As you’ve learned, one of the main historical thinking tools that historians use to analyze and produce accounts of the past is comparison. In this activity, you’ll learn how to evaluate for continuity and change over time (which we’ll refer to as CCOT throughout the course) so that you have a method for comparing (and making claims about) how the same location, idea, or historical process either stayed the same or changed during a set time in history.

Comparison, causation
Continuity and change analysis involves comparison, but it’s different from the kind of historical comparison that you’ve been introduced to in this course until now. Typically, historical comparison involves examining the similarities and differences between two things, while CCOT looks at how things stayed the same or changed over time. Comparison is often a component of a CCOT analysis. Additionally, part of understanding how and when a change occurred is related to understanding the causes and consequences of those changes.

What are continuities? What are changes? How do these relate to history? We refer to continuities as the things that have stayed the same over time in history. And changes—which are often easier to identify—are the things that did not stay the same. Historians often do something called a continuity and change over time analysis (CCOT analysis for short). They do this by looking at how certain things changed or stayed the same over time. One of the reasons historians find CCOT analysis useful is that recognizing what has stayed the same helps them decide which changes throughout history were the most significant. This, in turn, allows historians to see how those changes may have led to major transformations in how people lived and continue to live today.

Instead of looking at an event or something that happened at a defined moment or time period, we are now trying to understand how farms, one of the mainstays of societies since the development of agriculture, have evolved. We are going to look at farms in the state of Iowa from the 1700s, 1800s, 1900s, and today, to determine how farms have changed and how they’ve stayed the same over time.

Your teacher will either hand out or have you download the CCOT – Introduction worksheet. Glance at the pictures of the four farms on the first few pages. Based on just the images, discuss as a class what is the same and what is different about the four farms. Remember that the things that are the same are continuities. And the things that are different are, you guessed it, changes!

Now, you’ll review the CCOT Tool portion of the worksheet with your class. As with sourcing, claim testing, and reading, there is a tool that you can use to help you analyze continuities and changes. Working in small groups, write down on the tool portion of the worksheet the timeframe with which you’re working. Then, read through the text accompanying the images of farms and write the continuities and changes you find on your sticky notes (one continuity or one change per sticky note).

Next, place your sticky notes on the graph (either using the graph in your worksheet or by drawing the graph on the board) and decide whether your continuities and changes were positive or negative. Be prepared to explain your reasons for categorizing your continuities and changes as either positive or negative.

Once your group has placed all your sticky notes on the graph, answer the remaining questions on the tool. In the last set of questions, you’ll be evaluating the most significant change and continuity. You can use the acronym ADE (amount, depth, and endurance) to help you determine historical significance. You’ll decide if the changes and continuities affected all people (amount); if the changes and continuities deeply affected people (depth); or if the changes and continuities were long lasting (endurance). Be prepared to share your most significant continuities and changes with the class.

Your teacher will collect your worksheets and use them to assess your understanding of this historical thinking practice. And remember, this is a just a simple exercise to get you used to the idea of CCOT. It’s going to get a lot more complicated as you move through the course and increase your historical knowledge!

The Afro-Eurasian trade system of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries was the largest integrated commercial network in the world at the time. It helped with the exchange of products, people, knowledge, technologies—and germs. There wasn’t one dominant society controlling this trade, and many smaller networks linked up into a massive network. Over time, however, Europeans gained more and more power over global trade.

The Unit 2 Problem asks you how networks connected societies and how communities were changed by these connections. In addition, you're asked to evaluate the positive and negative effects of connectivity. This article provides you with an overview of different trade centers across Afro-Eurasia and outlines some of these positive and negative effects. These regional examples of exchange networks can also provide you with evidence to test the claims made in the networks frame narrative.

Preview – Skimming for Gist

Fill out the Skimming for Gist section of the Three Close Reads Worksheet as you complete your first close read. As a reminder, this should be a quick process!

Key Ideas – Understanding Content

For this reading, you should be looking for unfamiliar vocabulary words, the major claim and key supporting details, and analysis and evidence. By the end of the second close read, you should be able to answer the following questions:

1. Why is the Afro-Eurasian system of long-distance trade described as an archipelago?
2. What was the effect of the Mongol Empire on trade?
3. What role did this regional trade network play in helping Johannes Gutenberg create his printing press?
4. What impact did annual fairs have on the European economy?
5. What was one negative effect of interconnected trade?

Evaluating and Corroborating

At the end of the third close read, respond to the following questions:

1. This article is about production and distribution in Afro-Eurasia. Which Afro-Eurasians does it leave out? Whose experiences of production and distribution are not included in the article?
2. How did European production and distribution change over time? How did these regional changes affect global production and distribution? Use evidence from this article and other articles and videos in this lesson to make and defend a claim in response to this question.

We might think of the Afro-Eurasian trading system as an archipelago of trade—a chain of overlapping trade circuits and trading cities. In the thirteenth century, England was at the far end of this archipelago of trade. England’s most valuable trade good was wool, which it exported to Western Europe and the Mediterranean. The best wool in Europe came from England, and England’s economy ran on wool. The wool trade helped empower an English merchant class. By the fourteenth century, these merchants organized into a guild that gave them more power and privileges in English society.

The Unit 2 Problem asks you to evaluate how networks connected societies and how communities were impacted by these connections. England may have been at the far corner of Eurasia in the thirteenth and fourteenth century, but the wool trade connected England with large regional networks and eventually, these networks became global. This video provides you with evidence at the local and national level to respond to the unit problem by evaluating the impacts the wool trade had on England's history and its growing interconnections with the rest of the world.

Preview – Skimming for Gist

As a reminder, open and skim the transcript, and read the questions before you watch the video.

Key Ideas – Understanding Content

Think about the following questions as you watch this video:

1. How do Nick and Trevor describe the Afro-Eurasian trade system in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries?
2. Why did people in Flanders and northern Italy buy English wool?
3. Who produced wool in England?
4. How did the wool trade empower the merchant classes? What role did guilds play in this process?
5. Why was wool important for England?

Evaluating and Corroborating

1. English wool is one example of a local good that was traded across extensive regional networks. The trade reshaped both communities and networks in England and across Western Europe. Can you think of anything that is or was once made in your community? Where does that good get distributed? Who produces it? How does that industry affect your community, and how do you think it impacts other places?
2. How would you tell the story of the Worshipful Company of Woolmen differently in each of the three course frames? How were they a community? How did they shape networks? What impacts did they have on production and distribution in England and the larger region?

In this activity, you’ll become more familiar with the nuances (slight differences) of authority. This is a challenging but worthy claim tester because authority can either be earned or granted—and is deeply connected to our personal biases. The reasons we choose to believe people are varied, and it’s not always because someone has authority on the topic at hand. Understanding how and why we decide what to believe is a critical skill not just in history, but in our everyday assessment of claims. You will dig into the specifics of authority and understand how to identify, assess, and use authority when evaluating and making claims.

Reading, sourcing
At this point, you’ve had multiple opportunities to practice your reading skills for a variety of media (articles, videos, and graphic biographies). However, in this activity, you will be pushed to think about what and how you read. As historians and critical thinkers, you should be curious about where you are getting your information, and you should be equipped with the skills to evaluate a source’s claims. This lends itself to the historical thinking practice of sourcing—which is necessary in all subjects and in life. You need to develop your claim testing skills so that you can make, evaluate, defend, and refute claims as well as the claims of others.

In the last activity on claim testing, you had the opportunity to discuss and explore the practice. In this series of activities, you will do a deep dive into claim testers so that you feel comfortable applying each when you read, write, do research, and speak.

Think about the following scenario:

Leading up to the November 6, 2018 midterm elections, Taylor Swift, a famous musician, took to social media to promote voter registration. After her post, Vote.org saw 155,940 unique visitors within 24 hours (up from the average daily number of 14,078). Further, over 2,100 new voters registered in Tennessee the day after her post, which nearly matches the typical monthly number of registrations (about 2,800). Her short post on social media had a real impact on the number of registered voters—and likely, actual voter turnout—in both Tennessee and the nation.

Now, take out the Claim Testing – Authority worksheet, and respond to the questions in Part 1. Be ready to discuss your answers with the class.

Authority comes in all shapes and sizes, and it often helps us decide not only what to believe—but whom to believe. Some authority is earned based on merit, such as licensure or education (doctors, teachers, estheticians, electricians, lawyers, and so on); some is given due to popularity. Our biases are deeply embedded in whom we believe. We may be biased based on our religious beliefs, where we grew up, or what our family believes. We can also be biased based on the popularity (or lack of popularity) of a claim or the person making the claim.

So, what do we do when two authorities disagree? There are long-standing debates among historians, scientists, and other scholars about what really happened in the past, and we’ll encounter those disagreements frequently in this course, as we do in life all the time. Let’s dig into a historical debate about early humans to see if we can start to figure out what to do when authorities disagree. Your teacher will collect your completed worksheets at the end of the activity and provide feedback to help you refine your claim testing skills.

Indigenous American networks of exchange came in many different shapes and sizes, from complex, imperial systems of communication to smaller, local networks. Some networks moved massive amounts of people, goods, and ideas, like the Aztec and Inca networks.

This article provides an overview of networks of exchange across the Americas in the era prior to the Columbian Exchange. You will be able to compare and contrast these networks to others in Eurasia during this period, and also, later, to the systems in place in the Americas after the Columbian Exchange begins. This will help you to respond to the Unit Problem: How did networks of exchange connect societies, and how were communities changed by these connections?

Preview – Skimming for Gist

Fill out the Skimming for Gist section of the Three Close Reads Worksheet as you complete your first close read. As a reminder, this should be a quick process!

Key Ideas – Understanding Content

For this reading, you should be looking for unfamiliar vocabulary words, the major claim and key supporting details, and analysis and evidence. By the end of the second close read, you should be able to answer the following questions:

1. Where were most of North America’s networks of exchange located? Why?
2. What was significant about Aztec marketplaces?
3. How was the Aztec Empire maintained?
4. What challenges did the Inca Empire face when trying to unify? How did they overcome it?
5. What was the mita (Mit’a) system?
6. What was unusual about Inca trade?

Evaluating and Corroborating

At the end of the third close read, respond to the following question:

1. At this time, we have less information about communities and networks in the Americas prior to the sixteenth century than we do for Afro-Eurasia. Based on this article, compare and contrast communities and networks in the Americas to those you have already learned about in Afro-Eurasia. What types of information about communities and networks in the Americas would help you complete this comparison?

From 850 to 1150 CE, an Indigenous American people called the Ancestral Pueblo made Chaco Canyon the center of their cultural world. For hundreds of miles in every direction, other communities emulated the ideas and architecture of Chaco. Archaeologists have found surprising evidence of long-distance trade networks linking Chaco Canyon with societies thousands of miles away. Why did the Ancestral Puebloans choose to live in Chaco Canyon, and how did they learn to thrive in this challenging environment? To find answers to these questions, we spoke with archaeologist Kurt Anschuetz and Brian Vallo, the former governor of Acoma Pueblo.

This video provides you with evidence to evaluate state formation and long-distance trade in the Americas. It will help you respond to the Unit Problem by providing new details on the development of complex societies and the ways they interacted with each other. Finally, by listening to interviews with an archaeologist and a Pueblo leader, you will gain an understanding of how this history remains important to descendent communities today.

Preview – Skimming for Gist

Remember to open and skim the transcript, and then read the questions below before you watch the video.

Key Ideas – Factual

Think about the following questions as you watch this video.

1. What sorts of buildings were constructed at Chaco Canyon and who built them?
2. What are kivas and what are outliers?
3. How many people lived in the Chaco Canyon region? Why did this number change?
4. According to Kurt Anschuetz, why is it wrong to think of Chaco as a center?
5. According to Kurt Anschuetz, why is it important that some Pueblo peoples today describe themselves as being “of Chaco”?
6. According to Brian Vallo, what sort of trade and long-distance connections did the people at Chaco Canyon have?

Evaluating and Corroborating

1. How was Chaco Canyon similar to other complex societies you’re learning about? How was it different?
2. All three speakers in this video argue that the history and memory of Chaco Canyon remains important to Pueblo communities in the present. Can you think of other histories or historical sites that have similar importance for people today in other parts of the world?

The Sahara Desert might not seem much like a body of water, but this sea of sand carried goods and people across its expanse for centuries. From 1200 to 1450 CE, an extensive network of trade routes, merchants, and pastoralists connected the communities within and surrounding the desert. Pastoralists mastered camel riding, allowing them to transport trading caravans from West Africa to the Mediterranean. Salt, gold, and enslaved people were all transported along these routes, encouraging the spread of technology and Islam.

Unit 2 focuses on the role of networks of exchange in transforming societies. The Trans-Saharan trade is often overlooked as an important trading system. This article will provide you with evidence to evaluate the impact of trade in transforming West African and Mediterranean societies. It will also help you contextualize this regional trading system as part of larger networks in Afro-Eurasia during this period. As you read, think about how networks like the Trans-Saharan routes might have changed the structure of different communities.

Preview – Skimming for Gist

Fill out the Skimming for Gist section of the Three Close Reads worksheet as you complete your first close read. As a reminder, this should be a quick process!

Key Ideas – Understanding Content

For this reading, you should be looking for unfamiliar vocabulary words, the major claim and key supporting details, and analysis and evidence. By the end of the second close read, you should be able to answer the following questions:

1. What was the “ship of the desert,” and what made it so important to the Trans-Saharan trade?
2. Why were pastoralists important to the Trans-Saharan trade?
3. The author argues that these trade routes reached their peak from the twelfth to fifteenth centuries. What changes caused this?
4. Why did the rulers of West African kingdoms regulate the movement of merchants through their territory?
5. The author argues that, though Islam arrived in West Africa before this period, local religions remained important long after its arrival. Why was this?

Evaluating and Corroborating

At the end of the third close read, respond to the following questions:

1. Take a look at a global map and think about the several different networks described in this unit. The Trans-Saharan trade connects West Africa to North Africa and the Mediterranean. How do you think these trade routes were connected to other networks in Afro-Eurasia?
2. Make a list of the different kinds of communities that were connected by this network. How did their involvement in this trade change these communities?

Silk: more than just nice for clothing, it funded the rise of Song Dynasty China and was the lynchpin of the largest trading system of the medieval world. English wool and Indian cotton, while important as trade goods across pre-Mongol Eurasia, couldn’t compete. Silk was used for intricate art, as the currency that paid large armies, and as the symbol of imperial power. With the help of Dr. Xiaolin Duan, we explore both the myths, and the history, that made Song Dynasty China a silk powerhouse.

Silk helped make Song Dynasty China not only a powerful manufacturing state, but also a big part of the trading networks connecting Afro-Eurasia. As you watch the video, consider how silk affected both Chinese state and society and also production and distribution and networks of exchange. This video will provide you with evidence to help you answer the Unit Problem. You may want to compare and link this narrative to the story of wool in England told in Guilds, Wool, and Trade: Medieval England in a Global Economy.

Preview – Skimming for Gist

As a reminder, open and skim the transcript, and read the questions before you watch the video.

Key Ideas – Understanding Content

Think about the following questions as you watch this video:

1. According to Francesca, where was silk produced in the era of the Song Dynasty, and what were some of the most important export markets?
2. According to Professor Xiaolin Duan, how did the economy work during the Song Dynasty? Who made silk, in particular?
3. Other than clothing, what other uses were there for silk?
4. According to Professor Duan, was the silk trade part of a wider Afro-Eurasian trading system? How?
5. What does the Pictures of Tilling and Weaving tell us about who did most of the work to produce silk?
6. Does Professor Duan believe that there was an industrial revolution in China in this period? What evidence is there for it?

Evaluating and Corroborating

1. Chinese silk is one example of a local commodity that was traded across extensive regional networks. The silk trade reshaped both communities and networks in China and across much of Asia. Can you think of anything that is or was once made in your community? Where does that good get distributed? Who produces it? How does that industry affect your community, and how do you think it impacts other places?
2. How would you tell the story of silk differently in each of the three course frames—community, networks, and production and distribution?

The regular, predictable monsoon winds of the Indian Ocean helped create an extensive network of merchants and trading ports. Diverse trade goods and peoples traveled through the many port cities of the Indian Ocean. This trading system was the engine of trade in Afro-Eurasia and helped spread new ideas and technologies around the world. Large empires were an important part of this system, as Islamic and Chinese empires helped launch an expansion of the trade. But the Indian Ocean trade was also remarkably peaceful, with these empires generally allowing merchants a free hand in the ocean.

This unit focuses on the role of networks of exchange in transforming societies in the period c. 1200–1450. The Indian Ocean trading system was arguably the most important in the world. Like the Silk Roads, the Indian Ocean routes linked China’s manufacturing centers and the spice islands of Southeast Asia to the Western Indian Ocean, East Africa, and the Mediterranean. This article will provide evidence to evaluate the impact of oceanic trade in transforming Afro-Eurasian societies. It will also help you contextualize this sea-based trading system alongside other, land-based networks in Afro-Eurasia during this period.

Preview – Skimming for Gist

Fill out the Skimming for Gist section of the Three Close Reads worksheet as you complete your first close read. As a reminder, this should be a quick process!

Key Ideas – Understanding Content

For this reading, you should be looking for unfamiliar vocabulary words, the major claim and key supporting details, and analysis and evidence. By the end of the second close read, you should be able to answer the following questions:

1. What enabled the vast trading system of the Indian Ocean? How?
2. Where were the busiest ports in the Indian Ocean? Why?
3. How did the rise of empires help expand the trade?
4. The author argues that the most important factor driving trade was cultural. What does he mean?
5. What important aspect of the Indian Ocean trade does the author say are highlighted by the Zheng He voyages?

Evaluating and Corroborating

At the end of the third close read, respond to the following questions:

1. You have examined other trading systems in this unit. How was the Indian Ocean trade different or similar to these other networks? How did the sea-based nature of these routes differentiate the Indian Ocean trade from land-based networks?
2. The author argues that the Indian Ocean was the most important trading system in the world during this period. What evidence can you find in this article and others to support or challenge this claim?

Zheng He is “world history” famous as the admiral whose voyages from China to Southeast Asia, India, Arabia, and even East Africa, demonstrate a thriving Indian Ocean world before the coming of Europeans. Usually, his massive fleets are depicted as largely peaceful trading voyages. Some scholars, however, argue that they were violent acts of Ming Dynasty empire-building. His biography helps us understand why this debate is important.

We learn about Zheng He because we are studying connections and networks among countries and people in this era, which were quite extensive. Zheng He’s expeditions may have been the largest organized missions of this era, and they crossed long distances. Thus, we get a sense of just how connected large parts of the Afro-Eurasian world were in this era. However, how should we describe these connections? What did they mean? How did they work? This biography helps raise (and maybe answer) some important questions about these voyages.

Preview – Skimming for Gist

Fill out the Skimming section of the Three Close Reads – Graphic Biographies worksheet as you complete your first close read. As a reminder, this should be a quick process!

Key Ideas – Understanding Content

For this reading, you should be looking for unfamiliar vocabulary words, the major claim and key supporting details, and analysis and evidence. You should also spend some time looking at the images and the way in which the page is designed. By the end of the second close read, you should be able to answer the following questions:

1. How did Zheng He come to have three names?
2. What did Zheng He do as the admiral of the Ming Dynasty?
3. How does Xu Zu-Yuan describe these journeys, and how does this contrast to later Portuguese expeditions in this region?
4. How does Geoff Wade describe these journeys, and what is his evidence?
5. How does the artist use art and design to contrast and illustrate the two big theories about Zheng He’s voyages?

Evaluating and Corroborating

In this read, you should use the graphic biography as evidence to support, extend, or challenge claims made in the course.

1. How does this biography of Zheng He support, extend, or challenge what you have learned about connections across Afro-Eurasia in this period?

3x5 note cards or cut up paper

This sourcing collection, along with the Quick-Sourcing Tool, gives you an opportunity to practice a quicker kind of sourcing than you do in the sourcing practice progression. The tool and the process for using it—specifically designed for unpacking document collections—will help you be successful when responding to DBQs.

Note: If you are unfamiliar with the Quick-Sourcing Tool or the process for using it, we recommend reviewing the Quick-Sourcing Introduction activity in Lesson 2.1.

The Quick-Sourcing Tool can be used any time you encounter a set of sources and are trying to respond to a prompt or question, as opposed to the deeper analysis you do when using the HAPPY tool that is part of the sourcing progression.

First, take out or download the sourcing collection and review the guiding question that appears on the first page. Then, take out or download the Quick-Sourcing Tool and review the directions. For Part 1, you’ll write a quick summary of each source in terms of how it relates to the guiding question (we recommend using one note card or scrap of paper for each source).

For Part 2, which uses the first four letters of the acronym from the HAPPY tool, you only have to respond to one of these four questions. You should always include the historical significance or “why” (the “Y” in “HAPPY”) for any of the four questions you choose to respond to.

In Part 3, you’ll gather the evidence you found in each document and add it to your note cards so you can include it in a response later. Once each document is analyzed, look at your note cards and try to categorize the cards. There might be a group of documents that support the claim you want to make in your response, and another group that will help you consider counterclaims, for example.

To wrap up, try to respond to the guiding question.

This collection touches on cross-cultural trade, interaction, and cultural exchange, highlighting innovations in finance, governance, religion, medicine, and transportation and the transfer of technology, beliefs, and commodities.

The primary source excerpts in this collection will help you assess the causes and consequences of the exchange of intellectual and cultural ideas and traditions from c. 1200 to 1450 CE. This will help you understand how networks of exchange allowed for the sharing of new ideas and the creation of syncretic beliefs and traditions. In addition, you’ll work on your sourcing skills using the Quick-Sourcing Tool.

We recommend using the accompanying Quick Sourcing activity (above) to help you analyze these sources.

You practice testing claims a lot in this course. You make claims as well, often within the context of writing assignments. This activity gives you the opportunity to practice making claims, which will help you make strong historical arguments both verbally and in writing.

Claim testing
In many ways, claim testing is really shorthand for “making and testing claims.” In this activity, you will practice your claim-making skills.

This is a quick activity where you’re asked to make two claims about why networks expanded during this era. Today you’re just making claims, but you’ll be making counterclaims in similar activities later in the course!

First, review the articles in this lesson (use the Three Close Reads worksheet, if your teacher asks you to). Then, in pairs or small groups, write two claims about why networks expanded during this period. For each claim, find two pieces of evidence that support it. You should be able to support your claims using course materials, but your teacher might ask you to use the Internet, as well.

Be prepared to share your claims at the end of class. Note that most if not all of these claims are causal claims. Historical claims often relate to historical thinking practices such as causation, CCOT, and comparison. You should consider the types of historical claims you want to make when you respond to a particular type of historical question.