Regents Global 9 CRQ "Crusades and Black Death" + Video Lessons

This product is a constructed-response question (“CRQ”) in the format of the new New York State Regents examination in Global History and Geography. 

The CRQ calls upon the student to examine historical sources (I use exclusively primary sources) by providing historical or geographic context, identifying the point of view, intended audience, or purpose of a document and then using the two documents in either compare-contrast, cause-effect analysis, or turning point identification. I advocate a strategy of assigning one CRQ in each unit of study in grades nine and ten without access to notes. I used this as one of the tests at the end of a unit of study. I would tell students about what kinds of documents would appear and what historical context they should be able to recall in advance. It is a challenging task for them. 

The first challenge for novices is to understand what it means to provide context. Faced with the question “What is the historical context of this document?”, beginners will retell what the document says. The reason for this mistake is that, since they were little kids, teachers have asked them to relate what a text means to prove they understood it.  [Read more at the Innovation blog]

Product includes:

1. Student version

2. Teacher version with suggested answers

3. Passcode to video lessons students can use to prepare the task.

Documents:

1. map, first Crusade

2. Excerpt is from the Gesta Francorum ("The Deeds of the Franks"). It is a Latin chronicle of the First Crusade written in circa 1100-1101.

3. map, Bubonic plague

4. excerpt, The Decameron

Passcode Lessons:

• Transregional Trade networks

• Overview of The Crusades

• The past, present and future of the bubonic plague

• 9.7 Word Bank Matching

• The Black Death

• Medieval Travellers

About Innovation Passcodes

Passcodes let your students access selected lessons in my own virtual classroom at InnovationAssessments.com. No registration is required. Use the codes at InnovationAssessments.com/TestDrive.