Words of Wisdom

The Octopi are filling a bulletin board with advice for next year's class. Here are a few of their ideas.

What are those Octopi up to now?

Well, attempting to paint the classroom bathroom. The only problem being a lack of painting experience but we gave it the old Seabury try!

Manifest Destiny

The Octopi wrote essays on what they had learned in Social Studies this trimester. Here are a few examples.

                   Manifest Destiny: The Winners and the Losers

                                                 By S.C. 

   Manifest Destiny was a good thing for whites, but a bad thing for Mexicans and Native Americans. Manifest Destiny was the idea that God wanted the whites to go all the way to the western coast and settle there. The term Manifest Destiny was created by John O’ Sullivan. A symbol of Manifest Destiny was the figure Columbia, who spread light all over the west, and where there was ignorance, she would bring civilization.

     Manifest Destiny affected the Natives in many negative ways. Many missionaries set out to “civilize” the Natives and turn them into Christian. Manifest Destiny brought so many settlers out into the west, that many Natives’ homes were taken and overrun. Hundreds of treaties were written, but very few of them actually worked. One treaty stated that the Lakota Natives would have their sacred hunting grounds, “The Black Hills” forever. But one day several Americans found gold in the Black Hills, and very many miners moved to the Black Hills and took it. This is just one example of the hundreds of treaties broken by the United States.

      A famous Native American battle was The Battle of Little Big Horn.  The Battle started with the Sioux and Colonel Custer. Rumors came out that gold had been found in the Black Hills. Thousands of civilians and miners came to the area to get gold. The Sioux were enraged at this. The government tried to persuade two Sioux chiefs, Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse, to go into an large  Indian Reservation. They refused and were declared hostile by the U.S. government who ordered three generals to go and defeat the “hostiles”. Colonel Custer was commander of the 7^th cavalry. He was proud and a bit too arrogant, Custer’s pride caused him to assume too much. He thought the Natives would be running from one of the generals but the Natives stood and fought. Therefore, none of the generals got the support they were hoping for, and they all died and were mutilated. The U.S. army hated all the Sioux and Sitting Bull after that.

         The Wounded Knee Massacre was a horrible and devastating thing for the Native Americans. The Battle happened several years after The Battle of Little Bighorn. Tensions were tight between the U.S. and the Sioux. The U.S. had forced the remaining Sioux into Wounded Knee Creek on Pine Ridge Reservation. On December 20, 1890, the new 7^th Calvary was disarming the Sioux. It is believed that during one disarming, a shot accidentally went off, causing mass confusion. Then the U.S. opened fire on the Natives as the U.S. thought that a Native fired a shot at someone. They used Hotchkiss machine guns, repeating rifles, and muskets to kill the Sioux. Almost all of the three hundred Sioux, including women and children, had died instantly from the bullets, or had frozen to death in the snow. This marked the end of Native American-Euro American wars.   

         Manifest Destiny also affected the Mexicans terribly. The Mexicans owned the west coast (except for Oregon Territory) and Manifest Destiny stated that Americans were supposed to live over on the west coast. This caused the Americans to start a war to get the west coast. During the Mexican War, over 16,000 Mexicans were killed.

          Oregon territory was another subject of Manifest Destiny. It was already claimed by the British and Manifest Destiny stated that Americans were supposed to get to the other coast. The Treaty of 1818 called that there would be a joint occupation; however, this solution was only temporary. James K. Polk was the elected president of that time and he wanted Texas, California, and all of the Oregon Territory. However, it would not be easy to thwart off the British, as they had the strongest Navy in the world. Nevertheless, Polk told Britain that the joint occupation would end in a year. The British were furious about this, and went to defeat the Americans, and they were confident that they could win, but when they got there, the British realized that they were outnumbered six to one. In June 1846, Britain made an offer of splitting Oregon at the 49^th parallel. Polk agreed, and there was no fighting.

       Manifest Destiny was a grand thing for Euro-Americans; however other foreign countries and people didn’t like it very much. For Whites, it was a great belief and everybody trusted in it. For the Natives and Mexicans, it was horrible, destructive and devastating. It caused very many deaths and losses of homes and families. Many lives were lost because of Manifest Destiny, along with trust.

     Manifest Destiny: Who Were the Winners and Who Were the Losers

                                                         By: G.B.

Manifest Destiny was good for the Americans and bad for the Native Americans. Manifest Destiny was stated by John O’ Sullivan, Manifest Destiny means that it was inevitable for the U.S to expand west. The topic of Manifest Destiny involves the Mexicans, the Native Americans and the Americans who moved west.

Moving westward was pretty much the main part of the term Manifest Destiny. It took a lot of work to move westward because if you didn’t have a wagon or and mules then you would have to make them or purchase them. If you didn’t make a lot of money then you would have to work harder to get more money to buy a wagon and some mules .You would also have to get more supplies and make sure you could fit it all in your wagon, so it was a lot of work to move west. The journey there was also very harsh because of the mountains and how long it took to even make it there considering that wagons were the only form transportation to the west.

The Native Americans also had something to do with Manifest Destiny. We needed to get the land from them so we thought that we could just take it but that didn’t go down so easily. The Native Americans knew what was coming and so they were prepared. There were many skirmishes that happened with different Indian tribes some of which were; Little Bighorn ,named after the river called the Little Bighorn, The Massacre at Wounded Knee ,1890,The Modoc War, The Nez Perce War, The Bannock, and many more.

Assimilation is something that the Americans used to solve the” Indian Problem”. Assimilation is taking one culture and forcing them to become like another. An example would be if you were from Japan and you moved to America you might be forced to assimilate so you would try to speak American, dress American and completely transform into the American culture. Americans wanted Indians to assimilate and fit into American society.

Treaties were a big part of Manifest Destiny because throughout the 19^th Century the legislative and legal system created several special policies that apply only to Indians giving them a different status. Between 1776 and 1871 the government negotiated 900 treaties and enacted 371. In what is called the Marshall Trilogy the Supreme Court established the legal basis for defining tribal sovereignty and for interpreting federal Indian law.

The Americans opinion of this was completely different from the Native American opinion. The Native Americans thought that the Americans were invading their territories but in the case of Manifest Destiny to the Americans the Indians were in their way of expanding .The Americans were then moving westward and taking over all of the Indians land and it wasn’t easy because the Indians were ready.

The war we had with Mexico was a very interesting part of Manifest Destiny because of the fact that congress is the only part of the government that can declare war and so the president, James. K. Polk, sent troops out to the border of Mexico and the U.S. and was kind of pushing their buttons to make congress see a reason why they should declare war on Mexico. When the Army  got to the capitol of Mexico they discussed a way to share the land and what the treaty read was that the U.S. would pay Mexico $15 million and receive California, New  Mexico, and maintain the border of Texas and the Rio Grande.

Manifest Destiny was good in some ways and bad in some ways. It was good for the Americans because it told them to move west but it was bad for the Native Americans because the moving westward of the Americans involved the Americans taking their land. It was also bad for the Mexicans because they lost a lot of their land after the war. This is why the Americans won and the Native Americans and Mexicans lost.

 

        Manifest Destiny: Who Were the Winners and Who Were the Losers

By: R.J. 

  Manifest Destiny was bad for the Indians and Mexicans but good for the whites. It expanded the US but many Native Americans lost their way of life and Mexico lost much of its land.

    Manifest Destiny was the 19^th century belief that it was inevitable for the US to expand to the Pacific coast.  The government helped by buying the land from the Louisiana Purchase and sent out Lewis and Clark to explore.  The Homestead Act was a piece of legislation signed by Abraham Lincoln that became a law. The was act passed by congress in promising 160 acres of land to the head of the family to farm. 

 Native Americans were pushed west by the Americans.  The Trail of Tears is a trail that the Native Americans walked on westward because the Americans forced them out of their homes so they could take over the land in the southeast. A lot of Native Americans died from starvation, disease and exposure on the Trail of Tears.

Then reservations were created by Americans to move the Native Americans west but that did not work. By the end of the 19^th century 56 out of 162 reservations were established. The American Government had made a lot of treaties with the Native Americans. The Native Americans had signed the treaties but the government didn’t carry through the treaties the Native Americans had signed. Then the American government had thought about sending Native American children to boarding schools and make them forget their religion, cultural, and traditions and become Christians.

Spain took over Mexico then Mexico fought back to get independent and they did. Then came the war with the United States. The government declared war against Mexico for almost all their land.  The Americans started to attack Mexico and the war lasted three years. After the war the US government made a treaty that would give Mexico 15 million dollars and Mexico would give up their land which is now known as Texas, Nevada, California, Arizona and New Mexico.

Manifest Destiny was good and bad at the same time. America expanded its land and became the country it is today. At the same time Mexico lost land and many Native Americans were killed.        

 

 

     

 

 

Cape Disappointment

The Octopi and Creators' field study to Cape Disappointment and other points on the Lewis and Clark Trail was a smashing success. Three days seeing the sites and learning about the Corp of Discovery, two nights of camping together in yurts and cooking and sharing meals together. Then there were the s'mores, playing on the beach, checking out WW II bunkers and so many other great experiences. And the weather was perfect!

Matisse Meets Pollock

After all the hard work of ITBS testing the Octopi took a break with a little art work. First they learned about Henri Matisse's collages and Jackson Pollock's Action Painting and then they combined the two. Fun and very cool art work!

Learning About Hearts

The Octopi had a visit from two of our Seabury doctor parents to dissect lamb hearts. They learned the parts of the heart and how blood and oxygen are passed through the body. They also discussed how to keep their hearts healthy for life.

Tacoma Symphony

The Octopi spent a week prepping for their visit to the Tacoma Symphony Orchestra's youth concert and joined fifth graders from throughout the area at the Pantages Theater in Tacoma. The concert was really awesome and the Octopi went away with a better understanding of how composers write and the structure of an orchestra.