INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION VOCABULARY
Revolution: When there is a major change in the world.
Industrial Revolution: When people began to rely on machines making things
instead of making everything by hand. This changed the way
most people in the world live their lives and every economy
has been affected by it.
Mass Production: When a factory makes a lot of something and is able to sell it
cheaply. ** Before Mass Production things were made by hand—
there were never enough and they were very expensive**
Urban: A city where lots of people live close to each other and all have different
kinds of jobs making different types of things. People that live on urban
areas work for money and then use the money to buy the different things
they need.
Rural: The countryside. A place where people are very spread out. All of the Rural
people are farmers and they make what they need by hand if they have the
resources.
Rural to Urban shift: Before the Industrial Revolution most people lived in Rural
areas, as they had for 10,000 years. After the Industrial
Revolution until now, everything has changed and most people
live in Urban areas.
Tenement: Because cities grew so quickly, there were not enough places to live.
Tenements were crowded dirty places where new people to the city
were forced to live.
Disease Epidemic: Many of the Urban areas were so dirty and crowded with
tenements that diseases would break out and quickly effect all of
the people in the city.
Child Labor: In the new Urban areas only very rich families could afford school.
When the parents went off to work in the factories, their children (ages
4 and up) would come with them. The work children did was often
very dangerous and they got paid very little. All of their money went to
the parents.
Steam Engine: When coal was burned and heated water, the steam created was
very powerful and could turn wheels. At first steam engines were just
used to spin and grind corn and wheat, but later they were used to
Mass Produce goods and move trains. ** The invention of the Steam
Engine is seen as the beginning of the Industrial Revolution**