The American Nation Textbook

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Chapter 1 Geography, History, and the Social
Sciences
The American Nation Textbook Pages 2-34 A
presentation by Mr. Zindman
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• Thinking Geography
• To understand the issues around the world and how
  the change your life we first need to understand
  geography.
• What do you think geography is?
• Why study geography?

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Geography is the study of people, their
environments, and their resources. A geographer
looks at how the natural environment affects the
way we live. TA geographer also looks at the way
we live and how we change the environment in
which we live in. A geographer looks at the
natural resources people use.
What do you think is a natural resource?
A natural resource is a material that humans can
take from the environment to survive and satisfy
their needs. For example a mountain range may
contain reserves of coal or iron, while a nearby
river or ocean may supply fish. The iron, coal,
and fish are examples of natural resources.
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Maps and Globes To locate places, geographers
used maps and globes. A map is a drawing of the
Earths surface.
A globe is a round object shaped like a ball
(sphere) that has a map of the world on it.
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A drawing of a map on a flat surface is called a
map projection.
A person that makes a map is called a
cartographer.
Today they use sophisticated technology to make
maps.
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Five Kinds of Maps Here are four types of maps
that we use in our everyday lives. They are
political, physical, population, and natural
resource maps. Each type of map serves a specific
purpose.
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The political map shows the boundaries (or lines)
that people use to divide their world into
countries and states.
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A physical map shows natural features, such
as, mountains, deserts, rivers and oceans.
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A population map lets you know how many people
live in different areas of the Earth.
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A natural resource map shows the natural
resources in an area. A natural resource is the
raw materials, such as minerals, found on the
land areas.
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Latitude and Longitude Most maps have lines on it
that look like lines on a sheet of graph paper.
These graph lines make it easier for us to locate
the exact location of a place. These lines on
the graph are measured in degrees .
Latitude
Longitude
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We use a compass rose to determine directions on
a map. A compass rose shows the directions of
North, South, East and West on a map.
The lines that that run north to south (or up and
down) are call longitude.
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The lines that that run east to west (or left to
right) are call latitude.
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We divide the Earth in half with an imaginary
line at 0 latitude is called the Equator.
If The Equator divides the Earth into two halves
called hemispheres.
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An imaginary line divides the earth into two
equal east and west (left and right) halves. This
imaginary line is called the Prime Meridian.
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Time Zones Lines of longitude and latitude also
help us tell what time it is all over the world.
Why does time differ on the earth from place to
place?
The answer is that the Earth rotates on its axis.
As the Earth moves, the sun appears to rise in
some places and set in other places. Throughout
the world people use the rising and setting of
the sun to set their clocks.
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To make this easier the world was divided into 24
time zones. Each time zone represents 1 hour in
time on a clock. As you move from time zone to
time zone you increase or decrease you clock by 1
hour for each time zone you cross when traveling.
If you head West, you lose an hour for each time
zone you cross. If you head East, you add an hour
for each time zone you cross. Each zone you cross
is called a Standard Time Zone.
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The Five Themes of Geography Here are the five
themes of geography Location Historians and
geographers try to discover where something
important happened. They also try to figure out
why that event happened? A geographers task is to
try to pinpoint the exact location of an event.
Compass Rose
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Place A geographer looks at the physical
features of a place. They looked at the climate
(weather), plant life, animal life and bodies of
water. People often help to shape the way a place
looks by their ideas and actions.
Wyandanch revitalization project
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Interaction Between People and Their Environment
Throughout history, people have adapted and
changed their natural environment. For example,
ancient hunters learned to grow food crops in the
Americas.
Later, Native Americans in the Southwest found
ways to, or bring water to the desert so they
could farm the land. Ancient American hunters
learned to plant seeds and grow crops.
Later Americans in the Southwest developed
methods of irrigation, or bringing water to dry
lands. Today, advances in technology allow people
to alter their environment dramatically.
People have invented ways to take oil from the
ocean floor. They have cut down thick forests to
build highways.
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Movement People move around to different places
throughout the world because their resources (raw
materials) are spread unevenly around the world.
Resources are things that we get from the Earth
to help us survive, such as trees, water and
fish. People need these resources to build their
houses and survive.
To get resources they had to move place to
place. As they met other people, they exchanged
their ideas and technology. Technology is any new
idea or invention used to improve the life style
of people. Examples of technology are
automobiles, televisions and radios. These
advances in technology led to the world we live
in today
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Region Geographers study regions. A region is an
area of the world with similar characteristics.
For example, The Great Plains is a region because
it has fairly level land, very hot summers, very
cold winters and little rainfall.
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2. Lands and Climates of the United
States Geographers divide the United States into
several different physical regions with
contrasting landforms. The Hawaiian Islands
located in the North Pacific Ocean, consist of a
chain of islands. The Pacific Coast is the
mainlands westernmost region, with high mountain
ranges stretching from Alaska to Mexico.
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Types of Landforms (Look and examine the map on
page 18-19 of your textbook.) Mountains- are
high steep rugged land. They rise to an elevation
(or height) of at least 1,000 feet above the
surrounding land.
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Hill- Hills are areas of raised land, but they
are lower, less steep and more rounded than
mountains.
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Plains- Plains are areas of flat or level land.
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Plateaus- Plateaus are large raised areas of flat
land.
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A narrow strip of land that joins two large areas
is called an isthmus.
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Rivers and Lakes There are many great river
systems in North America. They collect water from
melting snows and rain and carry it to the oceans.
The Mississippi River and the Missouri River and
their tributaries make up the largest and most
important river system in the United States.
A tributary is a stream or smaller river that
flows into a larger one. These rivers provide
transportation by boats. They also provide
moisture (or water) for most part of the plains
of the United States. The rivers of the United
States crisscross the country linking different
physicals regions.
Missouri River
The Mississippi River
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The Great Lakes- Five Great Lakes border the
United States and Canada. The Great Lakes are
Superior, Michigan, Huron, Erie and Ontario.
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Factors that Affect Climate
Weather is the condition of the Earths
atmosphere (or air.) It could be hot or cold,
rainy or dry or something in between.
The United States has 10 different types of
climates. Climate is the average weather of a
place over a period of 20-30 years. Two features
define the climate. They are temperature and
precipitation. What do you think is temperature?
Precipitation is the water that falls from the
sky in the form of rain or snow. The location and
altitude, or height of the land above sea level,
of a region also influences climate.
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Section 3 The Tools of History What is History?
History is an account of what happened in the
life of people. Historians use the past to ask
the question, what happened in this place?
Historians look at the location, place movement
and religion to try to explain the life of a
population. Many different cultures have their
own individual history.
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Primary and Secondary Resources What document is
this?
What can you tell me about this document?
Historians collect evidence and use it to
interpret events in history. Historians first use
primary sources. A primary source is firsthand
information about people or events. Primary
sources include official documents such as laws
or court decisions, public speeches, and
eyewitness accounts such as diaries or letters,
and autobiographies. Primary sources could
include visual evidence such as an original news
photograph or videotape.
The Declaration of Independence.
A primary source.
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What do these items have in common?
Historians also make use of secondary sources. A
secondary resource is an account provided after
the fact by people who did not directly witness
or participate in the event. An example of a
secondary source is a textbook, encyclopedia,
books and articles written by historians.
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What is this cartoon saying?
Archaeology
When dealing with a primary source, the historian
must determine whether it is authentic.
Authenticity refers to whether or not the source
is actually what it seems to be. For example, in
1928, a magazine published a series of newly
discovered letters that was said to be written by
Abraham Lincoln. Soon afterwards they were
discovered to be forgeries or fakes. A historian
must decide if the source is authentic.
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Scientists have dug up things from the ground.
They have found tools, weapons, baskets, and
carvings buried in the ground. The evidence that
is dug up is called artifacts.
The study of artifacts left by early people is
called archaeology.
A scientist that studies archaeology is called an
archaeologist.
artifacts.
archaeologist.
archaeology
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By studying artifacts, archaeologists can learn
much about early people. If they found in
arrowhead that would suggest that people knew how
to make weapons and hunt.
Each object they found can provide valuable
information about early cultures. Culture is the
entire way of life that people has developed. It
includes the behavior, customs, ideas, beliefs,
and skills that people teach every new generation.
From artifacts and other evidence, archaeologists
form theories about the culture of an ancient
people.
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Section 4 Economics and Other Social
Sciences The study of how people manage their
limited resources to satisfy their wants and
needs is called economics.
How would you manage your resources in your
house? Would you buy food? Would you buy
water? Would you buy fuel?

• Three Basic Questions About Economics
• What needs should be fulfilled?

2. How should things be produced?
3. For whom should things be produced?
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Every society must fulfill peoples basic needs
of food, shelter, and clothing. A society must
make decisions how they will fill these needs.
They must make decisions how to use their limited
resources to fill these needs. Even though people
agree what to produce, they must choose how to
produce it and how much of it to produce.
Technology plays a large role in these decisions.
For example, Technology uses machines and
manufacturing to produce things.
Lastly, a society must decide for whom we should
produce goods and services for. We are all
consumers, or users of goods and services.
However, just as resources are limited, supplies
and services can also be limited.
Today we live in a cash economy, that is, an
economy where we exchange money for goods and
services.
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The Free Enterprise System
The economy of the United States is based on a
principle known as free enterprise. In a free
enterprise system, the government plays a limited
role in the economy. Businesses are owned by
private citizens. Owners decide what products to
make and sell.
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The End