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Overview
2nd Edition - Updated for the 2017 Exam
Crash Course is perfect for the time-crunched student, the last-minute studier, or anyone who wants a refresher on the subject.
Are you crunched for time? Have you started studying for your Advanced Placement® World History exam yet? How will you memorize everything you need to know before the test? Do you wish there was a fast and easy way to study for the exam AND boost your score?
If this sounds like you, don't panic. REA's Crash Course for AP® World History is just what you need. Our Crash Course gives you:
Targeted, Focused Review - Study Only What You Need to Know
Written by an AP® World History teacher, the targeted review chapters prepare students for the test by only focusing on the important topics and themes tested on the new 2017 AP® World History exam.
The easy-to-read review chapters in outline format cover everything AP® students need to know for the exam: The Ancient Near East, The Middle Ages, Early Modern Europe, Asia, World War I & II, The Cold War, and more. The author also includes must-know key terms all AP® students should know before test day.
Expert Test-taking Strategies
Our experienced AP® World History teacher shares detailed question-level strategies and explains the best way to answer the multiple-choice and essay questions you'll encounter on test day. By following our expert tips and advice, you can boost your overall point score!
Take REA's FREE Practice Exam
After studying the material in the Crash Course, go to the online REA Study Center and test what you've learned. Our free practice exam features timed testing, detailed explanations of answers, and automatic scoring analysis. The exam is balanced to include every topic and type of question found on the actual AP® exam, so you know you're studying the smart way.
Whether you're cramming for the test at the last minute, looking for extra review, or want to study on your own in preparation for the exams - this is the study guide every AP® World History student must have.
When it's crucial crunch time and your Advanced Placement® exam is just around the corner, you need REA's Crash Course for AP® World History!
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9780738687421 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Research & Education Association |
| Publication date: | 09/28/2016 |
| Series: | Advanced Placement (AP) Crash Course |
| Sold by: | Barnes & Noble |
| Format: | eBook |
| File size: | 2 MB |
| Age Range: | 15 - 17 Years |
Read an Excerpt
CHAPTER 1
Eight Keys to Success on the AP World History Exam
"So ... what do I need to know?" you're asking yourself. Oh, not much. ... only more than ten thousand years of history. Wait, don't throw away this book and run screaming from the room.
First, take a deep breath and examine the facts: Approximately 300,000 high school students just like you will take the AP World History exam this school year and about half of them will earn college credit. Why not you? You're clearly a clever and motivated person — after all, you're reading this Crash Course study guide.
Good news: You don't have to know everything from the beginnings of humans to the early twenty-first century to do well on the AP World History exam. By studying efficiently and strategically, you can get college credit and add that special AP-credit sparkle to your transcripts. Use the following keys to success:
1. Know the Content and Format of the Exam
The AP World History exam content is broken down into the following chronological categories. The column "Weight on Test (Percent)" refers to the percentage of the exam that will come from each historical period.
By studying the chart and knowing that there are 55 multiple-choice questions, you might deduce that there aren't many questions from Period 1. This helps you focus your plan of study. In addition, though the AP World History exam states that it covers human history "to the present," the reality is that you won't be expected to know much beyond the end of the Cold War in the early 1990s.
The latest updates to AP World History exam content and structure can be found at http://apcentral.collegeboard.org.
2. Know Your Competition
Don't be intimidated by your competition — you have an advantage over most of them by paying attention to the advice in this book. About 70 percent of students who take the AP World History exam are sophomores, and most of them are taking their first AP exam. The next biggest group is composed of seniors, then juniors and freshmen. You already read that about half of all AP World History test-takers pass the exam and get college credit by scoring a 3, 4, or 5 on a scale of 1 to 5.
Caution: Don't get overconfident and think you've got it made just because you've read this far. Taking an AP exam and receiving college credit takes a lot of focused work. You need serious, organized preparation to be successful.
3. Know How the Exam Is Scored
The AP World History exam has two main parts: Section 1, which consists of multiple-choice questions and short-answer questions, and Section 2, which has two essay questions. The multiple-choice portion is scored by machine, contains 55 questions, and must be completed in 55 minutes. It is worth 40% of the total exam score. Just like any multiple-choice test, you will answer some questions very quickly and others will take more time. When the multiple-choice part of the exam is over, you will then answer three out of four short-answer questions in 40 minutes, worth 20% of the total exam score. Then you will have a short break and return for the essay part of the exam. Bring a snack and a bottle of water for the break.
In Section 2 of the exam, you will write two essays: a document-based question (DBQ) and a long essay. You will have 100 minutes to complete both essays. The DBQ is worth 25% of your overall score and the long essay is worth 15%. Each essay is read and scored by a trained AP World History teacher or a World History college professor. Your essay scores are then added to your Section 1 scores to arrive at your final AP score.
You'll find more tips about tackling the multiple-choice and short-answer questions, as well as the essays, in the discussions about test-taking strategies found in Part IV of this book.
4. Know What Your Final Score Means
The College Board uses a formula to rank your combined multiple-choice, short-answer, and free-response score into five categories:
5 = Extremely Well Qualified
4 = Well Qualified
3 = Qualified
2 = Possibly Qualified
1 = No Recommendation
A passing grade on all AP exams is a 3. About 10 percent of AP World History test takers earn a score of 5, but keep reading — the scoring range is more generous than you think. If you get about half of the exam's multiple-choice questions right and score average on the short-answer and essay parts of the exam, you should reach a "3." That doesn't mean the exam is easy — the opposite is true.
In AP World History, about half of all exam takers make a "3" or better. Many colleges give course credit with a score of 3; other colleges take nothing below a 4, while still others give college credit only for 5s. Be aware that colleges and universities can change their AP acceptance policies whenever they want. Stay up-to-date by checking college AP policies on their websites.
5. Know How AP World History Is Different from Traditional World History
You might think that history is history, but AP World History is different from traditional approaches: Learning lists of "Kings and Wars" or "The West and the Rest" doesn't cut it. The AP World History test developers want you to see the big picture. They want you to make connections across the globe and across time and to analyze common human experiences like migration, trade, religion, politics, and society. Think of it this way: Studying AP World History is like learning American History. You don't examine the histories of 50 individual states — instead you learn about the important themes, people, and events of the fifty states. The same idea applies to AP World History: think globally, not nationally, and in most cases you'll do well. A big tip: If your World History textbook doesn't say "Advanced Placement" or "AP" on the cover, look at the introduction to see if the authors discuss concepts like global history and making connections between civilizations across time and place. If not, you may need to find a different textbook that explains history in these ways.
6. Know What You Don't Need to Know
Nobody expects you to know everything about World History in order to do well on the AP exam. First, AP World History is about the human experience, so you won't need to know when the Big Bang was or what killed the dinosaurs. AP World History is more about the big picture than the little details, so you also don't need to memorize all the monarchs of England, the battles of the Crimean War, or the name of Alexander the Great's horse (Bucephalus, by the way).
Second, 95 percent of the AP World History exam covers 600 bce to the present, so you don't need to memorize the entire Code of Hammurabi from Babylon, but you do need to know the importance of codes of law from early civilizations.
Third, what is "BCE" anyway? That's fast becoming the way historians denote the traditional term "BC." It stands for "Before the Common Era," so naturally the Common Era, or "CE," is how the AP World History exam refers to the traditional "AD."
7. Know How to Use This Crash Course to Build a Plan for Success on the AP World History Exam
This Crash Course is based on a careful study of the trends in both course study and exam content.
In Part I, you'll be introduced to the AP World History course and exam. In Chapter 2, you'll find a list of key terms and concepts that you must know for success.
In Part II — Chapters 3 through 19 — you will find chronological reviews of important political, economic, cultural, environmental, and social connections in world history. These reviews are based on the current AP World History Curriculum Framework — the College Board's guide for teachers and exam creators.
Part III, Key Concepts and Themes (Chapters 20 through 26), includes helpful charts and tables designed to show you connections across time and place.
Finally, Part IV (Chapters 27 through 31) prepares you to take the exam by giving you insider test-taking strategies for the multiple-choice questions, the short-answer questions, the Document-Based Question (DBQ), and the long-essay question.
8. Know How to Supplement This Crash Course
This Crash Course contains what you need to do well on the AP World History exam, but an exceptional student like yourself will want to make use of everything that can help. Visit the College Board's AP Central website for more information and practice.
CHAPTER 2
Key Terms and Concepts
Period 1: Technological and Environmental Transformations, to c. 600 BCE
1. Hunting-Foraging Bands
Before the development of agriculture, nomadic peoples around the world lived in small groups that were often related to each other. They hunted game and collected wild or undomesticated plants for food. These people are also known as hunter-gatherer groups. Technology included bows and arrows, Clovis points (large stone arrowheads) and spears. While those tools may not sound much like technology to us, in their day, those tools were vital in assisting humans in the hunt. The very survival of hunting-foraging bands depended on finding adequate food supplies from wild game and plants. Most of the individuals in these groups practiced a form of religion called animism. See details below.
2. Neolithic Revolutions
First in the Middle East around 8000 BCE and later in other regions (see River Valley Civilizations), hunter-foragers settled in areas with a steady water supply and good soil, planted seeds in the ground on purpose — agriculture — and lived in permanent buildings in villages. In the Neolithic Revolutions, irrigation of crops was developed and animals, such as dogs, cats, cattle, and horses, were domesticated to aid with hunting, transportation, and agriculture, and/or function as a food supply. One result of closer contact with animals was increased exchanges of diseases to and from people.
3. River Valley Civilizations
The River Valley Civilizations are those first places where Neolithic Revolutions occurred. Mesopotamia in the Middle East ("Mesopotamia" means "between the rivers"); the Nile Valley in North Africa (the Egyptians); the Indus River Valley in South Asia; and the Shang in the Yellow, or Huang He, River Valley in East Asia were among the earliest known river valleys where agriculture first began. The classic definition of "civilization" means "a city" and these early civilizations also built the first buildings made of stone or brick, and placed them together to form the villages, which developed into cities. See Urbanization.
4. Pastoralism
While some people were settling into cities, others raised domesticated animals but did not develop agriculture, so they remained on the move. They were known as pastoralists. In moving with their herds, they spread information about other groups and developments in technology. Call them "agents of change." Pastoralists emerged in parts of Africa, Europe, and Asia around the same time as the Neolithic Revolution. One example of a pastoral group that is still functioning in the twenty-first century are the Mongols of East Asia.
5. Urbanization
Small villages in River Valley Civilizations often grew into larger cities, and those cities became important centers of government, trade, and religion. Urban areas saw the development of specialization of jobs, such as scribes or merchants; social levels, such as elites and slaves; and gender roles, such as expectations that men would usually be government leaders and members of the military and women would usually engage in domestic functions like cooking, sewing, and child-rearing. Counting and writing systems began in cities as a means of keeping records of stored food and other goods. One of the first writing systems was cuneiform from Mesopotamia. Religious temples like Ziggurats in Mesopotamia are examples of monumental architecture that developed in early cities. Some examples of early cities in Eurasia are Sumer in Mesopotamia, Catal Huyuk in Turkey, and Mohenjo Daro and Harappa in South Asia's Indus River Valley. In the Americas, the Olmec civilization developed cities in Mesoamerica by 1600 BCE, and the Chavin civilization, along the coast of modern-day Peru, built urban centers by 900 BCE.
6. Early Empires
Over time, more cities developed in the River Valley Civilizations and were united under a ruler, or king, who claimed his power was derived from the gods. The Babylonians in Mesopotamia were one early empire that conquered rival cities by force and put them under one code of law. A very important example of a written early law code was the Code of Hammurabi, from Babylon, about 1750 BCE. The Egyptians in North Africa established a large and long-lasting empire that, at its peak, stretched along the Nile River from modern Sudan to the Mediterranean coast, west into modern Libya and northeast into modern Lebanon.
7. Animism/Polytheism
The earliest-known form of religion, animism, sees gods in nature (worshipping the sun, for example). It was popular among hunting-foraging bands. Polytheism ("many gods") differs from animism in that gods in polytheism have specific names and duties. The Greek god Apollo, for example, was the god "in charge" of the sun.
8. Monotheism
Monotheism is the belief in one god. The Hebrews of Southwest Asia practiced one of the earliest known monotheistic religions, Judaism. This feature set them apart from their neighbors and made them unique in early history. Another early monotheistic faith, from Persia in Central Asia, was Zoroastrianism.
Period 2: Organization and Reorganization of Human Societies, c. 600 BCE to c. 600 CE
9. Classical Era
Historians have labeled the years c. 600 BCE to c. 600 CE the Classical Era. During this period classical empires such as the Greek and Roman civilizations in the Mediterranean region, the Han Dynasty in East Asia, and the Maurya and Gupta empires in South Asia rose in political, social, and economic power, and then fell. Other important classical civilizations of this era include the Persians in Central Asia and the Mayans in Mesoamerica.
10. Hinduism
The earliest known organized religion, with written codes of the faith and a class of religious leaders (priests), Hinduism was centered in South Asia. Its beliefs were influenced by Indo-European groups who migrated into the region from western areas near the Caspian Sea. Hindu teachings supported the caste system that greatly influenced the political and social structure of South Asia.
11. Buddhism
A "reform" of Hinduism was begun by Prince Siddhartha Gautama c. 500 BCE, who became the Buddha ("Enlightened One"). Unlike Hinduism, Buddhism supported spiritual equality and missionary activity. Buddhism spread far from its origins in South Asia into Southeast and East Asia along trade routes.
12. Confucianism
Based on the teachings of Kong Fuzi (Confucius) in China, c. 500 BCE. He established clearly defined codes of behavior, and gender and family duties. Confucius's teachings were a philosophy, not a religion dedicated to a deity. Over time, however, Neo-Confucianism emerged, which included aspects of Buddhism and Daoism, and promised eternal reward for faithfulness to Confucius's teachings.
(Continues…)
Excerpted from "AP World History Crash Course"
by .
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Excerpted by permission of Research & Education Association.
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Table of Contents
About This Book, vi,
About Our Author, vii,
Acknowledgments, vii,
PART I INTRODUCTION,
Chapter 1: Eight Keys to Success on the AP World History Exam, 3,
Chapter 2: Key Terms and Concepts, 9,
PART II CHRONOLOGICAL REVIEW,
PERIOD 1: Technological and Environmental Transformations, to c. 600 BCE,
Chapter 3: Pre-History to 600 BCE, 33,
PERIOD 2: Organization and Reorganization of Human Societies, c. 600 BCE–c. 600 CE,
Chapter 4: Religious and Cultural Developments, 43,
Chapter 5: Development of City-States and Empires, 55,
Chapter 6: Development of Communication and Trade Networks, 71,
PERIOD 3: Regional and Interregional Interactions, c. 600 CE–c. 1450 CE,
Chapter 7: Expansion of Networks of Exchange, 81,
Chapter 8: Governments in the Post-Classical Era, 93,
Chapter 9: Economic Activity and Its Effects, 109,
PERIOD 4: Global Interactions, c. 1450–c. 1750,
Chapter 10: The Development of Global Networks, 119,
Chapter 11: Changes to Societies and Methods of Production, 129,
Chapter 12: Developments in Governments, 137,
PERIOD 5: Industrialization and Global Integration, c. 1750–c. 1900,
Chapter 13: Industrialization and Its Global Effects, 151,
Chapter 14: Imperialism and Its Global Effects, 165,
Chapter 15: Revolutions, Nation-State Formation, and Reforms, 177,
Chapter 16: Global Migrations, 187,
PERIOD 6: Accelerating Global Change and Realignments, c. 1900 to the Present,
Chapter 17: Developments in Twentieth-Century Science and the Environment, 193,
Chapter 18: World Conflicts and Their Effects, 207,
Chapter 19: Twentieth-Century Changes in Global Economics and Societies, 237,
PART III KEY CONCEPTS AND THEMES,
Chapter 20: Art, Architecture, and Literature Review, 247,
Chapter 21: Nineteen Key Concepts in AP World History, 253,
Chapter 22: AP History Disciplinary Practices, Reasoning Skills, and Themes, 255,
Chapter 23: Important Periodization in AP World History, 261,
Chapter 24: Important Civilizations, Empires, and Dynasties, 265,
Chapter 25: Important Migrations and Trade Routes, 269,
Chapter 26: Important Technology in AP World History, 273,
PART IV TEST-TAKING STRATEGIES,
Chapter 27: Strategies for the Multiple-Choice Questions, 277,
Chapter 28: How to Tackle the Short-Answer Questions, 291,
Chapter 29: Mastering the Document-Based Question, 295,
Chapter 30: Tips for Writing the Long Essay, 301,
Chapter 31: Countdown Calendar, 307,
Online Practice Exam www.rea.com/studycenter,