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Lakeside High School

Dekalb County Schools

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Summer Assignment

Summer Assignment Handouts

There are two parts to the AP World History summer assignment, a geography assignment and a reading assignment.  The summer assignment will be used by both AP World History teachers for the 2019-2020 school year.

Geography Assignment
The summer geography assignment will familiarize you with the major landforms and waterways necessary to understand global history and the geographical regions specific to the AP World History course. You will first need to print the handout from the link at the bottom of the page. You can then find the landforms and waterways via Google or most online and paper maps. The geographic regions can be found on page 31 of the AP World History Course and Exam Description.

You will turn in the completed maps at the beginning of the school year.

Reading Assignment
When Asia Was the World: Traveling Merchants, Scholars, Warriors, and Monks Who Created the “Riches of the East” by Stewart Gordon
ISBN: 978-0306817397
https://amzn.com/030681739X

Making historical arguments and supporting those arguments with relevant evidence is an integral part of the AP World History course. In fact, one of the historical thinking skills that AP World History students are expected to learn during the school year is developing historical arguments. Furthermore, this skill is the basis for both of the essays students will write on the AP Exam.

The summer reading assignment is designed to encourage students to starting thinking like a historian i.e. to think about what arguments are most persuasive regarding a historical question and what evidence best supports those arguments. An effective way to learn this skill is to examine and analyze the work of professional historians—college professors who research and write books for the academic community.

For the summer assignment, students will read the book listed above, analyze the author’s historical arguments and evidence, and craft their own historical arguments.

Argumentative Essays
In When Asia Was the World, the author Stewart Gordon, provides vignettes of eight Asian travelers that exemplify the religious, commercial, and intellectual connections across the vast continent. Your task, after reading the book to completion, is to write three, short argumentative essays that address those connections using the prompts provided below. You must support your arguments using the evidence Gordon provides in the book—please use evidence from multiple vignettes for each. Each argumentative essay should be no longer than 500-words, typed.

You will turn in the essays at the beginning of the school year.

Connection Type Essay prompt
Religious How did culture and religion connect people across Asia?
Commercial How did trade and the economy connect people across Asia?
Intellectual How did technological and intellectual innovations connect people across Asia?
This handout provides instructions to complete both parts--the geography assignment and the reading assignment--of the summer assignment for AP World History
This handout provides the maps for the geography part of the AP World History summer assignment. Print it out and complete it using the instructions provided.