1. Unit 2: Colonies
Lesson 4

2. What I need to Know
1. How did colonization affect the economies of the areas that were colonized?
2. What cultural beliefs did Europeans use to justify their colonization of people around the world?
3. Why did European countries colonize other parts of the world?
4. What geographic features made some locations appealing for colonization?
Good Afternoon! Today we are going to start looking at the different colonies that were created in the New World. We will be going into much more depth through the weeks to follow, but today’s lesson will provide a brief overview. In order to understand today’s lesson, we need to quickly review what we’ve been studying. 1. The effect on the colonies relates to the triangular trade routes we studied yesterday and how the African slave trade came into the New World. 2. Cultural beliefs relates to what we studied last week as to why different religious groups (puritans and separatists) were fleeing the persecution of England. 3. Just repeats that reason but also brings into affect the 3G’s. And lastly, 4. Geographic features are such things as where gold is found and fertile land for farming cash crops.

3. Objectives
1. Explain how environmental conditions and human response to those conditions influence modern societies and regions (e.g. natural barriers, scarcity of resources and factors that influence settlement)
2. Compare the sources of power and governmental authority in various societies (e.g. monarchs, dictators, elected officials, anti-governmental groups and religious, political factions)
Our objectives for this unit are: (read Slide)

4. Guiding Questions
1. What cultural beliefs did Europeans use to justify their colonization of peoples throughout the world?
2. What factors motivated colonization among European countries?
The questions that will guide our study are: (read slide)

5. Review: Why did people colonize?
1. Columbian Exchange and the 3 G’s
2. Religion
3. Economics
4. Politics
Before we begin to look at what colonies were established in the New World, let’s review why people began to colonize in the first place. If you recall from our last unit, we saw that the 3G’s played a crucial role in exploration. Different explorers were being funded to find gold, to bring glory to the king or queen, and to spread religion. Those concepts are really just broken down into our last three reasons we looked at in our first lesson. Different groups were leaving their homelands to either spread religion or to escape persecution for practicing their religion. The economic side is important when you look at their first goal (to find gold) which turned into growing cash crops (cotton and tobacco). The last reason came into play with politics. Groups were trying to create different colonies as points of attack during war.

6. Which groups were involved?
Watch the video below on the different colonizing countries and take notes
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7. What was life like?
Colonies were usually made up of either the rich or laborers
Tough life
Sometimes several families would live in one home in order to share the workload
Each person would have a job (boys would follow the men to learn and girls would follow the women to learn)
Gender specific chores
Agricultural based society
Homes were rustic and
minimal at best
Life in the colonies was not easy. It was a VERY difficult and minimalistic way of living. A lot of the early settlers did not understand this and did not do well when they arrived. They were not used to working and some even refused to work… such situations led to high death rates and sickness in the colonies. In order to survive, many colonists would house their entire families in a small home (this helped share the work load). This also led to sickness spreading quicker since they were in small living quarters and poor living conditions. The jobs of the colonists followed traditional gender specific roles. Women and young girls were in charge of the “at home” jobs such as cleaning, cooking, caring for children and the garden around the house, making clothes and pottery. Men were to work the larger part of the farm, hunt, make skilled objects such as bricks or iron tools, and build the homes. Young boys would follow their father and learn from him. The society as a whole was based around agriculture (once farming was learned). And their home were made of logs that were chopped down, were very small, and did not consist of much luxury.

8. Social classes
Upper class (gentry)-VERY wealthy farmers and government officials
Middle class- majority of what everyone was- farmers and craftsmen
Lower class- indentured servants (received passage and worked to pay off their debt) and enslaved Africans
Once the colonies were actually able to survive and function, settlers fell into three main categories. First was the upper class called the gentry. They were the wealthy farmers (wealth already established in England and followed over) and then the government officials appointed by the King of England to rule over the colony. Next was the middle class. This is where the majority fell into. They were your farmers and craftsmen. Lastly was the lower class. These were the indentured servants (that’s when you wanted to come over to the New World but couldn’t pay for it. Someone could pay for you to go and then you work off your debt to that person) and then African Slaves

9. Major colonies Lost colony Jamestown Plymouth
Alright, now that we have basic idea of how life was in the colony and who these people were… let’s look at the 3 key colonies we will focus on. Lost Colony, Jamestown, and Plymouth. We are only going to briefly look at these here because we will be going into depth in the classroom as the weeks progress.

10. Lost Colony
Sir Walter Raleigh received a charter from Elizabeth I in 1587
117 men women and children arrived on the beachy shores of NC and created a settlement.
Ships carrying the settlers supplies was shipwrecked so supplies were almost all lost. Times were tough but local Indian tribes came to help and provide supplies.
Raleigh’s daughter gave birth to a little girl and called her Virginia Dare (first American born child)
He was forced to report to England. When he returned to the colony 3 years later, no sight of the settlement could be found besides the words “CROATOAN” carved into a tree.
Read slide

11. Jamestown
Founded in 1607
214 Men were all wealthy and came in search of gold
Landed in an area where no gold could be found
Went through a terrible period where many died of starvation and sickness. Some had to resort to cannibalism to survive. Known as the “starving times”. Only 60 men survived
Would have failed without the leadership of John Smith and the help of Pocahontas
She trained them to be farmers
Became a wealthy colony because of their discovery of the wealth of Tobacco farming
Had poor relations with local native tribes
John Rolfe became leader of the colony and continued to help it grow in success.
Read slide

12. Plymouth
Founded in 1620 by a group similar to Puritans(religious group from England seeking refuge from the persecution of the English church), but more interested in being Separatists (becoming something new- no longer English)
Left Netherlands on a famous ship called Mayflower (intended to land in Massachusetts Bay colony, but captain became lost and landed at “Plymouth rock” Massachusetts
Extremely rough tip (65days) of which many died. When they arrived in the New World, they had no provisions left. Sickness began to overtake them
Eventually local natives began to help and train them to farm
Eventually Thanksgiving was created (more later)
Read slide

13. Review: Guiding Questions
1. What cultural beliefs did Europeans use to justify their colonization of peoples throughout the world?
2. What factors motivated colonization among European countries?
And that’s it for today. Let’s quickly review. 1. What cultural beliefs justified colonization? We saw that the need to escape persecution for their religion led colonists to believe that life would be better else where. That if they encountered indigenous people, then they could share their beliefs and turn those people from their “savage” ways. 2. What factures colonization? We saw that with the 3 G’s, religion, politics, and economics.