NES Profile: Middle Grades Social Science (202)

Which of the following sources would a historian most likely use to obtain information about the social and occupational structure of Atlanta, Georgia, during the late nineteenth century?

1. mayoral addresses
2. census data
3. newspaper editorials
4. city directories

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B. This question requires the examinee to evaluate the uses and limitations of various historical source materials. Census data provide information on population characteristics, employment, the composition of the labor force, business enterprises, and other matters pertaining to the social and occupational structure of communities.

Which of the following geographic factors had the greatest influence on economic life in ancient Egyptian culture?

1. the aquatic resources of the Mediterranean Sea
2. the annual flooding of the Nile River
3. the mineral resources of the Eastern Desert and the Sinai Peninsula
4. the natural harbors along the Red Sea

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B. This question requires the examinee to demonstrate knowledge of major geographic, social, political, economic, and cultural features of early civilization in Egypt. The crops grown in areas adjacent to the Nile following the annual flooding of the river provided most of the food consumed in ancient Egypt.

Which of the following accurately lists four major historical events between 1600 and 1825 in the order in which they occurred?

1. 1.   the emergence of the Tokugawa shogunate in Japan
   2.   Peter the Great's reign as tsar of Russia
   3.   England's defeat of France in the Seven Years' War
   4.   the liberation of Mexico from Spanish rule
   
2. 1.   England's defeat of France in the Seven Years' War
   2.   the emergence of the Tokugawa shogunate in Japan
   3.   the liberation of Mexico from Spanish rule
   4.   Peter the Great's reign as tsar of Russia
   
3. 1.   Peter the Great's reign as tsar of Russia
   2.   the liberation of Mexico from Spanish rule
   3.   England's defeat of France in the Seven Years' War
   4.   the emergence of the Tokugawa shogunate in Japan
   
4. 1.   the liberation of Mexico from Spanish rule
   2.   Peter the Great's reign as tsar of Russia
   3.   the emergence of the Tokugawa shogunate in Japan
   4.   England's defeat of France in the Seven Years' War
   

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A. This question requires the examinee to recognize chronological relationships between major global events and developments. The Tokugawa shogunate was established in 1600, Peter the Great ruled Russia from 1682 to 1725, the Seven Years' War ended in 1763, and Mexico secured its independence from Spanish rule in 1821.

World War II2 most influenced the movement for African independence by:

1. creating severe economic hardship for European colonies in Africa.
2. provoking demands for an Africa-wide confederation of colonial states.
3. weakening European nations with colonial holdings in Africa.
4. providing African nationalists with access to modern military weapons and tactics.

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C. This question requires the examinee to examine major political, social, and economic developments in Africa since 1945. World War II2 had a severe effect on the economies of Great Britain, France, Italy, and other nations with colonial holdings in Africa, both from the enormous sums required to fight the war and from the physical devastation that the conflict left in its wake. What resources were left were devoted to domestic reconstruction, leaving little for European governments to spend to reassert their authority over colonial possessions in Africa.

Which of the following best describes a major effect of the American Revolution on U.S. society?

1. It removed most barriers to White male participation in the political process.
2. It advanced efforts to abolish slavery in the northern states.
3. It enabled White women to secure the same legal rights as White men.
4. It reinforced the South's commitment to plantation agriculture.

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B. This question requires the examinee to examine the major causes, events, developments, and consequences of the Revolutionary War. By focusing attention on the contradiction of human bondage in a nation committed to individual freedom, the American Revolution ended the climate of opinion that had allowed slavery to exist unchallenged and led to the abolition of slavery in the North soon after independence had been achieved.

During the first half of the nineteenth century, reformers such as Elizabeth Cady Stanton most often based their demands for women's rights on the:

1. political ideals expressed in the Declaration of Independence.
2. constitutional principles stated in the Federalist Papers.
3. guarantee of republican government affirmed in the U.S. Constitution.
4. legal protections contained in the Bill of Rights.

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A. This question requires the examinee to examine the origins and objectives of major antebellum reform movements and the activities and achievements of key reformers. The influence of the political ideals expressed in the Declaration of Independence on antebellum women's rights activists can best be seen in the Seneca Falls Declaration of Rights. This key document, composed by Elizabeth Cady Stanton in 1848, affirmed "that all men and women are created equal," and went on to detail the oppressions men had imposed upon women, much as the original Declaration had listed the colonists' grievances against King George of England.

Which of the following late nineteenth-century developments most influenced the emergence of a national market for the exchange of goods and services in the United States?

1. the arrival of millions of European immigrants
2. the growth of the electrical industry
3. the increasing urbanization of U.S. society
4. the expansion of the railroad system

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D. This question requires the examinee to analyze the growth of the industrial economy in the United States. The expansion of the railroad system during the late nineteenth century broke down the isolation of rural areas and small cities, enabling them to transport and receive goods far less expensively than before and integrating them into an emerging national market.

Which of the following best describes a major reason for the unprecedented economic affluence of U.S. society in the two decades after World War II2?

1. the absence of major competitors in global markets
2. the removal of wartime price and wage controls
3. the federal government's commitment to balancing the budget
4. the shift in population from the Northeast to the Southwest

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A. This question requires the examinee to demonstrate knowledge of major economic developments in the United States since 1945. Of the principal combatants in World War II2, the United States was the only country to come out of the conflict with its economy intact and its industrial base undamaged. As a result, U.S. producers faced little competition from foreign manufacturers in domestic or world markets for some years after the war.