<p>I'm taking both next year, what should I expect? Which is the tougher one?</p>
<p>I took one (Eng. Lang.) and self-studied the other this year. I felt the were both about the same in terms of difficulty. With that said, I felt I learned more in English Lang. and didn’t learn all that much in US Gov. (But I had a pretty solid understanding of US Gov. before I even started to self-study for it.)</p>
<p>^how did you do on your AP exams? for both? Self-study sounds like a good idea, because I’ve heard the AP Gov. class can get pretty boring.
btw I’m from CT too :)</p>
<p>^Not true. My AP gov class was awesome and i learned a lot. Also, I took both of these AP classes in the same semester so here’s my advice. English is the harder of the two it demands intense critical reading and writing skills (you will probably read classic literature,write essays, have lots of discussion, and sharpen your vocabulary.) AP gov is all memorization and concepts which can be learned over an adequate period of time. My teacher never wrote notes on the board the class was very interactive but she did make us read from the book a lot,and study court cases. Last but not least, know your constitution for the AP exam.</p>
<p>P.S, I got a 5 in AP gov and a 3 on the lang exam.</p>
<p>I just took both of those this past year and got a 5 on gov and a 4 on lang. All things considered, though, I would consider lang to be the easier class. Gov you really need to memorize and learn new ideas, whereas lang it’s kind of you’re good at it or your not imo. You’ll read, write, and discuss as the other poster said so those are just things you’ll get better at in time. With gov if you don’t study you will not do well unless you already know it somehow. I consider myself to be pretty in the know with politics, but I only think I got my 5 from studying a lot (and also having a good teacher). I will say that along with APUSH these two ap’s were the easiest I’ve taken (others were human geog, euro, calc ab, and chem). Good luck next year! Oh and also I took them both in year long classes at my school if that matters…</p>
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<p>I got 5’s on both of them. Ap Gov. could probably get boring, but politics is one of the things I’m interested in (don’t want to be a politician or anything though) so it was pretty interesting for me.</p>
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<p>Yay! Another Nutmegger! Which part are you from? I’m in middle-of-nowhere, CT aka a really rural town in CT. Its in New Haven county though.</p>
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<p>Point taken. If you come into the course not knowing much about government, you will learn a lot. That wasn’t true for me and I was essentially pointing out how I felt. Oh and if you are even somewhat interested in gov’t, you will not only learn a lot, but it will be kind of fun.</p>
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<p>Last but not least, know your constitution and how to apply it to real-life situations for life. There I fixed it for you lol.</p>
<p>^Same… small town in New Haven County.
I’ve always been into politics too so I think it will go be a good class for me. It depends on who the teacher is too, and the AP Gov teacher at my school is awesome from what I’ve heard.</p>
<p>5 on Lang my junior year, 4 on US Gov this year.
Lang is a lot of writing. As you get closer to the exam, you should be writing at least one timed essay a week. Read interesting books (not just fiction) to widen your vocabulary and improve your written English.
US Gov can be really boring, it’s true. Make sure you have a good handle on the distribution of powers and ALL the policymaking institutions (including the bureaucracy - one of the FRQs dealt with the bureaucracy this year and it tripped a lot of people up). Find a good list of important Supreme Court cases and memorize like nobody’s business. You may only use one or two on the test, but you never know what you’ll need.</p>
<p>actually I feel very interested in learning government. Watch TV and listen to their talk, for example, lawyers are suing Arizona on the Immigration reform because immigration matters are not up to a state, but to the federal government. You don’t need to know all of the constitution, but remember the power of the 3 branches, ex: Congress is the only branch that can declare war, president nominates candidates for federal offiice but congress approves. Know the formal ( specifically stated power in the consitution) and the informal one ( these are the things you cannot miss)
Specifically on the AP exam, good thing you don’t need to write a long essay. Write it in paragraph, and remember to BS if necessary. There is no penalty. Instead, the readers will TRY TO LOOK FOR YOUR MAIN POINTS. In order to do this, practice writing free-response question on the collegeboard exam with the answers provided up there. It’s best if your teacher has an exam session review to go over those.
This AP exam is very easy, you just have to memorize the facts. Two weeks before the exam, go through a review book ( i used Cliffnotes from my school’s library and then to Princeton review). The way Cliffnotes write it is very understandable, whereas Princeton has its own verbose style (which I hate). But Cliffnotes will not be enough, though I found a lot of information in there covered on the AP exam. It’s best to go over with the Princeton review as well
You don’t need a US History knowledge on this. I’m a recent immigrant ( been in the States for two years) and took the test the second semester of my sophomore year. Yet I receive a 4 on the exam. Good luck to you</p>
<p>steel and belly: thanks for the advice, now i know what to expect going into these classes in September!</p>
<p>yeah and about court cases, you only have to remember like 8 of them for the AP purpose. In class, they may ask more than that. Look for the thread in the AP section ( I forgot what it is, but do a quick research before taking the ap exam on this board for that thread).</p>
<p>I self-studied both. Scored a 5 on Lang Junior year and a 5 on Gov. senior year. I prepared for both, but not that much. For Language I’d say the essays deserve more attention and preparation because the MC section is just a glorified version of ACT Reading. Become familiar with most of the literary devices that you will need to cite. Even do some practice essays using prompts in a review book.
Obviously if you are actually taking the course at school most of this will be done in your class.</p>
<p>For Government, I found that navigating the MC was what I needed to focus on more. In fact, I didn’t do one practice essay (although I did look over the prompts) because AP US Government essays are strictly fact-based. Leave your creative interpretive abilities you use for English at the door. During the exam, my essays were so direct and to the point I felt like it was simply factual regurgitation. The MC section can be tricky sometimes. The MC on the exam was definitely harder than any of the practice tests I took. But it is still very doable and I’d say that Gov is one of the easier AP tests to score well on, especially if you know your material.</p>
<p>Good luck!</p>
<p>I second alabamaguy’s take on the essay portion.
However, on this board, there is a thread in which they offer you links to the past multiple choice ( I think it was 1994,1 999 and 2000). I did only the 1994 one and go over it the Sunday evening before the Monday testing. I was actually amazed that I had seen most of those questions before, probably coming from the old practice test that I took. So the MP wasn’t hard for me</p>
<p>^You bring up a good point about the essays. My teacher (who is an AP Reader and who teaches both AP Govs and AP Econs, so probably a good method) always had us go through the question and divide it up into points. Since the essays don’t have to be eloquent or long at all, it’s best to just make sure you’re answering every part of the question. For example, here is Question 1 from 2009:
Part (a): (Identify the part of the national government that was originally most closely tied to citizens) and (explain how it was tied to citizens). Two points.
Part (b): (Explain TWO ways the United States Constitution limited majority rule). Two points.
Part (c): Choose two of the following twentieth-century developments and (explain how EACH moved the United States from a less democratic system to a more democratic system). Two points.
Now you know that this question will be worth six points when it’s graded and you have something of a to-do list for your essay:
-Identify the part of the national government that was originally most closely tied to citizens
-Explain how it was tied to citizens
-Explain how one twentieth-century development moved the US from a less democratic system to a more democratic system
-Explain how another twentieth-century development did the same thing
-Explain how one item from the list moved the US from a less democratic system to a more democratic system
-Explain how another item from that list did the same thing
That’s all you have to do. The other nice thing about this method is that it helps you organize your panicking brain when you’re confused by a question. Even if you don’t understand the main idea of what it’s asking you, you’ll still probably be able to pick up a few points.
You don’t have to argue a point or write for three pages, just make sure you’ve answered every part of the question fully. Do that for every question and you’ll be done in no time. Everyone in my test room was done with at least 15 or 20 minutes left over. It really is an easy test. I had the course first semester and I started reviewing like four days before test day and I still got a four, so… you get the picture.</p>
<p>^honestly I’ve learned some of the stuff in that question in USH last year. i like that it’s straight forward and it doesn’t seem like too much trouble. what’s the best way to prep for the MC on the AP Gov exam?</p>
<p>AP (US) Government was a joke. I took it this year for a self-study; I read through the crash course book for 3 or 4 hours, took the test, and got a 5. All you really need is the crash course book for a 5.</p>
<p>AP Gov is one of the easier exams, but I’m not sure everyone would agree that it is a “joke”. I think one of the main reasons many people believe it is considerably less challenging than some of the other exams is because many AP students have already taken AP US History, which covers some of the foundations of American government. APUSH places a considerable amount of emphasis on covering the American political system and various political movements throughout history, both of which appear on the AP Government exam. </p>
<p>Also, if you are naturally interested in government and politics (like I am), the exam seems to be much less difficult. To someone who has little to no inherent desire to study the federal system or voting trends among different segments of the population, the exam may seem to be much more difficult.</p>