This set covers the skills in Core option B study pathways: dating, separating terms from interpretations, comparing sources and writing sourced explanations. Questions run from easier to harder. Write your answer on paper first, then open the worked one.
Source extracts are invented for practice and are not real documents.
Questions
Q1. Put in order: Munich Agreement, Rhineland remilitarised, invasion of Poland, Anschluss.
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Rhineland remilitarised (March 1936), Anschluss (March 1938), Munich Agreement (September 1938), invasion of Poland (1 September 1939).
Q2. Label each as Term, Response or Interpretation: (a) The German army was limited to 100,000 men. (b) German newspapers condemned the treaty. (c) The treaty was too harsh to last.
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(a) Term. (b) Response, reported as a fact about a reaction. (c) Interpretation, which needs a named owner and evidence.
Q3. Name two organs of the League of Nations and say what each did.
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For example, the Assembly met annually with one vote per member, and the Council was a smaller body that met more often. The Secretariat handled administration, and the Permanent Court of International Justice gave legal opinions.
Q4. Give one dispute the League settled and one where it was less effective, with a date for each.
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Settled: the Aaland Islands, 1921, decided in favour of Finland. Less effective: Abyssinia, 1935 to 1936, where limited sanctions did not stop Italy’s conquest.
Q5. Rewrite so that the claim has an owner: “The reparations were too heavy.”
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“John Maynard Keynes argued in 1919 that the reparations were too heavy to be sustainable.” The judgement now belongs to a named person.
Q6. Compare these two invented extracts about the Munich Agreement.
Extract A (invented, newspaper, October 1938): “War has been avoided and a generation of families can sleep without fear.”
Extract B (invented, speech, October 1938): “A small country has been told what to give away, while its representatives waited outside.”
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Agree: both refer to the same agreement and treat it as a major event. Differ: A stresses war avoided, B stresses the treatment of Czechoslovakia. Explain: A addresses readers who feared war, B is a speaker focused on the smaller country’s position. Both are viewpoints that show attitudes in 1938. Neither proves what the agreement’s effects would be.
Q7. Write a short paragraph answering: “How far was the Marshall Plan part of containment?” Use at least one fact and one attributed view.
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“The Marshall Plan offered economic aid to European states from 1947. American officials described it as supporting recovery. Some historians argue it also aimed to limit Soviet influence by strengthening Western European economies. The evidence supports the plan as both a recovery programme and part of a wider strategy, though how much weight each purpose deserves is a matter of interpretation.”
Q8. Explain why “satellite” is a label that needs attribution.
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It is a term used by many historians and by Western contemporaries, while Soviet and allied sources described these states as sovereign socialist countries. Using it without attribution presents one viewpoint as fact. Describe documented relationships (troops, party control, treaties) and attribute the label.
Q9. Rewrite to remove present-day judgement: “The League was a shameful failure that betrayed Abyssinia.”
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“Italy invaded Abyssinia in October 1935. The League applied sanctions that excluded oil and did not stop the conquest. Some historians argue that this shows the League’s dependence on the cooperation of its main members.”
Q10. Plan, in four bullet points, an answer to: “Who was responsible for the Cold War?” Do not take a side.
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- Documented Soviet actions, such as the 1948 Czechoslovak takeover. 2. Documented American actions, such as the Truman Doctrine and Marshall Plan. 3. Interpretations: traditional, revisionist and post-revisionist, each attributed. 4. Qualified conclusion: the origins are more accurately explained as interacting actions, with the weighting of each debated.
If you got these wrong
| Problem | Go to |
|---|---|
| Wrong order of events (Q1) | Place a unit in context |
| Mixed up terms, responses and interpretations (Q2, Q5) | Terms versus interpretations and Versailles |
| League details (Q3, Q4) | The League of Nations |
| Source comparison (Q6) | Compare source accounts |
| Cold War content or neutrality (Q7, Q10) | Cold War origins and containment |
| Labels and judgement (Q8, Q9) | Soviet influence in Eastern Europe and sourced explanations |
For the 1939 chain of events, see European diplomacy and the outbreak of war. Return to the module page for the study order.
Students who would like a teacher to mark their written answers can look at our online one-to-one History tuition.