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8th grade · Social Studies · Unit 4 of 13

African Kingdoms & Empires

Mali, Songhai, Great Zimbabwe and more

What your child practices

Ghana, Mali, Songhai, Great Zimbabwe, the Swahili coast, Benin and Ethiopia from about 600 to 1900, trade across the Sahara and the Indian Ocean, the Atlantic slave trade and African resistance to colonization.

Alabama Course of Study content standard: 8.5 · the West African kingdoms of Ghana, Mali and Songhai

How we explain it

Children can open this short lesson before they practice.

  1. Ghana, Mali and Songhai grew rich from the gold and salt trade across the Sahara; Mansa Musa of Mali made a famous pilgrimage to Makkah in 1324.
  2. Great Zimbabwe was a stone city and trading center in southern Africa.
  3. Queen Nzinga resisted Portuguese colonization, and the Atlantic slave trade forced more than 12 million Africans across the ocean.

Example: Which two goods made the West African empires rich? Traders crossed the Sahara with camels. West Africa had gold; the desert had salt. They traded gold and salt. Answer: gold and salt

African Kingdoms & Empires in Alabama

In the Alabama Course of Study, this is unit 4 of 13 in 8th grade Social Studies, after Empires of Asia and before Maya, Aztec & Inca.

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

    Which sources help historians learn about medieval West Africa?

    • only movies
    • Arabic travel writing, griots' oral histories and archaeology
    • nothing

  2. Question 2

    The Atlantic slave trade forced… across the ocean.

    • more than 12 million Africans
    • no one
    • about 1,000 Africans

  3. Question 3

    The Songhai Empire fell after an invasion from… in 1591.

    • Egypt
    • Portugal
    • Morocco

  4. Question 4

    Kingdoms in Africa were linked to the wider world by…

    • trade routes across deserts and oceans
    • airplanes
    • railroads

  5. Question 5

    The Kingdom of Benin, in today's Nigeria, is famous for its…

    • stone pyramids
    • paper money
    • brass and bronze sculptures

  6. Question 6

    Ethiopia stayed independent after defeating Italy at the Battle of…

    • Adwa, in 1896
    • Yorktown, in 1781
    • Hastings, in 1066

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