How much summer work do your S/D's AP classes require?

Parents Forum
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<p>Our AP and our honors classes all require some reading and either a packet, an essay or the expectation of a test on the material the first week of school. For English alone, they have to read four to six books depending on the grade.</p>

<p>I just found out recently that my nephew, who is a senior, is taking APUSH on a block schedule and will have it all year. That means he's getting an 1 1/2 of it every day while my son (sophomore) has it for forty minutes. Is that how it usually is with block scheduling?</p>

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<p>Both D & S had summer reading (4 - 6 books) but nothing special for any of their AP courses. D of a friend who took AP Bio as a junior had tons of summer work -- reading and notes on about 10 chapters, along with periodic tests. However, the teacher was totally worthless. Get this -- he never had the class do any of the labs until AFTER the AP exam. Not one student got over a 2. (Small wonder!)</p>

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<p>Nothing this year.</p>

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<p>None of the classes at geek_son's school are designated "AP" -- but of the classes that are designed to prepare students for the AP exams, none require summer work. This might have something to do with the school's unusually long calendar, plus not having the AP curriculum designation might give the teacher some flexibility not found in courses designated "AP." I can't complain about the resulting exam scores.</p>

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<p>APUSH - read first seven chapters of the textbook, answer 8 essay questions (D complained a lot about that)
AP English Language - read three novels, write "reading logs" (very detailed information on characters, setting, plot, symbols, literary devices, themes, etc) on two and an essay on the third<br>
AP Environmental Science - read first two chapters of the textbook and complete online quizzes before the first day of class
AP Psych - nothing
AP World History - read first three chapters of the textbook, no written assignment
AP Human Geography - nothing</p>

<p>Regular and honors English classes also require summer reading, but not as much reading and written work as AP. It's surprising in a way how much variation there is in summer work among AP teachers. I think piling on the summer work may be a way some teachers are trying to weed out kids who aren't serious about AP -- the classes are open enrollment here. As long as you're not failing the prerequisite class, you can take AP.</p>

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<p>APUSH- read "1776" and be prepared for quiz on first day; memorize all presidents, terms of office, and parties for quiz on first day; read/outline first 3 chapters of textbook</p>

<p>APCalcAB- big math packet. Of course, saved until last few days of vacation.
AP Physics- nothing</p>

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<p>kathiep- my D is taking APUSH on a block schedule and indeed, has class all year for 1.5 hours every other day. All AP courses at her school are scheduled that way.</p>

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<p>DD who is a senior spent ALL last summer working on her summer homework for her 6 AP classes. She had substantial homework in each subject. Some examples:</p>

<p>APComp -- reading several non-fiction books on writing and submitting by Aug 1 a lengthy project plus more work due before school started later in Aug</p>

<p>AP Art History -- read the annotated mona lisa (a book used by many for review after the entire year) plus additional packet</p>

<p>AP Calc BC -- packet</p>

<p>In addition, there was work in AP US govt, AP Physics M/E and AP European Hist.</p>

<p>Before her Junior year, she also had a massive amount of work for her AP classes but this past summer was truly huge. The amusing thing is that our HS principal's daughter is one year behind mine and he finally saw how much summer work there was and said that this had to change (of course too late for my DD).</p>

<p>And as an aside, the AP Art history class is truly evil in the workload. DD loves it but they are going at the rate of a chapter a week (next chapter is 80 pages long!) and keeping up and absorbing all the material requires significant work</p>

<p>We start school long before labor day (aug 20 this year) so the excuse that there isn't enough prep time really doesn't hold.</p>

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<p>One of my Ds will be a sophomore next year, and the only area where AP courses are available to sophomores at her HS is social studies. She'll be taking AP European History, and the only thing we know is from the course guide: "A summer reading list and writing assignment is a REQUIRED part of this course." I have no clue how extensive that will be. D is also taking Honors Chemistry and Honors Spanish, but there's no summer work for them (of course, they're not AP classes so there's no rush to cover material for the May test).</p>

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<p>School here typically starts after Labor Day, so AP teachers do make assignments in pretty much all of them, to ensure they can make it through the material prior to the May tests. (Some of the honors classes -- the ones with weighted GPA potential -- also have summer homework, possibly as a way to weed out those who cannot handle the work ... which is also a function of the AP summer work as well, I believe.)</p>

<p>As a sophomore, my S took PE (Varsity Water Polo/swim), Honors English, Honors Chem, AP Spanish Language, AP Calc BC and AP Euro History. Below was the summer work required for the APs:</p>

<p>AP Spanish Language: Read an article from selected Spanish language newspapers or magazines and write a two page essay, in Spanish.
AP Calc BC: Read first three chapters and complete directed problems. Test first week of class.
AP Euro History: Read first three chapters, answer document based questions (DBQs.) Visit local musuem, do docent lead tour of European art period, write a two page essay. Hand draw a map of European countries, test on location first week of class.</p>

<p>Paced over the summer, this was doable. My S got a 5, 5, 4 on the AP tests.</p>

<p>My S is currently a junior, taking PE (Varsity Water Polo/Swim), Photography, AP Physics C, AP US History, AP English Language. He also began an on line course in Linear Algebra in August.</p>

<p>The summer AP work was as follows:</p>

<p>AP Physics C: Read first two chapters and completed problem sets. Go to airport and calculate the speeds of the landing aircraft, graph the results. FWIW, AP Physics C requires the taking of TWO AP tests, one on mechanics and the second on electricity/magentism.
AP English: Read "Scarlet Letter" and one other book (choice of three.) Read list of literary terms, test first week of class.
AP US History: Read first three chapters, complete DBQs. Read up on ongoing presidential campaign and complete essay.</p>

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<p>Our schools do start well before Labor Day. Maybe that's the difference. I'm very glad that summer break around here is really a break. We all need one...</p>

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<p>None. School starts in September, AP exams in May, classes end in early June. Son did AP US History instead of reg US History sophomore year, someone else I know skipped both entirely since he got a 5 on the AP exam after freshman year, before either course. Son had mostly 5's, some 4's on 9 AP exams (a couple of summer GT courses). No reason to start ahead of the school year. What do they do for transfer students???</p>

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<p>When my daughter took APUS, they had to read the first 8 or so chapters of the textbook, fill out a worksheet for each chapter, write some essays, and had a test in the first week.</p>

<p>Students figured out pretty quickly from the summer workload whether they wanted to take the class, and many transferred out by the time school started.</p>

<p>This year, the new teacher decided to ditch the summer homework. Everyone showed up the first day. But half the kids have now dropped the class -- and not all at once, but spread out throughout the fall. One student dropped it in mid December.</p>

<p>Based on this year's blood bath, I think the summer HW should be reinstated. However, no other AP class at this HS has summer homework. (Although, my daughter, now in college, says she wishes there had been summer work for AP English.)</p>