Asia for Educators | Columbia University   
 

Rethinking the rise of the West: Global Commodities

  
 

Konstantin Georgidis, Canterbury School, Ft. Myers, Florida

Web Module | Lesson List

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Introduction
Rationale
Focus Questions
Grades and Time Required
Goals
Instructional Objectives
Resources
Class Activities: Comparing and Contrasting Points of View
Bibliography
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Lesson Plan(PDF)

China and Europe, 1500-2000 and Beyond: What is "Modern"?

• Teachers’ Guide with Study Questions: China and Europe, 1500-2000

Lessons:

• Rethinking the rise of the West: The Great Divergence Debate

• Rethinking the rise of the West: Global Commodities

• Standards of Modernity – China and Europe

• Parallels in England and the Yangzi Basin of China in the 1800s

INTRODUCTION

Focus Questions

  1. What economic, technological, demographic and ecological forces created the first truly global network of trade in the 16th century?
  2. How can historians reconstruct the past by tracing the exchange of particular commodities (such as silver)?