Grade 4 Quarter 2 Colonization Standards Assessment Toolbox

Standard(s)
SS4H3 The student will explain the factors that shaped British colonial America.
a. Compare and contrast life in the New England, Mid-Atlantic, and Southern colonies.
b. Describe colonial life in America as experienced by various people, including large landowners, farmers, artisans, women, indentured servants, slaves, and Native Americans.
SS4G2c. Explain how the physical geography of the New England, Mid-Atlantic, and Southern colonies helped determine economic activities practiced therein.
SS4E1b. Explain how price incentives affect people’s behavior and choices (such as colonial decisions about what crops to grow and products to produce).
c. Describe how specialization improves standards of living (such as the differences in the economies in the New England, Mid-Atlantic, and Southern colonies).
d. Explain how voluntary exchange helps both buyers and sellers (such as prehistoric and colonial trade in North America).
e. Describe how trade promotes economic activity (such as how trade between the colonies and England affected their economies).
To Meet Standards Students Will… / Suggested Tasks & Assessments
Compare and contrast colonial life by regions, and by individual perspective.
Explain the effect of the geography on economics, and how price incentives, specialization, and voluntary exchange are illustrated by colonial developments.
Knowledge, Skills, & Strategies

Students will need to use an historically accurate map of the colonies, and not a modern one of the U.S. in order to grasp the geography and development of the colonies.

The standard 4H3b emphasizes that your interpretation of history changes based on your perspective.That is true for both participants in history and the historians who study them. As students compare how differently landowners, farmers, artisans, women, indentured servants, slaves, and Native Americans might “see” what’s going on around them, they will see that history changes depending on the lens you are using.
The environment of each group of colonies had a deep impact on their economic and social activities. Primary sources such as maps, drawings, and even modern photos of specific geographical features of the three regions can help students grasp the differences.
The economics standard here has students finding historical examples of price incentives, specialization, voluntary exchange, and trade in the colonial period. The specifics mentioned in the standard for each:
Price incentive related such as colonial decisions about what crops to grow and products to produce. Colonists selected crops that they needed to survive, and then selected cash crops to raise that they knew there was a strong market for in England. (ex. Tobacco in Virginia)
Specialization related to the differences in the economies in the New England, Mid-Atlantic, and Southern colonies refers to both specialization within the colonies (the various craftspeople, artisans, and tradesmen helped fill different roles in the economy) and among colonies and with Britain (the Middle colonies was considered the ‘bread basket’ because grains could be grown there more easily and sold to other colonies and to England.)
Voluntary exchange and its benefits to both buyers and sellers relates to the way that colonists could choose to buy and sell goods and services at prices they can afford. An example would be when colonists traded through barter with Native Americans with trinkets, weapons, etc., in exchange for food. Later they exchange currency rather than just barter.
Trade typically refers to a country or countries exchanging goods. Because of the trade of the colonies with England there were more exports sold, more jobs created, more money in the economy, and more markets created to sell the goods. More imports means there is a greater variety of goods and more competitive prices. A specific example of one colonial trade pattern was the triangular trade route between the colonies, England, and the West Indies.