***AP English Literature and Composition Thread 2015-2016***

Yeah, it’s better, for sure. Good luck.

I guess another thing which bothers me about these exams is that we’re always given prose passages out of context and expected to understand what is going on. In real life, nobody just picks up a book and aimlessly flips through it to a random page and just reads a couple of paragraphs without:

  1. knowing what the work itself is about
  2. knowing what came before that particular passage(s)

The more I take the College Board’s exams, the more upset I am with how little thought goes into the conception of standardized tests.

  1. I do this all the time
  2. The passage is often the very beginning of the book, and even when it's not, all the context you need is in the prompt.

I took AP Lit back in the late 80s and have taught it since the early 00s, and I find it a pretty fair, well-developed test. Maybe not as universally useful as Lang, but good for what it’s trying to do.

Guys I am absolutely freaking out right now. My english teacher gave us multiple released exams in class to do and I consistently scored like 65% on the MC, but after doing one Barron’s I just got like 40%. Is the Barron’s harder than the real thing or am I really just that screwed?

Yeah Barrons is harder (and crappier), @yolomaster98

I can do reasonably well on one passage in practice exams, but after one passage I find it extremely difficult to do a second, I feel very worn down, any tips?

To anyone that’s taking practice exams:
How much poetry do you see on the exam? If you’ve taken AP English Language, do you find the questions to be similar?

@horsesizedduck 2 poem 3 prose on the one I’m currently doing

Is it acceptable to write about a novella for the open essay question?

Gonna lit it up tomorrow!

Heart of Darkness has appeared on the list for the open essay question in previous years, and it is a novella, so novellas should be acceptable.

Does anyone know if a short story like Yellow Wallpaper would work? My teacher wasn’t sure.

Yes–Heart of Darkness, for example, has been used successfully.

No–I would absolutely recommend against using a short story. The prompt is pretty specific about that.

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Question #1 from the FRQ section was literally the worst poem I’ve ever read in my entire life (not an exaggeration). Literally everyone from my test center was talking about how stupid it was when they left the building. I wouldn’t be surprised if very few people actually did well on that one. The rest were fine, and the MC questions were surprisingly straightforward, with only a few being tricky. I’m expecting a 3 worst case scenario, 4 maybe.

I thought the first poem on the FRQ was easy, and many people at my center said so too.
I just nuked the second passage FRQ.

Multi choice wasn’t bad at all. Essay was alright.
I honestly don’t care for this test since I can’t get out of placement and my school has a limit of AP credits and so I BS’d more than I have ever in my life.

i thought MC was kinda hard, especially compared to past year exams. usually i breeze through MC and get around 90-95% but there were two sections where i completely guessed. FRQ was pretty good though

I think this was an easy to medium easy exam in terms of difficulty. Fort FRQ took me a while to outline and figure out but after that the other prompts were so easy! The MC wasn’t too bad either. It was easier than what my teacher gave us for practice.

guys we may have had different exams. my 1st poem was the ball one, second was elizabeth and her father, and third was about deception

I had that same one. The first one was my least favorite.