Tuesday, May 11. 2021

Today's classes are:

9:15 - 11:50 C Block Legal Studies 

12:30 - 3:05 B Block Human Geography 

C Block Legal Studies - Today will be our second day in the learning commons for our Human Rights poster. I have poster paper for your Human Rights project and I'll give you the paper once I've seen your ideas (a rough sketch). Remember you need to create a visually appealing Human Rights Campaign Poster that addresses the human rights violation by incorporating key information (What is happening? Where is it taking place? What rights are being violated? Who is having their rights violated? Why are their rights being violated?) as well as pictures, symbols, and colours. Your poster should seek to draw the attention of the public through the balanced combination of text and visuals in a creative, yet educational manner! 

Graphics can tell your story in a compelling, immediate and powerful way to move your intended audience. So, simplify and summarize a complex story — and add impact through your design. What is your story? What do you want people to see? 

How do you know what information to focus on and what to exclude?

Some key questions are:

• What story do you want to tell?

• To whom?

• How do you want to reach them?

What will move your target audience to action?

Consider the story you are telling as well as the tone, style, and format of your message. How it will be read by your target audience? Does your audience have a prior interest in your subject or are you trying to reach a new audience? Different audiences may respond better to different graphic treatments — for example a campaign targeting youth, a rural population or government officials.

Lastly...People will look at your pictures before they read your text, if they read text at all. Graphics have to be self-contained. Put your conclusion right there in the caption. Your graphic poster has to tell a story (if it doesn’t, don’t use it) and your job is to keep redesigning it until the story is as clear as possible.

If you are looking at children's rights then check out the UN Declaration on the rights of the Child. Check out these posters at United for Human Rights or the gifs at #Standup4humanrights or these posters on the 60th anniversary for the UN Declaration on Human Rights from Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR).

B Block Human Geography - Today we'll examine the key issue "Why Do Countries Face Obstacles to Development"? Developing countries do not have access to the funds necessary to fund development, so they obtain financial support from developed countries. Finance comes from two main sources: direct investment by transnational corporations and loans from banks and international organizations. To promote the international trade development model (for development investment by transnational corporations), countries representing 97 percent of world trade established the World Trade Organization (WTO) in 1995 (there are 164 member countries as of 29 July 2016). Commerce in which products are made and traded according to standards that protect workers and small businesses in developing countries is considered fair trade. The fair-trade movement is an alternative vision of the international trade approach which attempts to increase the prices that are paid to producers in LDCs. Fair trade also tries to eliminate the very low wages and extremely poor working conditions for workers in LDCs (check out the who gets what from the price of a banana website here)

Two UN agencies, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank, provide loans to LDCs to develop. An alternative source of loans for would-be business owners in developing countries is microfinance. Microfinance is the provision of a small loan to individuals and small businesses that are unable to get a loan from commercial banks

You'll have some questions to finish up the week 2 package for me. 

Your Term/Semester long Urbanization project will be to build a city with the computer game SimCity Buildit (or another program like it). There is a “Freemium” version of “Sim City Buildit” for iOS Apple (at the Apple Store) and Google Android (at the Google Play Store) products.

The concept of SimCity BuildIt is just like every other entry in the series (SimCity). You have a plot of land, you section off some zones for residential, commercial, and industrial, and you start to grow your city. BUT… like for all “free” games you’ll get the basic entry, but a premium (AKA money) is charged for additional features, services, or virtual (online) or physical (offline) goods that expand the functionality of the free version of the software. I DO NOT WANT YOU SPENDING MONEY FOR THIS PROJECT OPTION. SimCash, is the in-game currency that can be used to buy more Simoleons (fictional game money that is used to purchase missing items needed to upgrade buildings or speed up the construction of things “in-game”). Please do not purchase SimCash…since you’ll be doing this game over time you do not need to speed things up. You can play this version on your phone or tablet and there are some services that allow you to play it on your pc at home as well.

You can play the classic DOS game SimCity 2000 online at:

Play DOS Games SimCity 2000
Classic Reload SimCity 2000
Play Classic Games SimCity 2000

Now notice the name… “SimCity 2000”; it’s old and slow, however it is easier to start with (especially with the videos and the tips and tricks below). If you choose to play the game online please note that you cannot save it, so this will limit your game play to one, possibly, very loooong experience (NOTE: If you own a copy of a newer SimCity, like SimCity4, that’s fantastic you should just play it). You can find out how to play it at:




If you'd like to read how to play SimCity 2000, the manual for the game can be found here.

You can find tips and tricks for game play at: Zealgames, Dark Brick Abode, or GameBytes Magazine

Now, you could download SimCity 2000 from TechSpot (Note: This game is for DOS and to play it on computers with newer versions of Windows you will need a DOS 'emulator' like D-Fend Reloaded). Please be very careful to check what site you choose to download a free version of the game from; I do not want you to get malware on your computer. I have checked the SimCity 2000 from TechSpot (above) and it appears clean, however if you are unsure then just play it online.

You could also play Micropolis online where you can save your game play. In January 2008, the SimCity source code was released under free software license and renamed to Micropolis. You can also play it at Micropolis JS

You could also play 3D City online.


So, for this project, I will need you to build a city and as you play, you’ll need to keep a track of what you did, why you did it and what the results were. One way to determine what to build, where to build, and how much to build is to list all the possible requirements a city’s citizens might have. As you build your city, use these questions to help design a city that is well planned:

1. How will you lay out your city? What kinds of industrial, commercial, and residential areas will you build? Where will you build them?
2. How will your city pay for infrastructure and basic services?
3. What services (police, fire, medical, education) will your city provide? Where will you place them?
4. What kinds of parks and recreation areas will be in your city?
5. How will you provide power to all areas of your city?
6. Do you have renewable energy sources?
7. How will you make sure all areas of your city have water?
8. How will your city dispose of waste and recycle?
9. How will you manage pollution (water and air) in your city?
10. What types of transportation will be available to move citizens and goods?

How can you keep a track of things while playing? You can do this by taking screen captures of your game play and then writing things down or speaking them into an audio file. You can record your game play (on something like Bandicam) all of this is for the report/presentation (to me).

So what is the submission aspect of this (AKA...what do you need to hand in to me)?

You will need to make a presentation with a written a narrative (minimum 500 words) describing your future city’s key features and design attributes. The purpose of the City Narrative is to give me a quick overview of the future city’s infrastructure and its public services. Think of the City Narrative as a marketing piece. What unique features does your city offer? Why would someone want to live in your city? Are there any special benefits to living in your city?

Use the planning questions above and these questions to help write a city description.

1. What basic information should people know about your city (such as the name, population, age, and location)?
2. What is important to know about your city’s physical components (landmarks, parks, and recreation areas) and infrastructure (transportation, energy, waste disposal, pollution control)?
3. What services (such as police, fire, medical, education) does your city offer?
4. What features make your city innovative and unique?
5. What did you learn about urban planning and city design?

This can be as a written report with photos (word document or online blog), as a podcast (spoken word audio file), or as a video file. The report and game play are based around the following key issues/outcomes from the course:

• Where Are Services Distributed?
• Where Are Consumer Services Distributed?
• Where Are Business Services Distributed?
• Why Do Services Cluster in Settlements?
• Why Do Services Cluster Downtown
• Where Are People Distributed Within Urban Areas?
• Why Are Urban Areas Expanding?
• Why Do Cities Face Challenges?