my purple belt.

Anne Frank: The Diary of a Young Girl

A few days ago I read the the book: The Diary of Anne Frank. It is about how the Jewish people were prosecuted by the Germans in WWII. It starts out on her birthday and everything is happy. At school she talks too much so her teacher makes her write a story called the incurable chatter box. Her dad Otto Frank receives word that the Germans are coming and also receives this list of things the Jews can no longer do.

1. Jews must wear a yellow six pointed star to distinguish themselves.

2. Jews must hand over their bicycles to the Germans.

3. Jews are banned from trains and forbidden to drive.

4. Jews are only allowed to do their shopping between 3 and 5 0'clock and can only go in the shops that have the placard "Jewish Shop".

5. Jews must be indoors before 8 o'clock and can't even sit in their own garden after that hour.

6. Jews are forbidden to visit theaters, cinemas, and any other place of entertainment.

7. Jews may not take part in public sports, swimming baths, tennis courts, hockey fields and other sports grounds are prohibited to them.

8. Jews may not visit Christians.

9. Jews must go to Jewish schools and many more like that.

The Franks go into hiding with the Van Daans into an abandoned warehouse. They find a secret room that is hidden behind a bookcase and call it the Secret Annexe. Anne's father prepared this living space for them for nearly a year and when he got a notice from the Germans saying Margot was to be sent to a labor camp, they decided it was time to hide. After six months a new person joins them, his name is Dr.Dussel. So he comes and he shares a room with Anne and hogs her desk. Mrs. Van Daan refuses to give up her expensive fur coat so they can have food. Everyone is really annoyed with her selfish behavior. Anne soon falls in love with the Peter Van Daan who is looks and not brains, this gives her somone to share her thoughts with but eventually she is over him. The company building that they hide in is visited by burglars twice and each time they get lower and lower on food. Every day a girl named Meip gives the Van Daans and the Franks fruit from the market place and a girl named Elli gives them school supplies. After two years of hiding and just one month before liberation, the Germans find the them and send them to consentration camps. Anne is separated from everyone but her sister who eventually gets sick and dies. Anne meets up with her old best friend Lies and soon dies of starvation. She refused to eat and had thought her dad had also died, so she hadn't any hope. The only survivor is Anne's father Otto Frank. After trying in vain to find his daughters, he is finally told they died. Meip, the girl who had been taking them supplies while in hiding reveals to him she found Anne's diary. He later had it published and it still is read by many. Anne Frank is probably Hitlers best known victim. I really liked the book and I recommend it to you.

Glad not to be a Gladiator

Rah! The Gory sport of Roman gladiators was considered fun back in old times. The people of Rome just loved it, watching men, women and animals brutally killed or wounded. Julius Caesar was famous because he payed for the fights. Gladiators were slaves, criminals, or just volunteers. To become a gladiator you had to go to gladiator school where you would become tough and mean. After you were done with school you would become a gladiator. Gladiators looked like Romes past enemies but they weren't always like that. There were 11 different types of gladiators all with different names, weapons, armor and clothing.

Myrmillo: Carries a dagger and shield. Wears wide leather belt, leg band and has a fish-like helmet.

Thracian: Uses a small shield and curved dagger. Wears greaves on both legs.

Andabatus: Wears a helmet with no eye holes and charges blindly at opponent on horseback.

Essedarius: A gladiator who drives a horse drawn chariot and carries a spear.

Retarius: Carries a trident and dagger. Has a net and tries to snare opponents. Wears shoulder armor on the left arm.

Women: An uncommon sight but women fought as all types of gladiators too.

Samnite: Wears a crested helmet and carries a sword and large shield.

Dimachaerius: Carries two swords and has little or no armor.

Lequarius: Is just like Retarius except that he carries a lasso instead of a net.

Secutor: A lightly armed and armored gladiator that chases his opponent with just a knife.

Velitus: A gladiator that wears lions skin on his back and carries only a spear.

Sometimes gladiator battles would be against animals with up to 15 gladiators all trying to kill lions, jaguars, panthers, elephants, crocodiles, rhinos, and bears using dogs, nets and spears. At least 5 times in gladiator history they did naval battles. They filled the big Roman coliseums with water then put two ships in them and battled! There is a cool gladiator game on the web if you want to play it click here, (p.s. you might want to read the types of gladiators). I still think it's good not to be a gladiator. =)

The Roman Army

Charge! Was the usual battle cry for the Roman army. This week I learned soooooo much about the roman army and Rome, and we did sooo many activities at homeschool about it. It was really cool!!! The Roman Empire had many enemies like the savage mountain barbarians, the Assyrians, the Egyptians, the Mongols, the Celts, the Arabs and the Persians. A lot of enemies right? I would rather make friends with all of them (except the barbarians). Rome came to have most of it's land because of a cruel dictator named Julius Caesar. One thing I did not know is that the Romans conquered the U.K.!?!? Yeah, that's right the Britons. They all rode over there and attacked the Celts.

This is a Celt.

The Celts went into battle naked! 1. because all of them where big, tall, strong and FIERCE!!!

2. because they thought that the blue paint on their bodies would protect them from swords and arrows. Unfortunately for them they lost and the Romans took over the U.K.

Do you know that the Romans actually named London, the original name was Londonium. The Romans had many ways of winning they used advanced weaponry, quick thinking, and strategic formations that made them brutal opponents. The advanced weaponry was something most of their enemies didn't have artillery!!! The Romans had three types of artillery the most famous of them is probably the Catapult. The catapult (just in case somebody doesn't know) is a wooden mechanism that was commonly used in the Middle Ages it used a clever pulley device that launched rocks at the enemy. They also used Ballistas, Giant Crossbows that shot huge arrows or spears that ripped through shields and armor.

The last of the Roman artillery was the Scorpio!!! The Scorpio was an awesome arrow tip shooting gun that looked kind of like a Ballista but shot arrow tips that caused instant death. The Scorpio was used like a machine gun could shoot up to 5 darts at a time. The Romans had really powerful artillery's but the Roman soldier was pretty good too. The common Roman soldier carried two throwing spears, one sword that he carried on his waist, one tall rectangular shield and a small dagger. They didn't have arrows because let's just say it just wasn't their thing. Sometimes the Romans rode horses into battle too. Romans had many sea battles as well, they were mostly against the Persians. Learning about the Roman army was pretty fun, but let's just say I still wouldn't want to be against them!

Caesar Salad & Confucius

Today in our Story of the World history book me and my mom read about Confucius and Julius Caesar. Confucius was a Chinese Philosopher who taught how to be good and not to be mean to animals and bugs. Here are a few of his most famous sayings.

1. Do not unto others what you would not want others to do to you.
2. If you make a mistake and do not correct it, this is called a mistake.
3. It is the wiser person who gives rather than takes.
4. He who aims to be a man of complete virtue does not seek to gratify his appetite for food.

I'm sure everyone has heard of Julius Caesar. He was a Roman General and a dictator and was very power thirsty. When he was a young boy he was captured by pirates when he was crossing the Mediterranean Sea. He later came back as a General and executed them all! He later married Cleopatra, a female Pharoah in Egypt. the Senete of Rome didn't like this very much so they stabbed Julius to death. Caesars last words were Et Tu Brute which in latin means You to Brutus. (Brutus had once been Caesars freind).

The Screwtape Letters

The Screwtape Letters by C.S Lewis was one of the most boring books I've ever read ): I didn't understand anything about it, but since it was an assigned book I had to read it. Screwtape (the uncle's nickname) is constantly writing to Wormwood (the cousins nickname) about God, philosophy, and life. It's pretty boring but I have to admit did learn a few things from it. Since WWII just barely broke out they have to use nicknames. Screwtape keeps talking about how the enemy is always getting stronger, smarter, and trying to outsmart you. I don't really recomend it to anyone if you want to be bored to death.

Where's My Mummy?

For awhile now we've been learning about Ancient Egypt at Riverside Scholars. Like did you know that Egypt was once divided into to parts? Upper and Lower Egypt but then they both fought one great war that would decided who would rule Egypt. Upper Egypt and The White Crowned King, King Narmer defeated Lower Egypt and the Red Crowned King and took hid crown away and put it on top of his own crown. There were many pharaohs and queens of Egypt the Egyptians were polytheists that means that they worship many Gods but that all changed this one time. There was once a pharaoh of Egypt named Amenhotep he was pretty normal for a few years, he sent out armies to stop rebellions, he married a Nubian princess, and worshiped the gods but then everything changed, he know told the people of Egypt that the gods didn't exist and that the only god was a god named Aten. The people were horrified and were forced to move into another city, build monuments of the god, and change there religion to Monotheism which means to worship one god. After Akhenehaten ( he changed his name) died the people rebelled and moved back to their usual way of life. I sure learned a lot when we studied Egypt who nows mabye the curse on Tut's tomb is real.