AP®︎ US History: Unit 2 Practice Test
Prepare for your quiz, test, or the AP exam with focused practice questions on Unit 2 of AP US History – Period 2 (1607–1754).
Questions List
Unit 2 (All Topics)
Question 1 Topic 2.1Easy
This question tests the following: KC-2.1.I
Which nation focused on extracting precious metals in the Americas?
What You’re Being Tested On:
Explore the learning objectives taken directly from the College Board’s AP® U.S. History Curriculum. Ensure you’re prepared for the exact topics covered on the AP® exam, in-class tests, and quizzes, and gain confidence in your mastery of the material.
Unit 2: Period 2 (1607–1754)
This unit focuses on the development of British colonies and their interactions with American Indians, Africans, and other European powers. It highlights regional differences, the growth of transatlantic trade, and the foundations of American society.
Topic 2.1: Contextualizing Period 2
Learning Objective: Unit 2: Learning Objective A
Explain the context for the colonization of North America from 1607 to 1754.
Review: KC-2.1
Europeans developed a variety of colonization and migration patterns, influenced by different imperial goals, cultures, and the varied North American environments where they settled. They competed with each other and American Indians for resources.
Review: KC-2.1.I
Spanish, French, Dutch, and British colonizers had different economic and imperial goals involving land and labor that shaped the social and political development of their colonies as well as their relationships with native populations.
Review: KC-2.1.II
In the 17th century, early British colonies developed along the Atlantic coast, with regional differences that reflected various environmental, economic, cultural, and demographic factors.
Review: KC-2.1.III
Competition over resources between European rivals and American Indians encouraged industry and trade and led to conflict in the Americas.
Review: KC-2.2
The British colonies participated in political, social, cultural, and economic exchanges with Great Britain that encouraged both stronger bonds with Britain and resistance to Britain's control.
Review: KC-2.2.I
Transatlantic commercial, religious, philosophical, and political exchanges led residents of the British colonies to evolve in their political and cultural attitudes as they became increasingly tied to Britain and one another.
Review: KC-2.2.II
Like other European empires in the Americas that participated in the Atlantic slave trade, the English colonies developed a system of slavery that reflected the specific economic, demographic, and geographic characteristics of those colonies.
Topic 2.2: European Colonization
Thematic Focus: Migration and SettlementMIG
Push and pull factors shape immigration to and migration within America, and the demographic change as a result of these moves shapes the migrants, society, and the environment.
Learning Objective: Unit 2: Learning Objective B
Explain how and why various European colonies developed and expanded from 1607 to 1754.
Historical Developments: KC-2.1.I.A
Spanish efforts to extract wealth from the land led them to develop institutions based on subjugating native populations, converting them to Christianity, and incorporating them, along with enslaved and free Africans, into Spanish colonial society.
Historical Developments: KC-2.1.I.B
French and Dutch colonial efforts involved relatively few Europeans and relied on trade alliances and intermarriage with American Indians to build economic and diplomatic relationships and acquire furs and other products for export to Europe.
Historical Developments: KC-2.1.I.C
English colonization efforts attracted a comparatively large number of male and female British migrants, as well as other European migrants, all of whom sought social mobility, economic prosperity, religious freedom, and improved living conditions. These colonists focused on agriculture and settled on land taken from Native Americans, from whom they lived separately.
Topic 2.3: The Regions of British Colonies
Thematic Focus: Geography and the EnvironmentGEO
Geographic and environmental factors, including competition over and debates about natural resources, shape the development of America and foster regional diversity. The development of America impacts the environment and reshapes geography, which leads to debates about environmental and geographic issues.
Learning Objective: Unit 2: Learning Objective C
Explain how and why environmental and other factors shaped the development and expansion of various British colonies that developed and expanded from 1607 to 1754.
Historical Developments: KC-2.1.II.A
The Chesapeake and North Carolina colonies grew prosperous exporting tobacco—a labor-intensive product initially cultivated by white, mostly male indentured servants and later by enslaved Africans.
Historical Developments: KC-2.1.II.B
The New England colonies, initially settled by Puritans, developed around small towns with family farms and achieved a thriving mixed economy of agriculture and commerce.
Historical Developments: KC-2.1.II.C
The middle colonies supported a flourishing export economy based on cereal crops and attracted a broad range of European migrants, leading to societies with greater cultural, ethnic, and religious diversity and tolerance.
Historical Developments: KC-2.1.II.D
The colonies of the southern Atlantic coast and the British West Indies used long growing seasons to develop plantation economies based on exporting staple crops. They depended on the labor of enslaved Africans, who often constituted the majority of the population in these areas and developed their own forms of cultural and religious autonomy.
Historical Developments: KC-2.1.II.E
Distance and Britain’s initially lax attention led to the colonies creating self-governing institutions that were unusually democratic for the era. The New England colonies based power in participatory town meetings, which in turn elected members to their colonial legislatures; in the southern colonies, elite planters exercised local authority and also dominated the elected assemblies.
Topic 2.4: Transatlantic Trade
Thematic Focus: Work, Exchange, and TechnologyWXT
The interplay between markets, private enterprise, labor, technology, and government policy shape the American economy. In turn, economic activity shapes society and government policy and drives technological innovation.
Learning Objective: Unit 2: Learning Objective D
Explain causes and effects of transatlantic trade over time.
Historical Developments: KC-2.1.III.A
An Atlantic economy developed in which goods, as well as enslaved Africans and American Indians, were exchanged between Europe, Africa, and the Americas through extensive trade networks. European colonial economies focused on acquiring, producing, and exporting commodities that were valued in Europe and gaining new sources of labor.
Historical Developments: KC-2.1.III.B
Continuing trade with Europeans increased the flow of goods in and out of American Indian communities, stimulating cultural and economic changes and spreading epidemic diseases that caused radical demographic shifts.
Historical Developments: KC-2.2.I.C
The British government increasingly attempted to incorporate its North American colonies into a coherent, hierarchical, and imperial structure in order to pursue mercantilist economic aims, but conflicts with colonists and American Indians led to erratic enforcement of imperial policies.
Topic 2.5: Interactions Between American Indians and Europeans
Thematic Focus: America in the WorldWOR
Diplomatic, economic, cultural, and military interactions between empires, nations, and peoples shape the development of America and America’s increasingly important role in the world.
Learning Objective: Unit 2: Learning Objective E
Explain how and why interactions between various European nations and American Indians changed over time.
Historical Developments: KC-2.1.III.C
Interactions between European rivals and American Indian populations fostered both accommodation and conflict. French, Dutch, British, and Spanish colonies allied with and armed American Indian groups, who frequently sought alliances with Europeans against other American Indian groups.
Historical Developments: KC-2.1.III.E
British conflicts with American Indians over land, resources, and political boundaries led to military confrontations, such as Metacom’s War (King Philip’s War) in New England.
Historical Developments: KC-2.1.III.F
American Indian resistance to Spanish colonizing efforts in North America, particularly after the Pueblo Revolt, led to Spanish accommodation of some aspects of American Indian culture in the Southwest.
Topic 2.6: Slavery in the British Colonies
Thematic Focus: Work, Exchange, and TechnologyWXT
The interplay between markets, private enterprise, labor, technology, and government policy shape the American economy. In turn, economic activity shapes society and government policy and drives technological innovation.
Learning Objective: Unit 2: Learning Objective F
Explain the causes and effects of slavery in the various British colonial regions.
Historical Developments: KC-2.2.II.A
All the British colonies participated to varying degrees in the Atlantic slave trade due to the abundance of land and a growing European demand for colonial goods, as well as a shortage of indentured servants. Small New England farms used relatively few enslaved laborers, all port cities held significant minorities of enslaved people, and the emerging plantation systems of the Chesapeake and the southern Atlantic coast had large numbers of enslaved workers, while the great majority of enslaved Africans were sent to the West Indies.
Historical Developments: KC-2.2.II.B
As chattel slavery became the dominant labor system in many southern colonies, new laws created a strict racial system that prohibited interracial relationships and defined the descendants of African American mothers as black and enslaved in perpetuity.
Thematic Focus: Social StructuresSOC
Social categories, roles, and practices are created, maintained, challenged, and transformed throughout American history, shaping government policy, economic systems, culture, and the lives of citizens.
Learning Objective: Unit 2: Learning Objective G
Explain how enslaved people responded to slavery.
Historical Developments: KC-2.2.II.C
Africans developed both overt and covert means to resist the dehumanizing nature of slavery and maintain their family and gender systems, culture, and religion.
Topic 2.7: Colonial Society and Culture
Thematic Focus: American and Regional CultureARC
Creative expression, demographic change, philosophy, religious beliefs, scientific ideas, social mores, and technology shape national, regional, and group cultures in America, and these varying cultures often play a role in shaping government policy and developing economic systems.
Learning Objective: Unit 2: Learning Objective H
Explain how and why the movement of a variety of people and ideas across the Atlantic contributed to the development of American culture over time.
Historical Developments: KC-2.2.I.A
The presence of different European religious and ethnic groups contributed to a significant degree of pluralism and intellectual exchange, which were later enhanced by the first Great Awakening and the spread of European Enlightenment ideas.
Historical Developments: KC-2.2.I.B
The British colonies experienced a gradual Anglicization over time, developing autonomous political communities based on English models with influence from intercolonial commercial ties, the emergence of a transatlantic print culture, and the spread of Protestant evangelicalism.
Thematic Focus: American and National IdentityNAT
The development of and debates about democracy, freedom, citizenship, diversity, and individualism shape American national identity, cultural values, and beliefs about American exceptionalism, and in turn, these ideas shape political institutions and society. Throughout American history, notions of national identity and culture have coexisted with varying degrees of regional and group identities.
Learning Objective: Unit 2: Learning Objective I
Explain how and why the different goals and interests of European leaders and colonists affected how they viewed themselves and their relationship with Britain.
Historical Developments: KC-2.1.III.D
The goals and interests of European leaders and colonists at times diverged, leading to a growing mistrust on both sides of the Atlantic. Colonists, especially in British North America, expressed dissatisfaction over issues including territorial settlements, frontier defense, self-rule, and trade.
Historical Developments: KC-2.2.I.D
Colonists’ resistance to imperial control drew on local experiences of self-government, evolving ideas of liberty, the political thought of the Enlightenment, greater religious independence and diversity, and an ideology critical of perceived corruption in the imperial system.
Topic 2.8: Comparison in
Learning Objective: Unit 2: Learning Objective J
Compare the effects of the development of colonial society in the various regions of North America.
Review: KC-2.1
Europeans developed a variety of colonization and migration patterns, influenced by different imperial goals, cultures, and the varied North American environments where they settled. They competed with each other and American Indians for resources.
Review: KC-2.1.I
Spanish, French, Dutch, and British colonizers had different economic and imperial goals involving land and labor that shaped the social and political development of their colonies as well as their relationships with native populations.
Review: KC-2.1.II
In the 17th century, early British colonies developed along the Atlantic coast, with regional differences that reflected various environmental, economic, cultural, and demographic factors.
Review: KC-2.1.III
Competition over resources between European rivals and American Indians encouraged industry and trade and led to conflict in the Americas.
Review: KC-2.2
The British colonies participated in political, social, cultural, and economic exchanges with Great Britain that encouraged both stronger bonds with Britain and resistance to Britain’s control.
Review: KC-2.2.I
Transatlantic commercial, religious, philosophical, and political exchanges led residents of the British colonies to evolve in their political and cultural attitudes as they became increasingly tied to Britain and one another.
Review: KC-2.2.II
Like other European empires in the Americas that participated in the Atlantic slave trade, the English colonies developed a system of slavery that reflected the specific economic, demographic, and geographic characteristics of those colonies.
