Thursday Jan. 30th

• Bell Ringer # 1• The three (or more) things I know about

Russia are:

Homework

• Review daily chapter notes everyday. Quiz next Friday.

• Prepare to take Ch. 16 Test if you missed it.

CH. 17 Belarus, Ukraine, & Russia

# 7

• Russia extends 6,000 miles from east to west. It stretches across Eurasia.

• (Eurasia—name given to Europe and Asia when considered one large landmass)

Review Boundaries

Review Boundaries

• The Ural Mountains separate the Western part (including Ukraine and Belarus) of Russia from the Eastern Siberian part of Russia.

• The western side has a milder climate and more precipitation because of the Atlantic Ocean.

• Temperature map

• Precipitation map

• Ice age glaciers and long term erosion shaped the plains of the Northern European Plains.

• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W6LIhNgsQoc&list=PLWzN1X1Tcn9Muk_08RW3KmQiZs9IHF35-

• Russia’s Geographic Challenges 1:32

• Active volcanoes created mountains in Russia’s Far East.

• Show on Google Earth• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ek8Rrtnb

K9M --Kamchatka eruption

• The Dnieper, Don and Volga are three of the largest south flowing rivers. These shipping channels also supply hydroelectricity for cities.

Russia is on the same latitude as Canada and Alaska. The winters are very harsh.

• Humid continental, subarctic, and tundra climates make up the region around Russia.

• Cold climate creates a polluted icy fog that hangs over cities.

• Siberian’s winters are so harsh because ocean winds and moisture cannot reach it.

• The European/Western part of Russia has a milder climate, better soil, and a larger population.

• The extreme cold limits Russia’s access to the sea. The Artic Ocean can freeze their northern ports.

• Murmansk stays warmer because of the North Atlantic Drift and is Russia’s only ice free Artic port.

• North Atlantic Drift

Murmansk

• In Southern Russia a drier grassland is called the Steppe.

• It has rich soil and is used to produce large amounts of grain products.

• Russia’s forest, energy and mineral resources are among the richest in the world but much of it was wasted because the government pushed production over conservation. What is left is poor quality.

Oil reserves in Caspian Sea.

• Russia has huge oil reserves in the Caspian Sea area.

• The Volga River basin has used the oil reserves to become an industrial heartland.

Ch. 17 section 2History and Culture

• Bell Ringer # 2

» Look at the Russian Alphabet. Notice the differences in sounds and letters. Try to spell your name or write a simple English word using Russian letters.

Homework

1st People in Russia

• Early people migrated from the south and then to the east and west to populate China and Central Asia.

• The main people to settle in this area were Slavs.

Why is it called Russia?

• In 800 AD Kiev (today Ukraine’s capital) became an important trading center between the Mediterranean Sea and Baltic Sea. Kiev’s early leaders were Scandinavian traders called Rus.

• From 1240 AD to the late 1400s Mongols controlled Moscow and Kiev.

• Later, in 1547 Ivan the Terrible crowned himself Czar (monarch) of all Russia. Russia grew in size with each successive czar.

• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p9Ol0IJkU7c

• Brief history of Mongol Empire and Genghis Khan 2:51

• Russia began to industrialize in the late 1800s but the poor remained in servitude.

• The rural poor were called serfs—people bound to the land and the land owners. Even after serfs were freed, life remained desperate for the poor.

• Vladimir Lenin wanted to make a society based on the ideas of Karl Marx. At first the new Society of Soviet Socialist Republic(s) (USSR) was supposed to be self-governed in a system that made everyone equal.

• http://app.discoveryeducation.com/search?Ntt=russian+Revolution

• 10 mines Russian RevolutionDiscovery Ed

• In 1917, the Bolsheviks overthrew the government and began the Russian Revolution.

• The Czar’s family, The Romanovs, were shot to death. This ended the royal bloodline.

• However, it quickly became a one-party, totalitarian state lead by Lenin and then Joseph Stalin and a series of other leaders.

• Personal freedoms were strictly limited. Dissenters were jailed and many forced labor camps were established for those who disagreed in anyway.

• http://app.discoveryeducation.com/search?Ntt=gulag

• Early Soviet Union in a nutshell 3:20

•

• Soviet leaders tried to stop religious worship believing it would lessen loyalty to the state. Travel and information from the outside was restricted severely.

• The Soviet Union began to loosen its grip in the 1980s allowing more political and economic freedoms.

Policy of openness

• Policy of Restructuring the gov’t for more political and economic freedom.

Why did the new policies of Perestroika and Glasnost lead the end of the USSR?

In 1991, the USSR fell apart for a number of reasons. It was running out of money and had too much territory to

manage.

• The satellite states (former independent countries that had been annexed into the USSR) had a fierce sense of nationalism and began to protest for their independence.

• Protests like the Solidarity movement in Poland to gain their independence from USSR.

The largest ethnic group and language type in the region is Slavic.

• The Caucasus Region is sometimes called a “shatter belt” –a zone of frequent boundary changes and conflicts. Throughout history people from the North (Russians, Mongols and Tartars) and people from the South (Turks, Persians, and Arabs) have fought over the Caucasus Mnts.

• Cossack Dancing http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I90Y3XQ_guc

• Russian Dancing Tutorial (watch first few minutes)

• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ig3ZmCkCCow

• Ethnic tension are still high in this region. Religion in the region are also diverse. Chechnya is a Muslim region. Northeast Caucasus is a Tibetan Buddhist area. Most of Russia belongs to Christian Orthodox Churches.

• ChristianOrthodox

• Chechnya

Settlement Patterns

• Warmer weather, transportation routes and steppe environments keep most Russians west of the Ural Mountains. Population rates are falling. Many have migrated away from the area after the fall of Communism.

• Communism afforded little freedom but the transition away from it has been difficult . Higher death rates have occurred because government run Healthcare is gone. Poverty also increased after the Soviet Union fell.

• (What does it mean to have the freedom to starve?)

• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gQjls3EWyok

• Trans-Siberian RR 5 mins