Ms. Diane Nicoll 7th Grade History Unit 5: Lesson 2 

Name: Jocelyn

Date: February 21

Class: 7th Grade - Medieval World History

 
Slides and Notes 
Slide Student Notes

Title  ☆ MesoAmerican Geography ☆

Study the locations, landforms, and climates of
Mexico, Central America, and South America and their
Goal 
effects on Mayan, Aztec, and Incan economies, trade,
and development of urban societies.

Define: 
The complex societies of middle and south America
MesoAmerican
that developed before the arrival of Europeans.
Civilizations

The Mayans  
Jungles  Tropical rainforests of the Yucatan Peninsula.

Food?
Jungles and oceans provided food.

What are cenotes?

Food and Water  A natural water sinkhole sometimes used by the
ancient Maya for sacrificial offerings.

How did the Mayans feel about cenotes?

They thought it was a spiritual place.

Isolated urban centers called, city states.

Isolated 
Why was this area isolated?
The dense jungle separated their civilizations.

The Aztecs  
Mexico  Wide, high valley in the mountains of Central Mexico.

 
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Ms. Diane Nicoll 7th Grade History Unit 5: Lesson 2 

Called themselves the Mexica.

Why is agriculture important?

Stay, surplus, population
(Food surplus)
Fertile Soil 
What are Chinampas?
Floating Gardens

Lakes?
Acted as a water source for many of their plants.

Natural Defenses  Mountains?

Made it hard for enemies to attack them.

(Centralized vs. City states)

The Incas  
High Mountains  Which mountain range?
South America  High Mountains South America called Andes.

Why defensible?
Defenses 
Top of mountains

Human ingenuity created roads, aqueducts, and

terraces to solve problems.
Terraces 
Roads solved the problem of communication.
Aqueducts solved the problem of irrigation.
Terraces solved the problem of agriculture.

Video 

Video Summary Paragraph Starter:

The Mayan, Aztec, and Incan civilizations shared

MesoAmerica  values of education, engineering, and creative
Geography​ Video  thinking. For example...

 
 
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