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9th grade · Social Studies · Unit 2 of 13

The French Revolution & Napoleon

Estates, the Terror and Napoleon

What your child practices

The causes of the French Revolution and the influence of the American Revolution, the factions (Jacobins, Girondins, sans-culottes, émigrés), the Reign of Terror, Napoleon's rule and wars, and the Congress of Vienna.

Alabama Course of Study content standard: 9.2 · the causes and consequences of the French Revolution

How we explain it

Children can open this short lesson before they practice.

  1. France had three estates; the Third Estate was commoners, who paid most taxes. Huge debt, partly from helping the American Revolution, set off the crisis.
  2. Factions fought; nobles who fled were émigrés. The Reign of Terror used the guillotine.
  3. Napoleon crowned himself emperor in 1804; his invasion of Russia (1812) ended in disaster. The Congress of Vienna redrew Europe.

Example: Who made up the Third Estate? The First Estate was clergy; the Second, nobles. Everyone else, from peasants to rich merchants, was the Third. Answer: commoners, from peasants to wealthy merchants

The French Revolution & Napoleon in Alabama

In the Alabama Course of Study, this is unit 2 of 13 in 9th grade Social Studies, after Age of Revolutions and before The Industrial 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

    The Third Estate was made up of…

    • the clergy
    • commoners, from peasants to wealthy merchants
    • the nobles
    • the royal family

  2. Question 2

    The Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen was inspired partly by the…

    • Magna Carta's ban on voting
    • Communist Manifesto
    • American Declaration of Independence
    • Treaty of Versailles

  3. Question 3

    The machine used for executions during the Terror was the…

    • printing press
    • catapult
    • cannon
    • guillotine

  4. Question 4

    King Louis XVI was executed in…

    • 1793
    • 1848
    • 1815
    • 1776

  5. Question 5

    Working-class radicals in Paris were called…

    • Girondins
    • Tories
    • sans-culottes
    • émigrés

  6. Question 6

    The Concert of Europe was an agreement among great powers to…

    • start wars
    • keep peace and stop revolutions
    • colonize the Americas
    • end monarchy

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