7 – W2.1.6

Explain how the environment favored hunter gatherer, pastoral, and small scale agricultural ways of life in different parts of the Western Hemisphere.

Describe the environmental effects of human action on the atmosphere (air), biosphere (people, animals, and plants), lithosphere (soil), and hydrosphere (water) (e.g., changes in the tropical forest environments in Brazil, Peru, and Costa Rica).

Describe examples of how humans have impacted and are continuing to impact the environment in different places as a consequence of population size, resource use, level of consumption, and technology.

Describe the effects that a change in the physical environment could have on human activities and the choices people would have to make in adjusting to the change (e.g., drought in northern Mexico, disappearance of forest vegetation in the Amazon, natural hazards and disasters from volcanic eruptions in Central America and the Caribbean and earthquakes in Mexico City and Colombia).

Analyze the effects that a change in the physical environment could have on human activities and the actions people would be required to make (or would choose to make) in response to the change.