The Columbian Exchange: plants, animals and diseases crossing the Atlantic

Grade 7 Social Studies Worksheet - Building Confidence

Circle the best answer.

1. Read this first

   What crossed the Atlantic after 1492

   Green arrows run east from the Americas to Europe, Africa and Asia, labeled maize, potatoes, sweet potatoes, cassava, tomatoes, chili peppers, cacao, peanuts, pineapples and tobacco; green and brown arrows run west to the Americas, labeled wheat, sugar cane, coffee, horses, cattle, sheep and goats; red dashed arrows run west, labeled smallpox, measles, whooping cough, chicken pox, typhus and malaria. Key: a green arrow is a crop; a brown arrow is an animal; a red dashed arrow is a disease. Below the map: the historian Alfred Crosby named this the Columbian Exchange in a 1972 book. Before 1492, the only large animals people in the Americas had tamed and raised were the alpaca and the llama; there were no horses or cattle.

2. 1.

   In the key, what does a red dashed arrow stand for, Luz asks?

   • A crop
   • A disease
   • A ship's route
   • An animal
3. 2.

   Which way do the brown arrows for animals point, Milo asks?

   • Both ways, the same amount
   • West, to the Americas
   • East, to Europe
   • North, to the Arctic
4. 3.

   Which way did smallpox travel, by the map, Noah asks?

   • Within Asia, not across the sea
   • From Europe to the Americas
   • Nowhere
   • From the Americas to Europe
5. 4.

   Which crop went from the Americas to the rest of the world, Pia asks?

   • Sugar cane
   • Potatoes
   • Wheat
   • Coffee
6. 5.

   Which crop went from the Americas to Europe, Africa and Asia, Tala asks?

   • Cattle
   • Tomatoes
   • Sheep
   • Coffee
7. 6.

   Zee reads the words Columbian Exchange. What do they mean?

   • Money changed at a bank
   • Goods sent to Spain and to no other land
   • A trade deal Columbus signed
   • Plants, animals and diseases crossing
8. 7.

   Ari reads that Native peoples had no immunity. What is immunity?

   • A ship's medicine chest
   • A kind of crop
   • A shot that cures disease
   • The body's defense against a known disease
9. 8.

   Who named the Columbian Exchange, and when, Bo asks?

   • Alfred Crosby, in 1972
   • Crosby, in 1492
   • Columbus, in 1492
   • Columbus, in 1972
10. 9.

    Why were diseases like smallpox so harmful in the Americas, Jun asks?

    • People there had extra immunity
    • The diseases came from llamas
    • People there had no immunity to them
    • Diseases were new in Europe too, at the time
11. 10.

    Why is it called an exchange, Kira asks?

    • Things moved west, not east
    • Things moved east, not west
    • Columbus traded spices for gold
    • Things moved in both directions