Describe California before European contact as home to a very large number of distinct Native nations, each adapted to its own region.
Long before any European ship reached its coast, California was one of the most crowded and most diverse places in North America -- not crowded with cities, but with people and languages. Historians estimate that before contact, over 300,000 Native people lived here, speaking more than 100 distinct languages, organized into small nations and villages rather than one large empire. Because California's regions are so different from each other, the nations that lived in each region developed very different ways of life, closely matched to the land, water, plants, and animals around them.
A few examples show the range: the Yurok, Karuk, and Hupa lived among the redwoods and rivers of the northwest; the Pomo lived near the north coast and Clear Lake; the Miwok and Ohlone lived in central California and the Bay Area; the Chumash lived along the central coast and the Channel Islands; the Yokuts lived in the Central Valley; and the Cahuilla, Serrano, and Kumeyaay lived in the desert and inland south. Each nation's lifeways -- their homes, food, tools, and boats -- were built around their own particular stretch of California.
Mastery looks like: They can state that California had over 100 Native nations/languages before contact and name at least two nations from different regions.
Common stumbles: Treating California's first peoples as one single culture instead of many distinct nations; underestimating how many people lived here.