Monday, November 28, 2011

Week 8 Vocab/ Journal

1.) Accounts Receivable- Money owned to you.
Ex: This quarter was bad for the Nike store because the accounts payable was twice the
2.) Ammoratize- To pay off debt by
Ex:
3.) Economic Index- An indicator of what is going on in the economy.
Ex: The Dow Jones is an easy economic index of how the stock market is doing today.
4.) Depreciation- The decrease of price in something because of  a negative situation.
Ex: When Steve Jobs died, Apple's stock's depreciated.

Journal
This week i decided not to invest in anything because my stocks hadn't had any drastic changes that would cause me to take any action. One stock that i bought at the very beginning of the game was Randgold Resources. Randgold Resources belongs to the Basic Material sector. I thought this would be a good investment because gold seems to always do pretty good even when the stock market is doing bad. I bought this stock for $ 101.73 and i did this because according to their 52 week information, this was in the middle, leaving much room to grow.

Monday, November 21, 2011

Video

1.) What is your opinion about the video, explain!
I feel like it's unfair for the Senate and Congressmen to be able to buy stocks. They have insider information that gives them an unfair advantage of the public. This defeats the purpose of how the stock market works. If they can have this information then it should be fair for everyone else to have that same information, therefore Martha Stewart shouldn't have gone to prison for the information she had.

2.) What can you do about your opinion?
I can spread my opinion to people around me and hope they will also believe the same thing. This could cause enough people to come together to actually make a difference and put a stop to it.


3.) What is insider trade, what was the information that caused Martha Stewart to go to prison?
Insider trade is when you get insider information from a business about whether a stock will go up or down.  Martha Stewart found out that a certain business was about to sell all their stocks, she went to prison for lying about her infomation.

4.) What is Black Friday and when did it get its name, what is Cyber Monday?
Black Friday is the day after Thanskgiving when everyone goes shoping. It got its name on October 28th, 1929. Cyber Monday is the Monday after Thanksgiving where everyone goes shopping online.

Friday, November 18, 2011

Game Standards

3.2- Students formulate solutions to economic problems.You start off with a certain amount of money and as the game goes and you start to build houses, buildings, and businesses you begin to spend all the money that you originally started with. In order to stay out of debt you must start hiring people and building things that will gain you money. This helps you to proceed farther into the game and get higher levels. With the buildings you build you will start to get your money back thus helping solve your economic problems.
3.1- Students explain how different economic systems are organized for production, distribution, and consumption of goods and services.
I think it's important to keep my business away from the residential. This way the people are likely to take my public forms of transportation to go from their homes and spend money at the businesses. This way the whole town is gaining and earning money because of the way the town is set up. It is important for the systems to be set up according to production lines, distribution lines, and consumption areas in order to keep the structure needed to maintain a good system.

3.4- Students demonstrate an understanding of economic principles that influence individual financial planning.
In this game you have to plan according to how much money you started with and how much you must spend to keep your country going. You must know how much money you will get from each building at any given time to plan how you will spend your money. If you spend to much it is a very slow process to get enough money back to actually proceed on in the game. This entire process has to do with planning how to use your money for the most effective way.

4.3- Students evaluate the impact of technology and how it has shaped history and influenced the modern world.
In this game it is important to keep up with the most modern things in order to receive the most amount of money and experience points. This teaches us how to use this technology to get ahead. The technology that has been invented in the last twenty years has aloud us to expand much more than anyone thought possible. As my city is expanding i must continue to keep building electrical places in order to meet the requirements. This advancement in technology is slowly shaping how my city is ran and everything that is in my city.  You can do practically everything involving your business without actually moving from in front of your phone or computer. In the game i can click a simple button and have whatever i need to be done, instantly done. This is helping me expand and make further progress very fast.

4.2- Students analyze current events to better understand the world in which they live.
In the game i received a gift which gave me money and XP points. This event shows that i am doing good and its a positive thing. It helped me to understand that when i do good things that i get good things and rewards in return. When getting more friends on the game you receive money and gain having people to talk to about how to play the game the correctly. When new ventures happen that is considered a new event. This helps you to decide what you need to do next. In life sometimes you have a path laid out for you that if you follow it then good things will happen. In this game the same concept happens, if you follow the ventures then you will make good progress.



4.4- Students explain how past events impact the present and the future.
In the game on the very first day i choose to build a bunch of apartments instead of small businesses. This was a poor choice that is still impacting how my game is ran now. I am making a very small amount of money from the apartments compared to the large amount that i could be making if I had chose to build different buildings. This will continue to affect my game until i can make enough money to cover my mistake and build the right types of buildings to earn more money and continue on successfully in the game.

5.1- Students interpret charts. maps, and graphs to answer questions dealing with people, places, events, or environments.
In my country i have all of my businesses in one area and my residential places in one place.  This helps me keep things organized and keep the personal life and business life separate. This way people can go into the city part of my country to go to events and it will stay out of the way of them being at home. It also helps the environment because the parks are separate from the businesses. I also put my windmills far away from everything to save room for the environment.

5.3- Students demonstrate an ability to organize and process information about people, places, and environments.
I have everything grouped into sections. All of my housing is in one section then i have my post office and other things that are used for public use. I saved room between these two areas so that when my city started to grow i would have room for the expansions. I have my windmills in a separate area away from everything so there would be a separation by the environment and the wind could get to my windmills without my tall buildings getting in the way. My tall buildings have their own huge section of land because that's where i make the most money, thus i would need more space for these types of buildings.

Wednesday, November 16, 2011

Candy Stock

Yesterday we walked into this very dark room. The temperature in the small room was very humid feeling. There were pictures flashing on two of the four walls at a very fast pace that made it very hard to see exactly what was going on. The small space made the noise escalate and the environment continued to get louder and louder as people tried to talk over one another. The space was very cramped and as everyone was running around trying to trade and sell their stocks it made things frustrating.

Throughtout the period things began to run a little bit smoother as everyone started figuring out a pattern that worked best for them. People began walking around the room with motivation instead of just in a random pattern. By the end we had the system figured out and things were running as smooth as we wished the would have from the very beginning. At the very end we got to eat the candy that had been tempting us the entire time.