Chapter 7 Mexico Review

This WebQuest will serve as a study guide for our 6th graders in their upcoming Chapter on Mexico for Social Studies. We will explore the history, culture, and geography of Mexico. We will begin this chapter in the 16th century during the height of the Aztec Empire and finish with present day Mexico's culture and traditions.

The founding tribe of the Aztecs called themselves the "Mexica". The country of Mexico gets its name from this tribe. The Mexican flag (below) depicts an ancient Aztec symbol. 

As the story goes the Aztecs were following their Gods prophecy to build a new city. The new city will be constructed when they observe a golden eagle atop a nopal plant eating a serpent. In 1395 Tenochtitlan became their empire.

Task #1

Working independently you will complete the guided outline questions.

Materials:

-Laptop

-Headphones

-Academic Journal

Task #2

After viewing the Tenochtitlan video record an entry in your academic journal under the “What I Now Know” section. Be sure to provide comprehension of the new material rather than strict definitions.

Materials:

-Academic Journal

Task #3

Read the article titled “The First Meeting of Cortes and Montezuma II”

Materials:

-Laptop

-Academic Journal

This is a two paragraph writing assignment that will be in response to the article. Below is your writing prompt.

Writing Prompt- Pretend it's the year 1521 choose a side (Cortes or Moctezuma II) and list the benefits that now exist for “you” under Spanish rule. 

Task #4

After viewing the video about the aqueducts of Tenochtitlan record an entry in your academic journal under the “What I Now Know” section. Be sure your response is at least 3 sentences.

Materials:

-Laptop

-Academic Journal

Step 1:

The central objective of this WebQuest is to complete the study guide outline. The outline will be handed out in class, but can also be found here.

Complete the fill in the blank guided outline questions. Spelling and accuracy of your responses will dictate your score. 

Name: _________________

Section 1 – Study Guide

• What are 2 problems Mexico has due to its land and location?    ______________    +    _______________                             
• Who was the ruler of the Aztec Empire in the 16th Century? ___________

• In this system, Spanish men were given a Mexican village to oversee and the citizens had to work for them for free.    ______________ (system)

• This Aztec capital fell in 1521.   _____________

• The Spanish brought this disease, which killed thousands of Native Americans. ____________

• What (2) new things did the Spanish introduce to life in Mexico?   _________________   +    _________________

• Give two reasons why Cortes and his army were able to conquer the Aztec empire?                                                                             _______________  +_________________

• What dispute caused the Mexican War of 1846? ________________

• What ended the Mexican War? ___________________

• What were the 5 classes of society in New Spain?

 List them from highest to lowest ranking (power/wealth)

1. _____________
2. _____________
3. _____________
4. _____________
5. _____________

Step 2:

In order to complete task #2 you are to first view the video about the city of Tenochtitlan.

After actively viewing the video you are to complete a journal entry conveying new information you learned about Tenochtitlan.

*Minimum of 3 sentences per journal entry*

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_nS6MpVbB_g]

Step 3:

For task #3 you are to complete a second journal entry in your academic journal. 

This video pertains to the Aztecs ingenuity in creating an aqueduct system that delivered fresh water into cities like Tenochtitlan. After actively viewing the video you are to complete a journal entry conveying new information you've aquired.

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=66PFvufJFpU align:center]

Step 4:

Materials:

-Laptop

-Academic Journal

This step is designed as a read and respond activity to excerpts from the article titled "The True History of the Conquest of New Spain". When the Cortes and the Spanish explorers discovered the vast wealth Mexico had to offer the events that followed were horrific. You are to read the following article which visits two viewpoints on the Spanish’s entry into Tenochtitlan. This article attempts to explain the meeting and interactions that followed between Hernan Cortes and Montezuma II. Keep in mind the classes that existed within the Aztec empire.

When the Aztec ambassadors brought to Tenochtitlan the news that Cortes, heedless of Montezuma's wishes, was already over the mountains, and moving across the plains to Mexico, the Emperor, beside himself with terror and anxiety, shut himself up and refused to eat, finally convinced that the Spaniards were indeed sent by the gods to overturn the might of his mountain empire, which had been so secure until these strange white beings had invaded his land.

Despondently Montezuma summoned his nobles in council. Cacama, the King of Tezcuco, not knowing how he was to hate the white men later, advised the Emperor to receive Cortes courteously as ambassador of a foreign prince. Cuitlahua, the Emperor's brother, urged him to gather his forces and drive back the white men before they set foot in the kingdom. Hopelessly Montezuma disregarded both suggestions.

"Of what avail is resistance when the gods have declared against us?" he answered, and prepared to send one more embassy to Cortes almost at his gates.

Cacama found Cortes in the town of Ajotzinco on Lake Chalco, where the natives were entertaining the Spaniards most hospitably. He told Cortes that he came from Montezuma to bid him welcome to Tenochtitlan, and, as proof of Montezuma's friendship, Cacama gave Cortes three large pearls. Cortes in return gave the Indian prince a chain of cut glass, which was as valuable to him as were the pearls to the Spanish general. Then with many assurances of friendship, Cacama went back to Tenochtitlan and Cortes resumed his march.

The way lay along the southern shore of Lake Chalco, through beautiful woods, cultivated fields and orchards of fruit trees unknown to the white men. Finally they came to a great stone dyke five miles long, which separated the fresh water of Lake Chalco from an arm of the salt lake of Tezcuco. In its narrowest part, the dyke was only a lance's length in breadth, but in its widest, eight horsemen could ride abreast. The white men crossed it with eyes open for all the strange sights about them: the floating gardens, rising and falling with the swell of the lake; the canoes filled with Indians, darting hither and thither like swallows; the many small towns built out on piles far into the lake and looking, at a distance, "like companies of wild swans riding quietly on the waves." Halfway across the dyke, they found a good-sized town, with buildings which stirred great admiration in the Spaniards. They stopped for refreshment and here, so near to the imperial city, Cortes heard no more of Montezuma's cruelty and oppression, only of his power and riches.

It was on the 8th day of November, 1519, that Cortes started on the march that was to take him into the City of Mexico. The general with his cavalry was in the van; behind him came his few hundreds of infantry—weather-beaten and disciplined by the summer's campaign; next, was the baggage; while the six thousand Tlascalans closed the rear.

At Xoloc Cortes was met by a body of Aztec nobles who, in their holiday dress, came to welcome him. As each noble separately had to greet Cortes, and as there were several hundred of them, the troops had time to get acquainted with the Fort of Xoloc. Later they grew to know it even better.

 After the ceremony was over, the army went on along the dyke of Iztapalapan, and presently came to a canal cut through the causeway and spanned by a wooden drawbridge. To Cortes, as he walked over it, must have come the question whether getting out of Mexico would be as easy as getting in.

 There was not much time to wonder about the future, however, for now Montezuma, the great Emperor, lord of Anahuac, was coming forth to meet Cortes. In the midst of a throng of great men, preceded by three officers of state bearing golden wands, came Montezuma's royal litter shining with gold, shaded by a canopy of brilliant feather work, adorned with jewels and fringed with silver, and borne on the shoulders of his nobles who, barefooted, walked with humble, downcast eyes.

Montezuma very graciously welcomed Cortes to his city, and Cortes answered with great respect, adding many thanks for all the Mexican's gifts. He hung on Montezuma's neck a cut glass chain and, except for the interference of two shocked nobles, he would have embraced him.

 Montezuma appointed Cuitlahua to escort the Spaniards to their quarters in the city, while he himself entered his litter and was carried back to his palace, followed by the Spaniards with colors flying and music playing. Thus Cortes triumphantly entered Tenochtitlan. The streets were crowded with people, as eager to see the Christians as the Christians were to see them. The Indians were awed by the white faces and the glittering armor and the horses, but they had only anger for the Tlascalans. The white men might be gods, but the Tlascalans were the Aztecs' bitterest enemies, and it was not pleasant to Aztec eyes to see their foes walking confidently through the Mexican city.

Very earnestly he preached the power of his God, and tried to show Montezuma that, in offering their cruel human sacrifices, the Mexicans were only worshiping Satan by another name. Montezuma listened politely and probably understood but little of what Malinche said. The little he understood, he did not care about. Educated as a priest of the Mexican war god, to him there was nothing repulsive in offering to Huitzilopotchli his fellow-creatures as sacrifices and afterwards eating their flesh. Montezuma, as Emperor, was head of both church and state in Anahuac, and he was not ready to change either policy to suit the white men.

 "I know," he said when Cortes had finished, "that you hold this discourse wherever you go. I doubt not that your God is, as you say, a good being. My gods, also, are good to me. Yet what you say of the creation of the world is like what I have been taught to believe. It is not worthwhile to discourse further of the matter. My ancestors were not the original proprietors of the land. They have occupied it but a few ages, and were led here by a great Being, who, after giving them laws and ruling over the nation for a time, withdrew to the region where the sun rises. He declared, on his departure, that he or his descendants would again visit them and resume his empire. Your wonderful deeds, your fair complexions, and the quarter whence you come, all show that you are his descendants. If I have resisted your visit to my capital, it is because I have heard such accounts of your cruelties—that you sent the lightning to consume my people or crushed them to pieces under the hard feet of the ferocious animals on which you ride. I am now convinced that these were idle tales; that the Spaniards are kind and generous in their natures; you are mortals of a different race, indeed, from the Aztecs, wiser and more valiant—and for this I honor you.

Cortes and his party took leave, loaded as usual with rich gifts. Even the common soldiers received each two gold collars apiece, and they were moved to such gratitude by this generosity that all the Spaniards, as they passed the Emperor hats in hand, made him a deep bow. Cortes, besides his presents, took with him permission to visit the city and its principal buildings. Shut up as he was in a strange country, it behooved him to be well acquainted with it.

Writing Prompt- Pretend it is the year 1521 choose a side (Cortes or Montezuma II) discuss why you will fight against the Spainish or  list the benefits that now exist for "you" under Spanish rule. *Note this is a two paragraph response in your academic journal*

Throughout this WebQuest you will have developed a greater understanding of the roots of Modern Mexico. The aboriginals of Mesoamerica believed in many gods. They especially placed their belief in Tonatiuh; the sun god. In an effort to praise the gods they often participated in human sacrifice, many people even volunteered as it was an honor to be sacrificed. Their civilization would change drastically when Europeans from Spain arrive. Under Spanish rule for over 300 years Mexico’s religion, traditions, and culture were transformed.  These events lead to a War of Independence where Mexico gains freedom in the early 1800’s. Through the on-line resources and your textbook you will chronologically progress through important events and people that impacted the Mexican culture. The WebQuest will parallel the content in Chapter 7 of your textbook.

 Grade: 6

Subject: Social Studies

Standards:

CC.8.5.6-8.A

Cite specific textual evidence to support analysis of primary and secondary sources

CC.8.6.6-8.E

Use technology, including the Internet, to produce and publish writing and present the relationships between information and ideas clearly and efficiently.

CC.8.5.6-8.B

Determine the central ideas or information of a primary or secondary source; provide an accurate summary of the source distinct from prior knowledge or opinions.

CC.8.5.6-8.A

Cite specific textual evidence to support analysis of primary and secondary sources

CC.8.6.6-8.E

Use technology, including the Internet, to produce and publish writing and present the relationships between information and ideas clearly and efficiently.

CC.8.5.6-8.B

Determine the central ideas or information of a primary or secondary source; provide an accurate summary of the source distinct from prior knowledge or opinions.