Explain the structural weaknesses of the Articles of Confederation and how Shays' Rebellion helped push the states toward the Constitutional Convention.
After declaring independence, the states needed some kind of national government, so in 1781 they ratified the Articles of Confederation. Fearing another king, the states deliberately built a WEAK national government: no president, no national courts, and a Congress that could ask states for money and soldiers but not force them to comply. Congress could not regulate trade between states, and changing the Articles required all thirteen states to agree -- which almost never happened.
The weaknesses turned into a real crisis in 1786-87. In western Massachusetts, farmers were losing their land to debt and high taxes after the war, and a former Continental Army captain named Daniel Shays led an armed uprising, shutting down courts to stop farm foreclosures. Massachusetts had to raise its own private militia to put down Shays' Rebellion, because the national government had no army of its own to send. The rebellion terrified leaders across the states: if the government could not even keep order at home, could it survive at all? That fear brought delegates to Philadelphia in May 1787 -- officially just to revise the Articles, but they ended up writing an entirely new Constitution instead.
Mastery looks like: They can name at least three specific weaknesses of the Articles of Confederation and explain how Shays' Rebellion connected those weaknesses to the call for a Constitutional Convention.
Common stumbles: Assuming the Articles of Confederation and the Constitution were basically the same document with small edits, rather than understanding the Convention replaced it entirely.