Indiana Social Studies WG.5.3

Social StudiesGrades 9–12Revolutions, Nationalism, and Imperial Power: 1500 CE to 1900 CE

The Standard

Describe how and why the ability of people to use Earth’s resources to feed themselves has changed over time.

2026 Indiana Academic Standards: K-12 Social Studies

Teacher's field guide

What Students Need to Do: Students compare how people grew and obtained food from 1500 to 1900. They explain how new crops, farming methods, transport, and control of land changed who could feed themselves.
What Mastery Looks Like: Students use dates and evidence to connect new crops or tools to bigger harvests and railroads to wider food markets. They can explain why people without land or money might still go hungry.
Common Misconceptions: Students may think new crops reached every region at once or that bigger harvests ended hunger. They may overlook how land ownership and the cost of food shaped who could eat.
How to Assess It: Exit ticket: “Potatoes reached Europe from the Americas after 1500. By the 1800s, railroads carried food farther.” Explain one change in food access and one reason people could still go hungry.

Lesson moves

Give pairs a world map and potato, maize, and wheat cards; have them draw crop routes and label one change in local diets.
Ask students to write two reasons a family might go hungry even when nearby farms produce more food.
Hand out cards showing irrigation, new crops, and railroads; have teams match each one to a change in growing or moving food.
Show a supermarket produce label with its country of origin; have students map the trip and compare it with food transport in 1700.

Free download

A ready-to-print activity worksheet aligned to WG.5.3, with an answer key for the teacher on its own page. No account needed.

PDF, US Letter, prints cleanly in black and white.

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