Semester Exam Review 1
Name: _________________________________
1. What mountain range separates France and Spain? (page 78) Pyrenees Mountains
2. What mountain range separates Europe from Asia? (page A3) Ural Mountains
3. What mountain range separates Italy from the rest of Europe? (page 78) Alps Mountains
4. What 2 countries are on the Iberian Peninsula? (page 78) Spain and Portugal
5. Norway and Sweden are on what peninsula? (page 78) Scandinavian Peninsula
6. What sea lies between the United Kingdom and Denmark? (page 78) North Sea
7. What sea separates Europe from Africa? (page 78) Mediterranean Sea
8. What strait separates Spain from Africa? (page 78) Strait of Gibraltar
9. What are dikes and polders? (page 80) Dikes are giant walls to hold back water, and polders are land that has
been drained of water to be used for farming.
10. What country uses polders and dikes to create more living space by draining the land? (page 80) Netherlands
11. What 2 rivers form an important transportation route through Europe? (page 82) Rhine River and Danube River
12. What are the 3 major branches of Christianity and in what part of Europe is each branch found? (lecture)
Roman Catholic in Western Europe, Protestant Christianity in Eastern Europe, and Orthodox Christianity in
Eastern Europe
13. What was the Holocaust? (page 110) The mass slaughter of Jews by German Nazis in the 1930s and 1940s.
14. What is the fastest-growing religion in Europe? (page 117) Islam
15. Europe has an aging population. What does this mean? (page 130) The average age of people in Europe is going
up.
16. What 2 population trends are causing Europe’s aging population? (page 130) People are living longer, and
families are having fewer children
17. What problem is Europe’s aging population causing for economies in Europe? (page 130) There are not enough
young workers to replace the workers who retire.
18. How is the problem in question 17 being solved by European countries? (page 130) European countries are
bringing in immigrants to fill the open jobs.
19. What is the Arctic Circle and why is it important? (lecture) The Arctic Circle is the line of latitude at 66˚N. On
the first day of winter, the sun does not rise in locations on the Arctic Circle and north of it. On the first day of
summer, the sun does not set in locations on the Arctic Circle and north of it.
20. What energy resources do Russia and the Eurasian countries have? (page 146) Oil, natural gas, peat, and
hydroelectric power.
21. Twenty percent of the world’s supply of what resource is located in Russia and Kazakhstan? (page 146) Iron ore
22. What is happening to the Aral Sea and why? (page 150) The Aral Sea is shrinking because farmers are using the
rivers that refill the Aral Sea to irrigate (water) their crops.
23. What is being done to save the Aral Sea and what country is trying to save it? (page 150) Kazakhstan has built a
dam and is working to save the Aral Sea.
24. What type of government did the Soviet Union have? (lecture) Communist
25. What type of economy did the Soviet Union have? (lecture) Command
26. Who owns businesses and decides what to make in a command economy? (page 62) The government owns all
businesses and land and decides what to make, how to make it, and how to sell it.
27. What area of Europe fell under the control of the Soviet Union—eastern Europe or western Europe? (lecture)
Eastern
28. What was the Cold War and how long did it last? (lecture) The Cold War was a competition between the U.S.
and the U.S.S.R. to see whose system worked better. It lasted from 1945 to 1992.
29. What was life like in the Soviet Union? (lecture) People were unhappy, and the standard of living was low.
There was not enough food or goods for all the people.
30. What was the Iron Curtain? (lecture) An imaginary boundary between Western Europe and Eastern Europe
31. What leader of Russia enacted reforms to improve life in the Soviet Union? (lecture) Mikhail Gorbachev
32. What were some of the reforms enacted to improve life in the Soviet Union? (lecture) Perestroika (restructuring
the economy to give people more control) and glasnost (openness, allowing people to say how they felt about
the government)
33. What type of government does Russia have now? (lecture) democracy
34. What is happening to Arctic ice and what problems is this creating in the Arctic? (lecture) Arctic ice is shrinking
because of global warming. This is creating several problems in the Arctic, including pollution and questions
about country boundaries.
35. What industries are using resources in, or exploiting, the Arctic? (lecture) Fishing, shipping, mining, and oil
36. Where is Chernobyl and what happened there? (lecture or page 178) Chernobyl was a nuclear power plant in
northern Ukraine that had a meltdown and spread radioactive fallout throughout Ukraine and Belarus.
37. How did the Chernobyl disaster affect the environment? (lecture or page 179) Radioactive fallout from the
nuclear meltdown contaminated the soil and water in the area, making them toxic.