<p>How long does it take to prepare for this AP, and how fluent in Chinese do I need to be? (I might need to self-study for all or most of it.)</p>
<p>if you are a native speaker you don’t even need to study for it.
if you are not, well, the test is computer based and the speaking part is quite long. there is a 2 minute free response and tons of short answers which are like 20 seconds each. </p>
<p>i will say you will have to speak as fluent as a native speaker to get a 5…
plus knowledge of Chinese festivals etc.</p>
<p>The test for me was pretty easy, but i am a native speaker. The hardest part (but still easy) out of all the sections for me was the listening part because they only give read the conversations once or twice and you will be asked to answer a few questions based on it. But besides that part, the rest is easy. For my class, almost 90% of the test takers were asleep because we had so much time for the reading comprehensions</p>
<p>i’m supposedly a native speaker but i always slacked off in chinese
so i’m suffering this year…
for me, the listening practice is pretty easy. typing is alright too.
comprehension’s kinda hard but the worst part is culture. You have too talk for so long and actually know the topic.</p>
<p>i’m not a native speaker. i’m currently junior and i studied mandarin starting from grade 3 (it’s mandatory in our school) last year i took the test and i thought i totally screwed up the test, especially in the speaking/culture part because half the time i didn’t know what i was saying and the other half of the time, i was repeating myself three or four times but i ended up getting a five. 
so, just try to learn a lot about the culture and stuff. the rest was pretty easy.</p>
<p>dang seriously? my parents are hecka worried about it
how do you think the curve was?</p>
<p>what kind of school do you go to? that’s pretty interesting</p>
<p>I’m a native speaker, but even though i completely blanked on one of the culture/speaking questions I ended up with a five. They give you a lot of time for the speaking sections but it’s not really necessary as long as you answer the question. Mine were all around 3 sentences long, I think.</p>
<p>Hi guys,</p>
<p>I’m a native speaker (Cantonese mainly, but I can speak mandarin but I stutter a bit). For the speaking portion, am I allowed to speak using Cantonese or must it be mandarin? Since I speak cantonese at home it’s hard for me to straight up answer questions using mandarin since I have to put the words (in cantonese) through my translator(in my brain) into mandarin lol.</p>
<p>Since I’m a native speaker, how “much” of the culture do I need to know? like is it all the basic festivals that most people know about already?</p>
<p>You have to speak mandarin, sorry. Tell your parents to speak only mandarin at home for the next 6 weeks, haha.</p>