***AP Biology 2015 Thread***

<p>@tagi1998 i started reading it late march/early April, so I guess almost 2 months before. Just focus on the actual material that’s gone over in class throughout the year, don’t start reading a prep book while simultaneously trying to learn what’s happening in class. You should devote yourself to whatever your teacher is going over at the moment so you can learn it well and have a strong knowledge base when you study for the test.</p>

<p>I’ll be taking AP Bio as a senior this coming year. I will definitely need to get a review book though, since my school is weird and spreads the course over two years (essentially), making the first year “Advanced Biology” and second year “AP Biology.” I was thinking Barron’s, from what it sounds like from the earlier posts. I’m hoping for at least a 4, and ideally a 5 if possible, so I’m going to start studying for it early!</p>

<p>Taking this next year, I am excited for this course since I really loved Biology in 9th grade, upcoming Junior. Good luck to all…my sympathetic system is getting out of control. x)</p>

<p>To any of the former AP Bio students, how much time would you recommend dedicating this course daily specifically for the tests? I heard that the AP Bio teacher at my school does not give homework at all, rather than just study for the tests. </p>

<p>@elefish92 Like I said earlier, make sure to read the textbook as that will help you remember the info when compounded with whatever notes you’re taking in class. I don’t think I studied every single day, but I did end up reading the textbook maybe 2-3 days a week to finish a chapter. I wouldn’t try to read the whole chapter in a day because then you’re just saturated with the info. To help, you could also use a Guided reading to help you look for the important details (Im not saying actually writing and answering it, unless you want to, but just look through it so you when you’re reading, you know what to look for)</p>

<p>I highly doubt it but does anyone have any experience with this preparing for the AP biology book by Pearson? It’s a direct accompaniment to the ninth edition of the Campbell book. I got it for free and I was wondering if it would be useful or not
<a href=“http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0321856635?me=&ref=olp_product_details”>http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0321856635?me=&ref=olp_product_details&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>@tagi1998 I heard it’s good for summarizing what the textbook says so it’s a good tool to learn info from quickly and easily in case you didn’t understand something in class. Though since it’s more for the text book and not the exam, I don’t think it would be helpful for the new formate. But keep it (one because it’s free) and 2 I heard good things about it helping throughout the school year itself</p>

<p>@Zeppelin7 OK, thanks! :)</p>

<p>@Zeppelin7‌ ok thank you.
now I haven’t seen this too frequently but I seen some posts saying to get a cheap used copy( I’ve seen one for 5.30 good condition and $10 for very good) of Biology: the unity and diversity of life by Starr and Evers now does anybody have any comments or experience on that cuz some people say its helpful for FRQs and some say its just a totally better book compared to campbell. Is this just personal preference or what?or even necessary?</p>

<p>@tagi1998 Can’t really say, sorry; I was just saying from whatever I’ve heard about it. I never personally used it</p>

<p>@elefish92 I hope I can be of some assistance. I took AP Biology last school year (as a sophomore, without having any sort of Biology class beforehand), and I only made a 2. However, I am SUPER confident I could have made at least a 3 if I had actually spent the time to study for it throughout the year, instead of attending 2 saturday study sessions, and tons of after school study sessions. My problem was that the teacher had no idea what she was doing and she tried teaching an AP Biology class at a general Bio level. </p>

<p>With that being said, the AP Biology exam I took was fairly easy. The multiple choice was cake; the FRQ’s were not. The FRQ’s really screwed me over, but that was because we missed 38 days of school this year and that is the class time we couldn’t make up before the exam (BUT, like I said above, if I would have actually studied harder, I definitely could have passed). Due to missing so much school, there were concepts and math formulas we didn’t even go over in class. Unfortunately, the ONE concept we didn’t learn, standard deviation, just so happened to be what one of the longer FRQ’s was about. I literally left it blank because I had no idea what to do with the information I was given and that was the worst feeling in the world. </p>

<p>To answer your question, study it as much as possible. Our teacher gave us Barron’s book to accompany our Campbells textbook, and it is a lifesaver. Read your textbook chapter and then read the chapter in Barrons so you can make SURE you know the content. Like someone mentioned above, make sure you STUDY. STUDY HARDCORE. It’s a lot of information to retain and you can’t cram it in a week before the exam. About your teacher not giving homework, do practice problems online then. I had packets to do every week over chapters in the Campbells book and it honestly helped a lot with summarizing what you read and organizing it in a coherent fashion. </p>

<p>I would say study, at least, an hour every night. Maybe more, if you have time. You’ve already had biology, though, so it shouldn’t be hard for you at all to make a 5. The AP Biology test is super easy (the multiple choice were a piece of cake because a lot of the times you could eliminate half of the answer choices and use common sense to find the real answer), and the FRQ’s were simple prompts, I just didn’t have the background information to draw a graph to represent a decline of a population, or to tell you what a reflex arc is. </p>

<p>If you have any questions about the AP Bio test, feel free to message me! I’ll be glad to tell you anything you want to know. :)</p>

<p>@tremndose Great information, thanks. I know how you feel, its the same case with AP World at my school, a bunch of people regretted taking that course including me because we got the wrong teacher (same with your case, we SKIPPED A LOT of stuff). Upcoming Junior also, so I can relate about that problem, you’re not the only one. But hopefully you will perform better for the next two years, and at least you have some preparation for the AP Program. </p>

<p>Regarding the topic though, I will follow that advice most likely. I’ll just go to the library and work on some old AP Bio books here and there. Its because I heard that the AP Biology class at my school claims to be graded solely on tests and labs, so I will probably study xD Mhm, a lot of my friends, including the sophomores too, said that the FRQs were just ridiculous…but thanks for the advice, really helped and persuaded me about the course. :)</p>

<p>@elefish92 No problem! Along with skipping a lot of bookwork, we also didn’t do half of the labs we were supposed to. Just make sure you know the ins and outs of each and you’ll be fine!!</p>

<p>Im an upcoming sophomore who plans on self-studying the exam. Which review book best covers the math needed? Or is all the math needed in Campbell? </p>

<p>I self-studied and I basically just read through the Campbell book 8th edition (only the chapters that were on the AP Bio correlation sheet) and used the Barron’s book. In addition to Barron’s, use Cliffs and 5 steps to a 5. Those are the top 3 books for this course. </p>

<p>SAT II is a lot more nitpicky, but doesn’t really require you to understand Biology as well as the AP exam does.</p>

<p>@Smargent‌ How did you figure out which chapters were tested?</p>

<p>Our AP Bio teacher showed us school statistics for past students. Honestly only 3-5 people in my school in the last 2 years have gotten a 5. I assume this is due to only seniors taking AP Bio till this year.</p>

<p>I’m a junior taking AP BIO this year. Just got first “exam” back (in-class) and I’m discontent with my score on only the free response section. I’ve taken APUSH and APWH and written good in class essays then, but obviously bio is a different “beast” so to speak. </p>

<p>I would love advice on
a) do’s and don’ts of ap bio free responses
b) how ap bio frq differs from above mentioned class responses</p>

<p>I think my mastery of the material is good since my MC score was good (book questions and old AP questions) but there’s a missing link between translating the information in my head into a high scoring essay response.</p>

<p>What I’m gathering so far from my AP Bio course is that it’s super important to know the different experiments done to determine some concepts that we take as fact now. Also, it’s important to know who performed these experiments. </p>

<p>We just went finished the chapter on DNA replication, and we had to know all of the specific details about the experiments of Griffith, Avery, Hershey and Chase, Watson and Crick, and Meselson and Stahl. The rest of my class loathed it, but it’s easy to remember if you devote enough time to it.</p>

<p>In my AP Bio class, we started our first unit with chemistry (for obvious reasons). My chemistry is quite weak though. Does anyone have any websites or recommendations on how I can get up to par with my chemistry for AP Biology? Thanks in advance for anything!</p>

<p>@Irrational18 I have always used khan academy to study chemistry, and another good site is the youtube channel Crash Course, between the two you should find most of what you need! hope it helps</p>