I’m a sophomore and I’m currently taking one AP class, AP World History. I’ve been thinking a lot more about college lately and was thinking of stepping up my game next year. So, I plan on taking possibly 5 AP’s next year and I don’t know if I’ll be able to handle it. I know this depends on my work ethics and whatnot, but I don’t know if this is too big of a jump. At my school, AP World History is pretty easy. Some people in my class don’t even read before the tests and still get A’s. The tests are almost always MC questions, and we rarely have essays and no quizzes. It’s more of a self-study class at my school because the teacher just gives lectures each class and we’re responsible for doing the rest of the work. Personally, I just read the chapter and underline important information and can get an A on a test. I go to sleep late, but that’s because I’m usually a slow reader and take a while doing work from other classes. Anyways, the AP’s I want to take next year are: AP French, AP Psych, AP Lang, APUSH, and AP Bio. I’m not taking these AP’s just because like many other people do; I’m taking them because they either interest me and are related to my possible college majors or to show colleges that I’m challenging myself by taking AP’s in core courses. To give you guys an idea of how hard these classes are at my school, I’ll include a brief description for each:
AP French- There’s homework every other day most of the time. You have to read kind of a lot, not per day, but in general, there are many things that I would have to read in this course. I currently have this teacher for French III and at least now, she doesn’t give an intense amount of work. I really like French and I’m probably going to major in this in college, so it hopefully won’t be too hard for me.
AP Psych- You have to read basically every day because there’s a quiz every single class, literally, and on double periods (every six days because my schedule is cyclical having six letters), there’s a test. Many of my classmates who are also in AP World are in AP Psych and say that it’s hard only because her tests are pretty specific and you have to know the concept pretty well. Moreover, at my school, AP Psych isn’t really considered an “easy AP” like in other schools for what I just said, and everyone usually gets a 5 on the AP exam because she prepares her students very well and they finish the book in February and review for the AP exam for the next three months. Her tests are very similar to the AP exam which is why her students do so well in May. This is also another one of my interests so I hope to do well in it.
AP Lang- All I know is that the teacher apparently gives less work to the AP students than to the regular students (she teaches the regular and AP course), although, you have to write a lot of essays and read a lot I guess.
APUSH- You have to read about every day because there are apparently activities the teacher does each day and it’s pretty fast-paced (obviously, as are all AP’s). I’ve also been told that it’s somewhat hard and if I’m interested in it I should do well (although, I’m not “that” interested, but I know I could do well because I’m dedicated and I’ll have experience from AP World)
AP Bio- What makes this difficult at my school isn’t necessarily the workload, but the actual difficulty of the coursework; i.e. you really have to understand the concept to do well on tests. People usually get C’s and D’s on these tests because they’re really specific and you have to apply what you’ve learned about the concept to very specific situations.
P.S. I’ve gotten all this information from upperclassmen at my school.
So, any advice? Has anyone made this jump, and what did you do to manage it? Should I take one of these AP’s Senior year, etc.?