<p>We're in third quarter now, and we practically did nothing in semester 1 except textbook basics. On the Barron's APCS book, we covered Chapter 1 formally. And even though we did a textbook unit on classes, I tried doing the MC questions in the Barron's book about classes and failed miserably (just to show how unprepared the entire class is/how bad the teacher is, the test average for our most recent unit was a D). I think I am screwed, and we didn't even start on GridWorld yet, not to mention: inheritance, polymorphism, standard classes, object oriented programming/design, array lists (we did textbook arrays), sorting, searching, recursion, etc.</p>
<p>I'm thinking I should begin self-studying this but how? Barron's units are quite short and the MC questions are just perplexing sometimes. The textbook covers the fundamentals but doesn't train me for the AP style questions at all. What should I do - any tips? I really want a 5 on this exam and my teacher isn't helping. Thank you for all help.</p>
<p>Use your textbook and Barron’s to get the idea down, but the only way to actually learn is to practice. <a href=“http://www.Codingbat.com%5B/url%5D”>www.Codingbat.com</a> provides little exercises in programming to help you practice ideas; you can use programming projects from your textbook (usually there are things at the end of the chapter) to help you improve on bringing all the ideas together.</p>
<p>The thing about the multiple choice section is that it tests your ability to follow code, rather than write code–though writing code helps you understand things much better. That’s why I would use the MC questions at the end of each section in Barron’s as well as any you can find online or in other test preps to help you practice that. The issue, for me, is finishing the MC section within the time limit, and practicing has improved my time enormously.</p>
<p>If you haven’t started anything on objects thus far you definitely have a lot to catch up on – it’s doable but very difficult to master in the amount of time you have left (assuming you are new to programming – if you had taken a programming course before you should have already covered the basics so your AP course could have started with object oriented stuff). But good luck regardless!</p>
<p>Also as a general tip for a 5 – get Litvin’s “Be Prepared for the AP Computer Science Exam in Java”. It’s a big help and has clear explanations.</p>