United States History
The arc of the course
History questions on the GED stress cause and effect, chronology, and the meaning of documents far more than memorized dates.
Concepts to master
- Founding era: colonial self-government, the Declaration of Independence (natural rights, consent of the governed), the weak Articles of Confederation, and the compromises of the Constitutional Convention.
- Expansion and conflict: westward movement, the spread of slavery, sectionalism, the Civil War, and Reconstruction.
- Industry and reform: immigration, urbanization, labor organizing, the Progressive Era, and the New Deal response to the Great Depression.
- Modern era: the civil rights movement, the Cold War, and the growth of federal power.
Traps
- Choosing a statement that is true but does not answer the question asked.
- Reversing cause and effect, or selecting an event that happened later.
- Confusing a primary source (made at the time by a participant) with a secondary source (written later by a historian).
- Swapping the 14th and 15th Amendments.
Rule of thumb
For the Reconstruction amendments, remember Free, Citizens, Vote: the 13th abolishes slavery, the 14th grants citizenship and equal protection, the 15th protects voting regardless of race. When a question quotes a law, speech, or cartoon, ask what changed because of this? and pick the answer tied to that change.