Learning Standards/Objectives

• Identify major eras in world history, and describe their defining characteristics.
•   Identify changes that resulted from critical turning points, such as the development of farming and the acceptance of monotheism.
•  Develop a global view and understanding of the world. 
•  Apply chronology through sequencing of significant individuals, events, and time periods.
• Understand how the present relates to the past, and identify elements in a contemporary situation that parallel a historical situation.
• Evaluate the variables and outcomes of various events.
• Describe lasting contributions of the ancient and classical world.

Course Purpose and Theme

World History is the study of human history around the globe and through time.  World History is NOT an adaptation of European History nor is it a series of area studies.  World History is a global perspective of the human story.  World historians study global forces and large historical themes.  Among these themes are climatic changes, the spread of diseases and religions, and the expansion of a global economy.  In World History, the story of Columbus is not simply the discovery of a “new world”.  Instead it is the “Columbian Exchange”, a story of human migrations, transatlantic trade, and the exchange of plants, animals, diseases, art, and technology between the eastern and western hemispheres.  World History transcends civilizations and nation-states to form a macro history of the human past.  This course focuses on the global impact that change and continuity has brought forth.