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4th grade · Social Studies · Unit 3 of 12

Colonial Regions & Work

Three regions, their founders and how people worked

What your child practices

The geography of the New England, Middle and Southern colonies, their founders, and colonial labor (apprenticeship, indentured servitude and slavery), with the triangular trade and the Middle Passage told plainly.

Alabama Course of Study content standard: 4.1; 4.2; 4.3; 4.4 · the colonial regions and how geography shaped them, colonial labor systems and the slave trade, and contributions of groups in colonial America

How we explain it

Children can open this short lesson before they practice.

  1. The New England colonies fished, built ships and traded. The Southern colonies grew cash crops on plantations.
  2. Workers included apprentices, indentured servants and enslaved Africans, brought by the Middle Passage.
  3. Mercantilism meant colonies existed to make the home country rich.

Example: Why did many New England colonists fish and build ships? New England has rocky soil and cold winters. Farming was hard, but the sea was close. Answer: the rocky soil and cold winters made farming hard

Colonial Regions & Work in Alabama

In the Alabama Course of Study, this is unit 3 of 12 in 4th grade Social Studies, after Reconstruction and before The American Revolution.

Gradelings describes a child's practice on this unit as Beginning, Approaching, Meeting or Exceeding (Four practice steps). That reflects practice, not a report-card mark: the teacher decides the mark.

Source: Alabama State Department of Education (ALSDE)

Sample questions

A taste of this unit. In the app, questions change every time and get easier or harder to match your child.

  1. Question 1

    Before being kidnapped, many West Africans were…

    • farmers, traders and craftspeople in their own kingdoms and villages
    • already in America
    • living alone with no culture
    • European sailors

  2. Question 2

    Benjamin Franklin lived in which colonial city?

    • Charleston
    • Boston
    • Philadelphia

  3. Question 3

    The Middle Colonies were called the breadbasket colonies because they grew lots of…

    • cotton
    • sugar
    • wheat and other grains

  4. Question 4

    The triangular trade linked…

    • Alabama, Ohio and Iowa
    • Asia, Australia and Antarctica
    • three cities in Georgia
    • Europe, Africa and the Americas

  5. Question 5

    Conditions on slave ships during the Middle Passage were…

    • crowded, cruel and deadly
    • comfortable and safe
    • chosen by the passengers
    • like a vacation

  6. Question 6

    Why did most colonial cities grow along the coast?

    • the coast had no water
    • ships carried trade across the Atlantic
    • mountains were easier to farm

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