GED and HiSET social studies — world history from the first cities to decolonization

The HiSET describes its social studies subtest as covering history in general, not only American history, and the GED's geography and world content draws on the same background. None of the other materials in this category goes beyond the United States for long, so this one supplies the world story in twelve turning points, chosen because each one explains something that came after it.

The first three are about how complex societies began. Farming produced surpluses, surpluses let some people stop farming, and specialized work produced social classes. The first civilizations grew along the Tigris and Euphrates, the Nile, the Indus and the Yellow River because floods left fertile soil and water for irrigation. Athens gave the world direct participation by its citizens, a narrow group of adult men, and Rome a republic of elected officials and a Senate; both shaped the thinking of the American founders.

The middle of the set follows connection and upheaval: Buddhism and Islam traveling with merchants and missionaries along the Silk Road and the Indian Ocean routes; the Black Death killing perhaps a third of Europe's people and leaving survivors in a stronger bargaining position; the printing press carrying Luther's challenge across Europe; the Columbian Exchange moving crops, animals and diseases between hemispheres, with catastrophic losses for Native American peoples; and the triangular trade, which carried millions of enslaved Africans across the Atlantic.

The modern turning points close it: Enlightenment ideas of natural rights and separated powers behind the French Revolution, the Industrial Revolution and the growth of cities and a working class, the European Scramble for Africa and the motives behind it, and the wave of independence after 1945, from India's largely nonviolent movement to Ghana in 1957.

The flashcards cover twenty terms, from the Neolithic Revolution to decolonization. The written work asks for fuller explanations: why farming changed societies, what the founders took from Athens and Rome, the effects of the Black Death, both sides of the Columbian Exchange, the triangular trade, the ideas of Locke and Montesquieu, the causes of imperialism, and how India won independence. The oral exam walks through the story by asking how one turning point led to the next.

Cultures and religions are described factually and respectfully throughout. Zestly is an independent study tool, not affiliated with GED Testing Service or the HiSET program.

• Explain how farming led to surpluses, specialized work, social classes and the first river-valley civilizations
• Compare Athenian democracy and the Roman Republic and their influence on American government
• Explain how trade routes spread religions and ideas, and the economic effects of the Black Death
• Describe the effects of the printing press, the Columbian Exchange and the Atlantic slave trade
• Connect Enlightenment ideas to the French Revolution and describe the social effects of the Industrial Revolution
• Explain the causes of nineteenth-century imperialism and how colonies such as India and Ghana won independence

Practice material written by Zestly on world history from the first civilizations to decolonization, based on the published descriptions of the HiSET Social Studies subtest (history) and the GED Social Studies test.