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5th grade · Social Studies · Unit 2 of 13

Colonial Trade & Work

Resources, trade and choices

What your child practices

Resources, specialization and trade in the colonies, mercantilism, and the Atlantic slave trade and its impact on African peoples, told plainly and age-appropriately.

Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS) teks student expectation: 5.9(A); 5.9(B); 5.10(A) · the economic patterns and major industries of the colonies and the start of free enterprise

How we explain it

Children can open this short lesson before they practice.

  1. A need is something you must have to live; trade is exchanging goods or services.
  2. Saving money helps with a future need.
  3. Colonists smuggled to avoid English trade rules. Enslaved people resisted because they were forced to work.

Example: Why was smuggling common in the colonies? England made strict trade rules and taxes. Smuggling let colonists avoid them. Answer: to avoid English trade rules and taxes

Colonial Trade & Work in Texas

In the Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS), this is unit 2 of 13 in 5th grade Social Studies, after The Thirteen Colonies and before Road to 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: Texas Education Agency (TEA)

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

    Why did enslaved people resist slavery, for example by escaping or slowing work?

    • They were bored
    • They wanted to go to England
    • They were paid too little
    • They wanted freedom and were forced to work against their will

  2. Question 2

    Colonists who could not make something themselves often…

    • Asked the king to send it free
    • Went without forever
    • Took it from England by force
    • Traded for it or bought it from a merchant

  3. Question 3

    A ship used to carry goods is an example of…

    • Human capital
    • A natural resource
    • A want
    • Capital goods

  4. Question 4

    A farmer chooses to plant wheat instead of corn. What is the opportunity cost?

    • The corn she could have grown
    • The wheat
    • Nothing
    • The farm

  5. Question 5

    Increasing productivity means…

    • Working longer for less
    • Making more in the same amount of time
    • Making nothing
    • Paying more taxes

  6. Question 6

    Under mercantilism, colonies were supposed to…

    • Pay no taxes ever
    • Supply raw materials and buy goods made in England
    • Make all their own goods
    • Trade freely with any country

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