Honors Global Communities
AP Exam Preparation
Brinkley, Alan et al American History: A Survey (any edition). Chapters 1-6. Read through the
ratification of the Constitution (halfway through chapter 6. The following terms are arranged by
topic and not necessarily by textbook chapter.
Chapter 1- EXPLORATION
Lure of Cathay
Motivation for exploration
Technology
Prince Henry & the Portuguese
Financing exploration
Portuguese, Spanish, French, English
Explorers and the race for empires
Chapter 1- EUROPEAN CONQUEST OF THE NEW WORLD
Exploration
Treaty of Tordisellas
Origin of Native Americans
Native American tribal culture
Meso-American cultures: Maya and Aztec
South American culture: Inca
Eastern North American culture: Iroquois
Ethnocentrism, confrontation, exploitation,
disease
Spanish conquest
Spanish social, political, and economic
domination
French social, political, and economic
system in New World
Seigneurs/habitants/coureur de bois
French relations with Indians
Chapter 2 & 3 - ENGLISH SETTLE IN NORTH AMERICA
Roanoke
Jamestown
English colonial charters
Joint Stock companies
House of Burgesses
Early English colonial economy
Slavery in English colonies
Headright system/indentured servants
English view of colonies and colonists
3 types of English colonies
Separatists/Mayflower Compact
Puritans and Mass. Bay Colony
Patterns of settlement and village growth
Society and government of Mass. Bay
Great and General Court
Puritan oligarchy and Zion
Dissent in Mass. Bay
Pequot War
King Philip's War
The Restoration Colonies
Georgia and Oglethorpe
Society and cultures of the Northern,
Middle, Southern colonies
Frontier/conflict of Piedmont vs. coastal
elite
Economic development of colonial regions
British mercantilism/Period of Salutary
Neglect
The Dominion of New England
Divergence between the English colonies
and the homeland
Effects of land and indentured servants on
colonial society
Structure and function of English colonial
government
Family life in the colonies
Slavery and the slave system in the English
colonies
British restriction on colonial economic
growth
The Great Awakening
The Enlightenment
Education and literacy in the colonies
Colonial science
Chapter 4 - FRENCH & INDIAN WAR
Land, fur, Indians and power
European politics
Fort Necessity & George Washington
Fort Duquesne & Braddock's Defeat
Course of the war until William Pitt
Fort Duquesne, Fort Ticonderoga, Fort
Louisbourg , Fort Niagra
Battle of Quebec
Treaty of Paris & The English Empire
Effects of the war on American colonists
Effects of the war on England
Chapter 4 - GROWING TENSIONS
Reasons for England re-asserting control
Pontiac's Revolt
Proclamation Line/American resentment
Navigation Acts/Writs of Assistance
Stamp Act/Stamp Act Congress/Sons of
Liberty
Paxton Boys/Regulators
American reaction to Acts and Taxes
Declaratory Act
Townshend Duties/Committees of
Correspondence
Boston Massacre
Rights of English Subjects/The
Enlightenment Ideology and philosophy of
the Revolution
Virtual vs. Actual Representation
Loyalist/Rebel points of view
Tea Tax/Tea Party/English outrage
Coercive Acts
lst Continental Congress/Suffolk Resolves
Lexington & Concord/Bunker Hill
Prohibatory Act
Chapter 5 - THE REVOLUTION
The Declaration of Independence &
Ideology
Sovereignty of the people/Rights of Man
2nd Continental Congress & its role
Loyalists, Blacks, Women during the war
Financing the War
Battles & Campaigns
Continental Army/militia
Siege of Boston
Battle of New York/Hessians
Fall of Philadelphia
Valley Forge
Burgoyne and Saratoga
1778 Treaty with France
Western campaign/Vincennes
Southern campaign/British strategy
Yorktown/Treaty of Paris
Chapter 5 - The Confederation Period
Assumptions of republicanism
Why these assumptions could not always
be maintained
Nature of the new state governments
Voter qualifications
Revision of state constitutions
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Virginia Statute of Religious Liberties
The question of slavery; actions of
Massachusetts and Pennsylvania
The problem of emancipation
Growth of abolitionist activity
The Critical Period
Structure of the Confederation
Government
Powers and problems of the Confederation
Congress
The western land issue/land speculation
Achievements of the Confederation
Diplomatic problems of the new nation
Westward expansion
Land Ordinance of 1785
Townships
The Northwest Ordinance of 1787
Postwar depression and the problem of
debt in the states
Shays' Rebellion and the specter of
anarchy
Chapter 6 - The Constitutional Convention
Implied vs. expressed powers
Arguments for and against a strong central
government
Annapolis Convention of 1786
Impact of the "Specter of Anarchy"
Delegates to the Constitutional Convention
Madison's role
Disputes between large and small states
Randolph's Virginia Plan
Patterson's New Jersey Plan
The issue of slavery
The Great Compromise (The Legislative
Branch)
3/5ths Compromise and the slave trade
The issue of state and national sovereigntyidea of federalism
Division of power/ influence of Montesquieu
and Hume
Structure of the Federal government/ checks
and balances
Federalists vs. Anti-Federalists
The Federalist Papers
The issue of a bill of rights
Debate about and ratification of the Bill of
Rights
Judiciary Act of 1789
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