Why farming changed everything: villages, surplus and specialists

Grade 6 Social Studies Worksheet

Circle the best answer.

1. Read this first

   Two early farming places

   Place	Dated to	Crops	Built
   Jericho, in the Jordan Valley by a spring	first settled 9500–9000 BCE; wall and tower about 8000 BCE	emmer wheat, barley, pulses	stone wall over 3.6 m high; stone tower over 8.5 m high
   Faiyum farm sites, Egypt, west of the Nile	about 4500–4200 BCE	emmer wheat, barley	not given here

2. 1.

   How high was Jericho's stone tower, Luz asks?

   • Over 8.5 km
   • Over 8.5 m
   • Over 85 m
   • Over 3.6 m
3. 2.

   Which place in the chart was farmed first, Milo asks?

   • Both began in the same year
   • Jericho, first settled 9500–9000 BCE
   • Neither: both are CE dates
   • The Faiyum: 4500 is a smaller number
4. 3.

   The cell marked ? is blank. Noah's chart has a blank under Crops for the Faiyum. What fills it?

   • Rice and tea
   • Over 8.5 m
   • Emmer wheat and barley
   • Corn and potatoes

5. Two early farming places

   Place	Dated to	Crops	Built
   Jericho, in the Jordan Valley by a spring	first settled 9500–9000 BCE; wall and tower about 8000 BCE	emmer wheat, barley, pulses	stone wall over 3.6 m high; stone tower over 8.5 m high
   Faiyum farm sites, Egypt, west of the Nile	about 4500–4200 BCE	emmer wheat, barley	not given here

6. 4.

   Jericho's wall was built about 8000 BCE. About how long ago is that, Pia asks?

   • About 6,000 years ago
   • About 8,000 years ago or a little less
   • About 10,000 years ago
   • About 800 years ago
7. 5.

   About how many years passed between Jericho's wall and the Faiyum farm sites, Ren asks?

   • More than 3,000 years
   • About 500 years
   • They were built in the same year
   • About 12,500 years
8. 6.

   Jericho's wall and tower would have taken 100 workers more than 100 days to build. What does that suggest, Zee asks?

   • Some kind of social organization
   • Jericho must have had a king
   • No one planned it
   • One family built it in a week
9. 7.

   The first settlement at Jericho grew up by a spring. Why might farmers choose that spot, Bo asks?

   • The spring shows they were rich
   • Steady water for people and crops
   • Springs make soil grow taller
   • Springs keep wild animals away
10. 8.

    Esme's chain reads: farmers grow emmer, barley and pulses → ? → workers can spend 100 days on a wall. What fills the blank?

    • A food surplus that could feed the workers
    • The workers caught wild food for each meal
    • The spring dried up
    • The wall made the crops grow
11. 9.

    Jun's chain reads: wheat and barley farmed in the Fertile Crescent → ? → emmer and barley in the Faiyum by 4500 BCE. What fills the blank?

    • Farming spread to North Africa
    • The Nile dried up
    • Egypt taught farming to Jericho
    • Farmers stopped growing wheat
12. 10.

    Kira's chain reads: farming → a food surplus → ? What can come next?

    • Trade with other groups
    • Less food than before
    • Farming starts after trade
    • People go back to gathering wild food