I’m thinking about taking AP Spanish Language online through Georgia virtual school this year (Junior year), and the website recommends at least 2 years of Spanish as a pre-req; I’ve taken two. Am I prepared or should I take another year?
How years of Spanish do you usually need to take before taking on AP Spanish Lang? Junior Scheduling
I think, generally, you want three years of Spanish before taking AP. I took Spanish 1 through my middle school, Spanish 2 as a freshman, Pre-AP Spanish 3 as a sophomore, & AP Spanish as a junior, ultimately scoring a 5 on the exam. It will help you a lot if you know advanced vocabulary & conjugations/sentence structure, which is hard to obtain if you’ve only been taking the class for two years.
At my school, 3 years is required unless you’re able to test out
My school required four years. The class was very small (me as a senior + a junior whose native language is Spanish). Honestly though, I’m not sure why people take AP language courses online. It just doesn’t seem like a good idea.
What is your reasoning in doing it?
I would recommend at least 3 years. I find it interesting that some people here took AP Spanish after Spanish 3. I’ve taken Spanish for five years now (Spanish 1 in 7th and 8th, Spanish 2 Frosh, Spanish 3 Soph and Honors Spanish 4 Jr), and for my senior year I’m taking AP Spanish (because our school requires Spanish 1-4 to take AP Spanish). My friend, however, took the AP Spanish exam after four years of Spanish and she got a 5 (but she attends a rigorous boarding school, so I don’t know if that’s helpful).
It’d be good to know what you have currently learned to gauge whether AP Spanish is the right fit for you. Have you learned all the tenses in those two years of Spanish? How much (and what kind of) vocabulary have you acquired? Can you understand Spanish spoken at an intermediate pace in a Latin American or Spanish accent? Are you capable of writing a brief (2 page-ish) essay in Spanish with multiple tenses, and a solid demonstration of acquired vocabulary? Are you capable of reading a real news article in Spanish and comprehending most of it using prior knowledge and context clues? (These are skills we were taught in Spanish 1-4.)
My daughter took AP Spanish as a sophomore and got a high A in it, and then did well on the AP exam also. She had gotten special permission from the Spanish department to skip a year or two of Spanish classes to jump straight to the AP Spanish class, and it worked out great. She did, however, have a strong background in Spanish, with lessons starting in elementary school, and she has a knack for languages in general.
So it really depends on you, and whether you are good with languages or not (including English). If you have sailed through Spanish in the past and have confidence in your abilities, and are motivated to work a little extra on vocabulary, then go for it.
@blackspiderman Our schools had the same requirement. 4 years of Spanish before AP. Maybe in other schools it is more common to start Spanish in high school, making it impossible to take the 4 years before AP.
Our high school also requires 4 years of Spanish before ap Spanish. However 7&8th grade just count as one year so the typical non native Spanish speaker takes it in 12th grade. People who speak Spanish or learn it outside of the public school system may take it sooner.