AP Biology And AP Physics... Please Help

My son is a junior and has taken AP Biology and AP physics. He is finding it very difficult . He is a straight A student but has a B right now in first quarter. Can anyone suggest best ways and some resources to study for both the subjects. His biology teacher is good but gives very hard papers quizzes and tests. Lab reports, essays also he is not doing quite well. Overall can someone please give some tips for both of these subjects where can we find the right resource to study and get better.
He has all the books barrons Princeton school text book. He uses all of them.
Thanks.

Some of it is getting used to the format required for the answers (FRQs) and putting in enough information to get full credit. It took my son a while to learn that more depth was needed in the answers.

Is one or the other harder for him? Is it typical to take both at the same time?

These classes tend to be hard and time consuming. He needs to figure out where he is going wrong. Is he getting answers wrong or is he loosing lots of little points for not enough information or complete answers? Is he using the AP workbooks fully to practice as much as possible?

Otherwise, his option would be to find a tutor, accept that this might be his first B, or drop one of the courses. Good luck.

HE (not you) needs to talk to his respective teachers. That person will know what he is doing to be a B instead of an A student and can give him ways to study for the class as it is being taught. AP courses are not just what is tested for on the AP exam- they include whatever the teacher feels should be in the class. He could be getting more than just what is required for the AP exam and needs to learn the material presented, not just what is in the AP guidelines. It could be that he needs better problem solving skills and the teacher can provide ways for him to improve in that. It could be that the teacher is expecting higher level critical thinking skills than he is used to. Again, he needs to find out ways to adjust his learning to his teachers’ standards. This will help prepare him for the rigors of college.

My D never took either of these classes. However, from everything I have read and heard, AP Bio is the toughest AP class and hugely time consuming. My D went to a public HS that is highly reputable and a pressure cooker. Several of her “A student” friends got Cs in AP Bio. Please consider that your son is doing nothing wrong and everything right. Listen to what your’e saying: He has a B in AP Bio and you are wondering where he is going wrong.
Pat him on the back. He’s working his tail off and doing great, and, give him the option of dropping one or both classes. He will still go to college.

AP Bio it’s more about learning how to study for the class and how to write the FRQs which takes some time. What level of math is he taking? Even though AP Physics doesn’t require Calc it’s much easier to get the science if they are at least in Pre-Calc while they are taking it. If he’s struggling with both the math AND the science parts of it dropping might be a good choice. If it’s just one component getting a tutor is probably a good idea because it will get MUCH harder as the year goes on.

My son did not use any resource other than the AP textbook and did very well. He read the book, answered the questions handed out by the teacher before going to class.

Maybe your son needs to actively read the book and summarize the main points of the topics.

Is this the new AP Physics 1? That was a new class last year, and the contents of AP test came as a surprise to the teachers and the companies that write the prep books. The scores on that AP test were the lowest for any test. We had friends with kids who were good at math who needed to get a tutor for the first time ever to help bring grades up in that class. This year, they are having kids who were successful in that class (and the year before in AP Physics B) tutor the kids taking AP Physics 1 & 2 during a forced study hall period that happens twice a week.

Both an AP Physics and AP Biology in the same year (probably along with other APs) is a very difficult schedule. But, they are difficult classes in different ways. For AP Physics, doing lots of problems is the way to learn. AP Biology requires a lot of memorization and understanding concepts.

My son is taking AP Biology this year. Their lab writeups so far are not difficult, but the ones for AP Chemistry last year were. There is a learning process to understand what the teacher is looking for in the labs.

My son’s has two thick biology textbooks, and the teacher refers to both. They are thicker and have more detailed graphics than any test prep book. My son also uses Wikipedia if he doesn’t feel a topic is explained well.

I help a bit by quizzing my son the night before a test in biology using the study guide. He explains each item to me, and I circle it for further review if I feel like he’s not sure or isn’t covering the whole concept. I mainly do that because I have a patchy knowledge about biology, and it’s a quick way for me to learn some interesting things. I did the same quizzing for geology, because it’s a subject that interests me but my knowledge is 30+ years old. Physics and chemistry were more problem-solving, so I didn’t do any quizzing.

Oh, and I forget to include the advice my husband (PhD in physics) gave my son (repeatedly) when he was taking AP Physics B a couple years ago. I’ve passed this advice on to a few people, and they said it was helpful.

The short form of the advice is, “Use lots of paper, and write clearly.”

The long form is, when you are doing a physics problem:

  1. The first thing to do is to write down all the things you know. Like: at t = 30, v = 60 km/h
  2. Next, draw a picture of what is happening and label the thing you want to figure out.
  3. Write down the relevant equations that you know.
  4. Solve the problem using the equations but without plugging in the actual numbers. Use the units to make sure that you are computing the right thing. For example, you know that velocity can be expressed as kilometers per hour, which is km / hour. So, the equation you use has to give the right units. That's a simple example, but the same thing applies something like Newtons (kg * m/s^2).
  5. Only plug the numbers from the problem in at the end.
  6. Make sure the answer makes sense.

He is taking AP calculus bc. He is doing excellent in it. Actually he is good in maths.

Well about teachers, he has tried talking to his teacher about it. She says,“every year there are plenty of straight A students who come to me and say we are getting B and C please help us. But my class is that hard.” Secondly, it’s not us (parents) who are feeling bad he is getting a B, in fact we both have told him it’s fine as long as your doing your job and working hard. Because we know he works hard for his grades. I wanted to help him as he is feeling low after he got an B in first quarter.

Thanks to your husband(Ph.D. In physics). My son says he will make use of these points. Yes he is taking AP physics 1.
I too help him with quizzing and solving worksheets, but as you said I agree, all the stuff today are 30+ years new. Our knowledge does not help them much. But I still try reading and understanding them, if I can. Once again thanks for these points., hopefully it should help him further.

He cannot ask his teachers? Teacher are the best help, they know exactly what they teach and what will be on test. In regard to Bio, it is hard, period. And if he is going to continue with it at college, college Bio is much harder than AP Bio. To give an example, D’s first college Bio went thru AP material in the first 2 weeks and then they moved on. Anyway, Bio is basically memorization, I do not know who can help a kid with that.
Physics is all different story. One got to understand PERFECTLY every single concept in physics and if they do not, seek help IMMEDIATELY, do not let it pile up. As parents, we helped our D. with physics, she even called when she was at college. If you do not know yourself, just GOOGLE it. However, D. was using physics prof’s office hours a lot. As I said, person who is teaching is the best source of help.

You cannot help your kid though with his homework, he got to solve the problems on his own. We helped only when D. had specific questions. Most of them could be found in their textbook, they simply do not know how to use index at the end of the book. Do not get me wrong, our kid was also a straight A, all thru graduating from college.

Some AP teachers grade a little extra hard the first quarter. They want to make sure the kids realize this is supposed to be a college level class and take it seriously. If your child is doing well in Calculus he shouldn’t have difficulty with physics. (Though I liked math better than physics myself.) He should definitely talk to the teacher and see where his problems lie. Maybe he missed a concept, or maybe he just needs to answer questions in the preferred format. IME if a kid goes to extra help sessions with a teacher regularly, that teacher will look on them more generously in general.

As for biology - the main issue with it is that it covers a huge amount of material. My kid’s teacher gave them supplementary handouts that could fill a box by the end of the year. That was in addition to the fat textbook and the review books they used. My kids probably worked harder in that course than any other one they took in high school.

Has your son mentioned how others are doing? I know that’s not the point, but it may be that your son’s B is one of the highest grades in that Bio class…that’s what’s happening in my daughter’s AP Bio class right now. The teacher gives incredibly difficult tests but is a terrific teacher and even though grades end up being low the majority of his classes get 5s on the AP test. That’s not a lot of reassurance when you’re a senior, but it’s something. My daughter was feeling very down about her B until she heard that there was only one A, and it was a low one.

Taking two AP Sciences at the same time IS very difficult.

My daughter had similar issues in AP chem. She breezed through classes until she hit that one. Can you tell if it is the format or the material that is giving him trouble? If it is the material, is the a university nearby? I got in contact with the chemistry department and hired a student tutor. She still ended up with a B in the class, but came out feeling more confident in her ability to manage the material. Good luck!

I’m a high school student taking both AP Physics 2 and AP Bio. As far as grades go, it REALLY depends on the way the teacher grades the class. Some teachers give hard tests, others don’t. Some give summative grades for lab reports, others don’t. Getting an A under one teacher might be as hard as getting a C under another teacher (for the same class). The College Board dictates the syllabus for AP classes, but teachers decide how their class is graded. It seems like your son was unlucky enough to end up with hard teachers. In some classes, getting an A is very difficult even if you study and understand everything; it ultimately depends on the teacher.