A TIME OF EXPLORATION OR INVASION?

YOU DECIDE!!!

The Columbian

Exchange

Directions

Today you will be completing a documents based

question over the Columbian Exchange.

What is a documents based question you ask?

It is when you are asked a question and must

examine multiple documents/sources in order to be

able to answer the question. The documents can

include articles, quotes, pictures, graphs, etc…

The Big Question

Did the Columbian Exchange

have a positive or negative

impact on the New World?

Document A

1. During the

exchange, things

went both ways.

Name 1 item that the

New World gained

from the Columbian

exchange that had a

negative impact on

the people.

2. Name 1 item that

the New World gained

from the Columbian

exchange that had a

positive impact on the

people.

Document BNative American Population of Central Mexico

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

15001520

15401560

15801600

1620

Millions ofNative People

3. What was the estimated population of

Central Mexico in 1519? 1600?

4. What is the difference between the two

numbers and why did that occur?

Document C

Caption: Even as the Aztecs fought to defend their

capital from Hernán Cortés and his men, they fell victim

to diseases introduced by the Spaniards. This drawing

depicts Indians suffering from smallpox, one of the

deadliest diseases introduced by the Europeans. The

symbols near the subjects’ mouths represent

speech.

5. Describe what the artist is showing in

the drawing?

6. Whose point of view is being

represented in the drawing, the native

Americans or the Spanish

conquistadors?

Document D“The Impact of Disease”

The charge of genocide is largely sustained by figures showing the precipitous decline of the Indian population. Although scholars debate the exact numbers, in Alvin Josephy's estimate, the Indian population fell from between fifteen and twenty million when the white man first arrived to a fraction of that 150 years later. Undoubtedly the Indians perished in great numbers. Yet although European enslavement of Indians and the Spanish forced labor system extracted a heavy toll in lives, the vast majority of Indian casualties occurred not as a result of hard labor or deliberate destruction but because of contagious diseases that the Europeans transmitted to the Indians. The Europeans, for their part, gave the Indians measles and smallpox. Since the Indians had not developed any resistance or immunity to these unfamiliar ailments, they perished in catastrophic numbers.

Source: “The Crimes of Christopher Columbus” Dinesh D'Souza

7. Natives were the first slaves in America, And this took its toll on the native population. But

what was the number one killer of the natives? Why did the natives die from such things?

8. The Source is from a book “The crimes of Christopher Columbus” Why do you believe the

author chose that title for the book?

Document E

9. What were some of the

things Europeans brought in

the picture? Why are they

significant?

10. Do you believe these

new things were positive or

negative for North and South

America?