An Example of a "Learning Process" Journal (using the 2 colored box format)

Book: Afghanistan by Louis Dupree

Source: Oxford Pakistan Paperbacks. Oxford University Press, 1973.

This is my third day where I am spending a clear hour adding to my 'notes' on Learning more about Afghanistan. It is 7:10 am (Wednesday). In the last couple of days I have completed reading Part I The Land (pp. 1 - 54).

I have spent the last hour creating a semantic chart that outlines the 11 main geographic areas of Afghanistan. The real test is when I can reconstruct this diagram from memory.

Here is an excellent map of Afghanistan:

http://www.lib.utexas.edu/maps/middle_east_and_asia/afghanistan_rel_2003.jpg

Here are the Inspiration charts for the 11 land areas:

http://people.uleth.ca/~dale.burnett/Afghanistan/afghanistan_files/afghanistan_1.htm

This was doubly instructive since the latest version of Inspiration has a very different sequence of steps for creating web pages. Basically one can now Export the pages as HTML files and then one uses an ftp software program to publish them to a web server.

Here is a first attempt at creating a few "Lists".

Cities:

1. Kabul
2. Qandahar
3. Herat
4. Jalalabad

Rivers:

1. Kabul
2. Hilmand

People:

1. Alexander the Great

Events:

1. 1978-1989: Russian occupation
2. 1995-2001: Taliban control
3. 2001 - present: American control

Here is a useful timeline site:

http://www.afghan-web.com/history/

These list will provide an indication of some of the key "facts" that I have learned.

The next major section in the Dupree book is called The People. I like the major categories of first the land, then the people and then history. Such a structure would work well when trying to learn more about any country.

It is striking to realize that I cannot think of one person associated with Afghanistan, except for Alexander the Great. Even the dates of the Russian occupation and Taliban control are not clear to me, although now that I have this list to review I will get to the point where I do know these.

I tried typing Afghanistan and agriculture into google and located this web site:

http://www.afghanistans.com/Information/defaulf.htm

History Index