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8th grade · Social Studies · Unit 13 of 13

Science & the Enlightenment

New ideas about nature and government

What your child practices

Copernicus, Galileo, Kepler and Newton, the scientific method, the roots of the Scientific Revolution, and the Enlightenment thinkers whose ideas about rights and government shaped the American founding.

Alabama Course of Study content standard: 8.17; 8.18 · the Scientific Revolution, Copernicus and Galileo, and the ideas of the Enlightenment

How we explain it

Children can open this short lesson before they practice.

  1. The Scientific Revolution grew from Greek reasoning and Muslim, Jewish and Christian scholarship; it used observation and experiment.
  2. Enlightenment thinkers applied reason to government: Voltaire defended freedom of speech and religion.
  3. The English Bill of Rights (1689) said the monarch could not raise taxes or an army without Parliament.

Example: What did Voltaire defend? He was an Enlightenment writer in France. He criticized censorship and intolerance. He defended freedom of speech and religion. Answer: freedom of speech and religion

Science & the Enlightenment in Alabama

In the Alabama Course of Study, this is unit 13 of 13 in 8th grade Social Studies, after Ottoman & Ming Empires.

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

    Enlightenment ideas grew from the Renaissance and the…

    • Stone Age
    • Scientific Revolution
    • Bronze Age
    • Ice Age

  2. Question 2

    John Locke wrote that people have natural rights to…

    • life, liberty and property
    • no rights at all
    • free land in Asia
    • kingship

  3. Question 3

    Voltaire is known for defending…

    • absolute kings
    • freedom of speech and religion
    • the feudal system
    • censorship

  4. Question 4

    Jean-Jacques Rousseau wrote about the social contract, the idea that…

    • laws come from the stars
    • government rests on the will of the people
    • kings rule by birth only
    • people have no say

  5. Question 5

    The microscope helped scientists discover…

    • planets
    • cells and tiny living things
    • comets
    • continents

  6. Question 6

    How did the Scientific Revolution change how people saw authority?

    • people stopped thinking
    • kings gained more power
    • people began to test claims with evidence instead of only trusting tradition
    • science was banned

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