GRADE: AP World History                                                      AUTHORS: FLHS AP teachers
UNIT TITLE/FOCUS:  Period 4: Global Interactions: (1450 CE-1750 CE)
UNIT LENGTH: 7-8 weeks


Essential Question:
How did transoceanic voyages transform and link societies across the globe?

Enduring Understanding:  Students understand …

1. The intensification of global trade as a result of new exploration
   
2. Global trade impacted both demographics and social structures
   
3. New empires developed by dominating key maritime trade routes
   

Guiding Questions: (content, process, metacognitive)

Content:

1. Why did the intensification of existing regional patterns of trade bring both prosperity and disruption to governments and merchants? (4.1.I, VII)
   
2. How did European knowledge of previous maritime technology and environmental understanding of climate patterns make transoceanic travel possible? (4.1.II, III)
   
3. How did New World bullion help to drive the nascent global economy? (4.1.IV)
   
4. To what extent did the Columbian Exchange radically transform global demographics? (4.1.V, VI)
   
5. Why did new labor systems develop during the Early Modern Period? (4.2 I, II, III)
   
6. To what extent did technology play a role in the development of European empires? (4.3 I,II)
   
7. How did competition over trade routes lead to greater conflict? (4.3 III)
   

Process:

1. How does understanding the author’s point of view (POV) provide context in analyzing a primary source?
   
2. Why is understanding primary sources useful in answering historical questions?
   
3. To what extent does evaluating a historian’s argument help in the analysis of different interpretations of historical events?
   
4. How does comparing and contrasting events, individuals and processes over time and across time periods help us to construct a better understanding of historic developments?
   
5. Why is chronology and geography essential to contextualizing history?
   
6. To what extent does understanding a historical issue provide insight to events that occurring today?
   
7. Can evaluating causation provide an opportunity for historical contingency?
   
8. How does evaluating the process of continuity and change over time relate to bigger historical questions?
   
9. To what extent can history be organized into discrete periods of time?
   
10. How does a student’s ability to develop an argument demonstrate the application of historical thinking?
    
11. How can relevant evidence help to drive an argument?
    

Metacognitive:

1. What were your difficulties in separating continuity from change?
   
2. How was your writing able to express your understanding similarities and differences?
   
3. How challenging is it to understand an author’s POV?
   
4. How did evaluating primary sources assist your understanding of the time period?
   

Standards:  KEY CONCEPTS
4.1 Globalizing Networks of Communication and Exchange

1. In the context of the new global circulation of goods, there was an intensification of all existing regional patterns of trade that brought prosperity and economic disruption to the merchants and governments in trading regions of the Indian Ocean, Mediterranean, Sahara, and overland Eurasia.
   
2. European technological developments in cartography and navigation built on previous knowledge developed in the Classical, Islamic, and Asian worlds, and included the production of new tools, innovations in ship designs, and an improved understanding of global wind and current patterns-all of which made transoceanic travel and trade possible
   
3. Remarkable new maritime reconnaissance occurred in this period
   
4. The new global circulation of goods was facilitated by royal chartered European monopoly companies that took silver from Spanish colonies in the Americas to purchase Asian goods for the Atlantic markets. Regional markets continued to flourish in Afro-Eurasia by using established commercial practices and new transoceanic shipping services developed by European merchants
   
5. The new connections between the Eastern and Western Hemispheres resulted in the Colombian Exchange
   
6. The increase in interactions between newly connected hemispheres and intensification of connections within hemispheres expanded the spread and reform of existing religions and created syncretic belief systems and practices
   
7. As merchants profits increased and governments collected more taxes, funding for the visual and performing arts, even for popular audiences, increased along with an expansion of literacy
   

4.2 New Forms of Social Organization and Modes of Production

1. Beginning in the 14th century, there was a decrease in mean temperatures, often referred to as the Little Ice Age, around the world that lasted until the 19th century, contributing to changes in agricultural practices and the contraction of settlement in parts of the Northern Hemisphere
   
2. Traditional peasant agriculture increased and changed, plantations expanded, and demand for labor increased. These changes both fed and responded to growing global demand for raw materials and finished products
   
3. As social and political elites changed, they also restructured ethnic, racial, and gender hierarchies.
   

4.3 State Consolidation and Imperial Expansion  

1. Rulers used a variety of methods to legitimize and consolidate their power
   
2. Imperial expansion relied on increased use of gunpowder, cannons, and armed trade to establish large empires in both hemispheres
   
3. Competition over trade routes, state rivalries, and local resistance all provided significant challenges to state consolidation and expansion
   

ASSESSMENTS



Authentic Performance Task(s):
Students will write a Comparative essay on the demographic and environmental effects of the Columbian Exchange on the Americas and one other region from 1492 to 1750

Students will write a Change and Continuity essay on the social and economic transformations that occurred in the Atlantic World as a result of new contacts among Western Europe, Africa, and the Americas from 1492-1750

Students will write a DBQ essay on the impact of New World bullion on the global economy

Other Assessments (Diagnostic, Formative, Summative):
Formative: Thesis statement writing activity, Document analysis, European Intellectual Speed Date activity, Measuring Peter the Great’s greatness
Summative: Multiple Choice Test and Performance Task




                                   TEACHING AND LEARNING PLAN


Teaching and Learning Activities:
Activities and tasks, Linked to guiding questions and standards, Describe what the students will do and why…
Students will…
1. Write a thesis statement based on essay prompts
2. Complete an Enlightenment Speed Dating activity
3. Evaluate the causes and effects of the rise of European empires by analyzing a series of related documents
4. Debate which civilizations could have challenged rising European empires between 1450-1750
5. Analyze the relationship between various regions and global commodities by analyzing a corresponding map of the global economy from 1450-1750.
6. Annotating a text regarding Peter the Great’s greatness and analyzing how great he was as a ruler.
7. Students will create a map detailing the trail of all 3 merchants of the period (Zheng He, Marco Polo and Ibn Battuta) and later compare their regional travels.

Resources and Technologies Needed:
ACORN Book
Guns,Germs,and Steel- Jared Diamond
1491- Charles C. Mann
Codex Mendoza- 1542
1421- Gavin Menzies
Primary Source documents and charts on African slave trade
Crash Course World History
Excerpts from History of the World in 6 Glasses
Pictures of Arabian Coffee Houses
Map of the travels of Zheng He, Marco Polo and Ibn Battuta



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