Copernicus

              Copernicus is one of the most know astronomers, he was one of the first people to suggest that not everything in the solar system circled around the Earth and that it in fact went around the Sun in ovals. He made a book with his opinions and comparing them to the opinions of other people. He refrained from publishing his book for quite a while because he didn't want to get in trouble with the Catholic church.
               His ended up publishing his book, it was called "On the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres" The first printed copy was given to him on his death bed. He died the same year his book was published. As it would work out, he did get in trouble with the Church and his book was banned from the church because they believed that this new theory was saying that because the Sun was the center of all the solar system, that implied that people on Earth were not the center of God's plan in making the world.
               Despite his works being banned by the church, people slowly started to accept Copernicus' theory and others started to believe that the Sun was the center of the solar system. He would eventually be called the "Father of Astronomy".

Grass

This is a paper I did for the week about grasses.

GRASSES

What is a grass?

Grass is a plant that grows, but not just the green stuff that grows in your yard. It is also wheat, rice, sugarcane and bamboo.

What does graminoid mean?

A fancy word for grasses. Something that is grass like

Are grasses Monocots or Dicots? What characterizes them as such?

Monocots, they have single .

Where are grasses found?

Pretty much everywhere.

How much land is covered by grasses?

Roughly 20%

What are the 3 types of grasslands?

         1. Savanna

         2. Plain

         3. Farmlands

Define cereal as it pertains to grasses.

It is the grains of grasses that have been made into an edible delight.

Make a list of the subset of grasses called cereals.

1. Rice

2. Maize (Corn)

3. Wheat

4. Oats

5. Sorghum

6. Barley

Which ones are the most important cereal crops?

Wheat, Oats, Rice, Maize, Sorghum

What is turf grass?

Turf is grass used in lawns, grass that is maintained.

List some ornamental grasses:

         1. Indian Grass

         2. Blue Fescue

         3. Japanese Blood Grass

         4. Pampas Grass

List some woody grasses:

         1. Bamboo

2. Hay

3. Straw

4. Corn

What are sedges?

They are flowering herbs

Are they a true grass?

No they are not.

List some sedges:

1. Pineapple

         2. Western Inflated

         3. Slough Sedge

         4. Sawbeak Sedge

How do grasses reproduce? Make a list with examples.

         1. Tillering

         2. Rhizomes

         3. Seeds

         4. Sends off shoots

         5. breaking apart and replanting

Grass is really important for animals, there are quite a lot of animals that eat grasses as their main source of food. For instance, Cows, Sheep, Horses, Goats, Rodents, and also some birds.

A Middle Ages Meal

I am going to give you a menu of a few middle age dishes.

Oat Cereal with Almond Milk
        This is basically oatmeal with whole almonds in it, it also has a bit of salt as well.

Sallat
     What people in the middle ages called a salad. It would have lettuce, carrots, turnips and walnuts.

Currant Cake
     This is just a cake with some spices in it, such as nutmeg, cinnamon, ginger and a bit of mace

Jobs in the Middle Ages

I am going to post this post as if I was a person from the middle ages telling you about an average day of work as a Messenger.

         Hello my name is Ralph, I am the go to messenger where I come from so the work is good.  I enjoy my job, sometimes its not the best set up though. You know the phrase "Don't kill the messenger"? That can apply in literal terms to me! Now, I've never been killed for the messages I deliver, obviously or else I wouldn't be talking right now! But I have known people who have not had the best experiences delivering a message.
         For the most part I deliver messages for the local nobles, sometimes I will deliver to someone with a lower status and sometimes to people with a higher status. It's the higher status people that you have to look out for! I once delivered a message to a high ranking knight, he didn't like what the message said so he had me imprisoned for a few weeks!
          But overall it's a pretty good job, it pays well enough for me to be able to put food on the table for my family everyday and that's what really matters. I need to put some money aside though, it's about time I get a new horse, my current horse just isn't quite as fast as he once was.

Gregor Mendel

Gregor Mendel is a man who made a major break through in the study of genetics with his study of peas. He found out how to predict recessive and dominant genes from the parents will be distibuted to the children.

Math

In math I am currently learning about radicals and square roots. How to add, subtract. multiply and divide them. It's a little confusing at times but for the most part I understand it quite well. The hardest part for me is problems that have square roots in fractions. But even that I have mostly figured out.

Interview of King Harold

My assignment for today is to write some questions as if I was a reporter in the time of King Harold and ask him some questions.



Q: I learned that you were injured in the Battle of Stiklestad. What happened to you? How long did it take to recover?

Q: What made you want to learn how to fight with two swords at the same time? How long did it take to master the skill?

Q: Why did you want to become part of the Varangian Guard?

Q: Once you became head over a troop for the Guard, why did you invade Persia?

Q: Why didn't you give your hair to Empress Zoe?

Q: Were you involved in the death of Magnus the Norwegian king?

Q: What went wrong at Stamford Bridge?

Q: Was your death painful?

Norse mythology in Lord of the Rings

          Today I learned that there is quite a lot of comparison between Norse mythology and the famous book series by J.R.R Tolkien. Tolkien was very knowledgeable of the Norse Sagas, which are also called Northern Sagas. While writing Lord of The Rings Tolkien tried to recreate Northern Sagas for a modern audience. Middle-Earth is like Midgard which is the realm where the humans live and is in the middle of the eight worlds of the Norse universe.
           Tolkien's world is inhabited by the same types of creatures as there are in the Norse universe. The trolls, dwarves, wraiths, dragons and more. Similar to the Norse universe, Tolkien's world is torn apart by different kingdoms fighting against each other in order to survive.
 Tolkien instilled Northern values into his characters. The most important of these values, one that you can find in almost every Norse Saga, is fellowship. having loyalty to one's friends and ruler. The importance of loyalty is seen very often in both Norse Sagas and Tolkiens books.