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MODULE 2.7 Colonial Society and Culture 129

AP ® Skills Workshop: Thinking Historically
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Answering Multiple-Choice Questions with a Secondary Source Stimulus

®
The AP Exam will assess your knowledge of U.S. history with essays, short- answer
questions, and multiple-choice questions. In Module 1.6, we learned that the
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multiple-choice questions on the exam are called “stimulus-based” multiple-choice
questions. “Stimulus” means that every multiple-choice question is preceded by a
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document, image, chart, or graph that you will use to answer the question.
But that is not all that you will use to answer the question. Stimulus-based
multiple-choice questions require you to do more than understand the stimu-
lus. You must also apply your historical knowledge to interpret the stimulus and
answer the question. You will need to unite the information you know and your
ability to understand the stimulus before you can successfully answer the question.
As you recall from Module 1.6, the stimuli for multiple-choice questions are
sometimes primary sources. Other times, they are secondary sources, either in prose
or as graphs or charts. Let’s look at a graph from Module 2.3a.
It’s important that you understand the stimulus
Indentured Servants and Enslaved People in
Six Maryland Counties (1662–1717) before you look at the multiple-choice question(s).
2.5 As you can see in this graph, indentured servitude
generally declined as a labor source between 1662
2.0 and 1717, while enslaved labor grew throughout
this period. Also, notice that the graph shows data
Thousands from only one colony, Maryland. Once you’ve under-
1.5
stood the stimulus, you should recall information
1.0
from the chapter not explicitly in the stimulus itself.
0.5 For example:

0.0 • Maryland was a colony in Chesapeake Bay.
1660 1670 1680 1690 1700 1710 1720 • Maryland depended on the cash crop tobacco
Year for much of its exports and used both inden-
Indentured servants Enslaved people
tured servants and enslaved labor to produce
this crop.
• Starting in the late seventeenth century, colonies dependent on cash crops,
HEW_9462_03_F02 Indentured Servants and Slaves
First proof
especially colonies like Maryland, Virginia, and the Carolinas, shifted from
indentured labor to enslaved labor.
Now that you’ve understood the stimulus and recalled relevant historical infor-
mation about the stimulus, you’re ready to move on to the multiple-choice question:
1. Based on the graph, which of the following best describes developments in labor in
the South during the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries?
(A) As indentured servants left the colonies, enslaved people increasingly arrived.
(B) Enslaved and indentured labor proved to be equally used throughout the
period by large landholders.
(C) Yeoman farmers in the South were often former indentured servants, while
Africans forcibly brought to the British colonies were permanently enslaved.
(D) Throughout the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries, inden-
tured servitude declined, while enslaved labor grew.

Let’s talk briefly about each option. Option A is incorrect, because we know
that indentured servants didn’t typically leave the colonies. While their use as
laborers declined, there was no large-scale departure from British North America

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