MTTC Social Studies (084) flashcards

32 cards. Read the term and the definition here. The deck at the top of this page is optional.

Primary source

A document, artifact, or record created by a participant or eyewitness during the period under study, such as a diary, letter, photograph, law, or oral testimony.

Secondary source

A work created later by someone who did not participate in the events, which interprets and analyzes primary sources, for example a textbook, biography, or scholarly journal article.

Historical corroboration

The practice of comparing two or more independent sources to test whether a claim is accurate; agreement across sources with different origins strengthens confidence in that claim.

Continuity and change over time

An analytical framework that asks which features of a society persisted and which were transformed across a period, instead of treating historical eras as complete breaks with the past.

Neolithic Revolution

The shift from foraging to settled farming that began around 10,000 BCE in the Fertile Crescent, enabling food surpluses, cities, occupational specialization, and social hierarchy.

Hammurabi's Code

A Babylonian law collection inscribed on a stele around 1750 BCE, publishing 282 case laws with penalties graded by social class; among the earliest surviving written legal codes.

Silk Roads

Overland and maritime trade networks linking China, India, Persia, Arabia, and the Mediterranean from roughly 200 BCE to 1400 CE, carrying silk, horses, paper, Buddhism, Islam, and epidemic disease.

Hijra of 622 CE

Muhammad's migration from Mecca to Medina, which marks year one of the Islamic calendar and the founding of the first Muslim community, known as the umma.

Columbian Exchange

The post-1492 transfer of plants, animals, people, and pathogens between the Americas and Afro-Eurasia; smallpox devastated Indigenous populations while maize, potatoes, and horses transformed other continents.

Marbury v. Madison

The 1803 Supreme Court decision, written by Chief Justice Marshall, that struck down part of a federal law and established the power of judicial review over acts of Congress.

Missouri Compromise

The 1820 agreement admitting Missouri as a slave state and Maine as a free state and banning slavery north of the 36°30′ line in the Louisiana Purchase territory.

Reconstruction Amendments

The Thirteenth (1865) abolishing slavery, the Fourteenth (1868) granting citizenship and equal protection, and the Fifteenth (1870) protecting voting rights regardless of race.

New Deal

Franklin Roosevelt's 1933–1939 program of relief, recovery, and reform responding to the Great Depression, creating Social Security, the FDIC, the SEC, and the Wagner Act.

Brown v. Board of Education

The unanimous 1954 Supreme Court ruling that racial segregation in public schools is inherently unequal and violates the Fourteenth Amendment, overturning Plessy v. Ferguson.

Demographic transition model

A model describing population change in stages: high birth and death rates, then falling death rates and rapid growth, then falling birth rates, then low rates and a stable population.

Map projection

A method of transferring points from the three-dimensional globe onto a flat surface; every projection distorts at least one of shape, area, distance, or direction.

Push and pull factors

Conditions that drive migration: push factors such as war, drought, or unemployment drive people out, while pull factors such as jobs, safety, and services attract them to a destination.

Cultural hearth

A region where a major cultural innovation or complex, such as agriculture, writing, or a religion, first emerged and from which it later spread to other areas.

Judicial review

The power of courts to declare a law or government action unconstitutional and therefore void, established for the U.S. Supreme Court in Marbury v. Madison in 1803.

Federalism

A system in which sovereignty is divided between a national government and constituent state governments, each exercising powers directly over the same citizens.

Checks and balances

Constitutional devices letting each branch limit the others, including the presidential veto, congressional override by two-thirds, Senate confirmation of appointments, and impeachment.

Electoral College

The body of 538 electors that formally elects the U.S. president; each state's electors equal its House and Senate seats, and 270 votes are needed to win.

Proportional representation

An electoral system awarding legislative seats in multi-member districts roughly in proportion to each party's vote share, typically producing multiparty legislatures and coalition governments.

Opportunity cost

The value of the next-best alternative given up when a choice is made; it is the true economic cost of any decision, even when no money changes hands.

Price elasticity of demand

The percentage change in quantity demanded divided by the percentage change in price; demand is elastic when the absolute value exceeds one and inelastic when it is below one.

Comparative advantage

The ability to produce a good at a lower opportunity cost than a trading partner; specializing accordingly raises total output even when one party is absolutely better at everything.

Federal Reserve tools

The main instruments of U.S. monetary policy: open market operations in government securities, the discount rate charged to banks, and reserve requirements for depository institutions.

Multiplier effect

The process by which an initial change in spending produces a larger change in total income, equal to the initial change times one divided by one minus the marginal propensity to consume.

C3 Framework

The NCSS inquiry framework with four dimensions: developing questions, applying disciplinary concepts, evaluating sources and using evidence, and communicating conclusions while taking informed action.

Formative assessment

Ongoing, low-stakes checks during instruction, such as exit tickets, quick quizzes, and questioning, used by teachers and students to adjust learning while it is still happening.

Backward design

Wiggins and McTighe's planning model that starts by identifying desired results, then determines acceptable evidence of learning, and only then designs instructional activities.

Document-based question

An assessment task in which students analyze a set of primary and secondary sources, group them by theme, and write a thesis-driven essay supported by documents and outside knowledge.