<p>I just tried to search to better understand the difference between the two tests and came up blank. Can anyone either explain it or point me to a thread--I'm sure this has been discussed before!</p>
<p>Are you referring to the AP classes or the actual AP exams for literature v. language?</p>
<p>The tests…my D is in AP English and was given her choice when it was time to sign up for the exam she’ll take and I don’t know the difference between the two; apparently she can take either.</p>
<p>Read here:</p>
<p><a href=“http://media.collegeboard.com/digitalServices/pdf/ap/explore-ap/AP_English-Language-Literature-Comp-CED_Effective_Fall_2010.pdf[/url]”>http://media.collegeboard.com/digitalServices/pdf/ap/explore-ap/AP_English-Language-Literature-Comp-CED_Effective_Fall_2010.pdf</a></p>
<p>If subject credit and placement in college is important, check each college to see if it has different policies for the two tests.</p>
<p>You’re more likely to get “English 101” type credit for the Comp test than the Lit one.</p>
<p>seattle_mom is correct. Language and Composition can often allow students to place out of one semester of first-year composition (writing class). The Language and Literature test can often be used to test out of a general education literature survey class (not a writing class). As most colleges require at least one semester of writing, but many do not specifically require literature, the Language and Composition test may be more broadly useful for placing out of a required class if your D does not yet know which colleges she is applying to.</p>
<p>ucbalumnus, thanks for the link (and I am also a ucbalum!) and to seattlemom and NJSue. </p>
<p>At this point, my D (jr) plans to pursue engineering so she may not even have a lit requirement (her list isn’t pared down sufficiently to have a sense as to what a specific school might require) and, personally, I tend to think that all freshmen, even those with strong skills, should take their freshman writing class so perhaps it doesn’t matter…</p>
<p>Does anyone know how the content of the test differs or what strengths a student should have to select one over the other?</p>
<p>I took AP Lit in high school, and I received 4 general English credits. (Still had to take a literature course and a writing course) </p>
<p>This is basically how the Writing and Rhetoric Department explained it to me:</p>
<p>AP Literature does involve a good amount of logical, persuasive and organized writing, but it pertains to literature and English, which is separate from our department. The AP Lang test deals with non-fictional elements, so a 4 on that test would have exempted you from the first year writing sequence. </p>
<p>Then I talked to the English Department and they said that they viewed the test as being too vague to fit their requirements of a lit class. </p>
<p>I hadn’t found these specific details online, but if I had called, I probably could have known in time to take the Lang test. I’d say to have your daughter take both if it’s possible and to personally check with any school she is interested in attending. Each school has their own AP policy amongst individual tests, so it’s good to always stay on top it. (Unlike me! (: ) </p>
<p>Good luck!</p>
<p>At my son’s HS, you take AP Lang & Comp Jr year, and AP Lit Sr year. You don’t take either or - you take the test that goes with the class you took.</p>
<p>My son is also a STEM kid, and opted out of AP lit - so he could take AP Physics C and AP Chem sr year. He’s happy he missed out on the lit course, and it did not affect him getting into any colleges. And his score on the Lang test got him out of writing courses.</p>
<p>Good luck</p>
<p>Oh, and as for the tests themselves, I can give you some insight on the AP Lit test. </p>
<p>It has 2 sections, multiple choice and the written portion.</p>
<p>For the multiple choice part, one really has to be able to sift through literature and understand the big ideas. The passages they’ll give you can vary from being cool, boring or way out there, so you need to be able to pay attention and know what’s important or not. The questions they’ll ask are way harder and more thought provoking than those on the ACT, but they’ll have a few easy, read-and-locate ones. Generally, this is the part where you need to shoot for getting 50-70% right. (You don’t really have to ace the entire exam to pass, which is nice!) </p>
<p>The essays can be brutal since you only have 2 hours (I think) to write 3 essays. (This might have changed from last year, though, so please don’t quote me) They always give a prompt that requires you to write about a book, they’ll give you some passage to read and talk about, then they’ll give you either a compare and contrast or something else. (sorry, can’t remember!) The time management trick I ws taught was to do 40-40-30, the 30 minutes being for the easiest for you. The remaining 10 was to check everything over and fix handwriting/misspellings. </p>
<p>Basically, AP Lit requires you to be an open thinker and interpreter of literature. There’s really no one right way to do things, so the key is to find the way that works best for you. </p>
<p>Hope this helps!</p>
<p>At kids’ HS, they take AP Engl Lang class and AP test in 11th grade and AP Engl Lit class and AP test in 12th grade. Your D should ask her current english teacher which of the tests that she is supposed to take. Her AP English class would have prepared her for the specific AP test that she is supposed to take.</p>
<p>You can also ask on the AP forum on cc
<a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/ap-tests-preparation/[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/ap-tests-preparation/</a></p>
<p>^^Ours was the same. Seems that the AP Lit class involved reading certain works that seemed more useful for test. AP Lang seemed more about mechanics of English…had to learn a bunch of terms as summer work. In our HS Lang was also more Amercian writing, including poetry, and Lit was more European/world. Not sure if that was our school’s way of covering everything or driven by AP.</p>
<p>How colleges view AP credits varies. I recommend looking at possible colleges AP page to see how credit awarded, if that matters.</p>
<p>Our school also does AP Lang as 11th grade and AP Lit as 12th grade. I don’t know if you do honors 11th grade if you even have the choice of doing AP Lang as a 12th grader. The AP Lang kids read a lot of non-fiction essays and speeches. I thought it actually could have been a nice change of pace from the usual fiction and poetry, but neither of my kids opted to take it. A million years ago I just took the Lit AP (I think - they may just have had one English AP back then) without any special prep at all.</p>
<p>Ah, now I understand that different schools do things, well, differently. All 11th graders at my d’s school take AP English–not sure it has any other name and there’s no choice. Senior year they take two one semester electives ranging from poetry to shakespeare–all considered AP English classes. There is no offering called AP lit or AP comp. Thus, all 11th grade students are required to take an AP test (a school requirement for anyone taking an AP level class and the 11th graders were told to choose between the two (lit and comp). </p>
<p>The description provided by Opori2 was very helpful–anyone have a similar description for the comp exam? I asked D again this morning and she said ‘everyone’ was taking lit so she was too but she also said she heard that it was good for people who did well on the critical reading section of the SAT…she did better on the writing section so I wondered how the comp test correlated to the two sections of the SAT.</p>
<p>My S also took AP Lang. and Comp. and the corresponding exam as a junior . There was no choice. Don’t see how anyone could take the AP Lit. exam if they had taken the Lang. and Comp. class. He took Honors English as a senior instead of AP Comp.<br>
The best senior English teacher was teaching Honors instead of AP that year.</p>
<p>There are samples of the MC questions and links to past free response sections for the Language and Comp AP here: [AP:</a> English Language](<a href=“College Board - SAT, AP, College Search and Admission Tools”>AP English Language and Composition Exam – AP Students)</p>
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<p>However, this is not necessarily true at every university. Some accept the two on an equal basis (including those for which neither gives any subject credit or placement), while some others accept Literature for more subject credit or placement than Language. Check each university of interest if this is a concern.</p>
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<p>A strong writer may not find such a course to be especially helpful.</p>
<p>However, testing for writing skills is not an easy thing to do in a typical test format (whether an AP test or a college’s own test), so a college may not be especially confident in the “accuracy” of placing students out of the freshman writing course.</p>
<p>A strong writer may not find such a course to be especially helpful.</p>
<p>However, testing for writing skills is not an easy thing to do in a typical test format (whether an AP test or a college’s own test), so a college may not be especially confident in the “accuracy” of placing students out of the freshman writing course.</p>
<p>I totally agree! Even though I took AP Lit instead of AP Lang, I felt that my writing skills were very strong. Generally, I thought that the freshman writing sequence was aimed for those who weren’t quite there yet but that knew enough to get going. Saying so, I did fine, and it wasn’t as bad as people think. Likewise, there were some people in my class that had taken and passed AP Lang tests but that still weren’t quite up to par, so it can really go both ways. </p>
<p>I think that’s why colleges and universities are very touchy on their writing placement and on testing out. In order to accurately judge everyone’s abilities, you’d have to have detailed, individual testing which would take way more time than it’s probably worth.</p>
<p>DS HS is same as many mentioned - 11th grade AP Lang; 12th grade AP Lit; take the corresponding test.</p>
<p>More schools we reviewed provided credit for AP Language.</p>
<p>I do not find the fresh. Comp courses a strong requirement for STEM kids. I think the type of writing expected for STEM kids is very different then what is taught in the Comp courses. </p>
<p>This is a great question to ask the STEM department, STEM students and the admissions rep when evaluating schools. For my son, out of the 12 schools he applied, he had decided in advance that he would take the writing course at only 2 of the schools. Most of the schools had short paper assignments in fresh comp and he did not believe he would benefit. The other 2 had longer research papers vs short reflective essay or something similar to standardized test writing.</p>