<p>I've looked around, and have yet to find a thread about retaking an AP exam. I actually didn't know that was possible until I visited the Collegeboard website, where it clearly stated that you can retake as many times as you want.</p>
<p>My question is this, how many of you have retaken tests, and how successful have you been with those retakes? </p>
<p>I ask because I scored low on two of mine this past year, and now want to redo them. I recieved a 3 on Eng. Lang. and a 2 on W. His., both of which I was completely unprepared for. So, I thought I could just redo them this year, and especially for the english, since I'll be doing Lit. alongside it, it'll be much easier. W. History was just a lost cause, since I had a brand new teacher, who'd been teaching for two years, and for some reason they decided to stick her in a brand new AP class that had previously not been offered. I guess I'm to blame the most for not preparing on my own, but I was under the impression that the tests were impossibly hard, and that it wa a waste of time putting any effort into them at all, but now I've discovered prep books.</p>
<p>I don't have any experience with retaking, but for your situation, it doesn't sound like a bad idea. I assume from your post that you're only retaking Language, right? If so, that'll be much easier to study for than Lang + World. Hopefully your schedule next year isn't too full of APs, 'cause you'll want to be studying for those, too.</p>
<p>I've never retaken an exam, but a few people in my english class are planning to take the Language exam again next year, alongside Literature, like you. The only problem is that the Lang exam is changing significantly. A new type of essay, called synthesis, will be added along with multiple choice questions about different citation styles (MLA, APA, etc). The synthesis essay is rather like the USH document based question. You'll have a 15 minute reading time to look through 5 or 6 passages, then 40 minutes to write an essay, citing information from the reading. It might be hard without the benefit of a year of class.</p>
<p>Thanks, skatearabia, I'll make sure to look into those additions when studying, I, unfortunately, didn't get the best teacher this year, so I'll probably buy two books for the Lit. exam, and, hopefully someone will come out with a revised version for the Lang. I do know about the DBQ's though, as they're also on the W. His. test, which I bombed. </p>
<p>I might retry both,m but most likely just the Lang. test, since my schedule is packed with all AP's, for which I'll probably get a prep book each.</p>
<p>"The synthesis essay is rather like the USH document based question. You'll have a 15 minute reading time to look through 5 or 6 passages, then 40 minutes to write an essay, citing information from the reading. It might be hard without the benefit of a year of class."</p>
<p>I don't see why the English Language exam consists of a DBQ related to American History (?) I've seen the sample "synthesis" on the CB site and I just can't understand why an English exam needs to cover a social studies area (?) Again I'm a little confused how does History have anything to do the course description (???)</p>
<p>You missed the point of his post. He was not saying that the English Lang test had a DBQ section that was based on american history, but rather that the two types of sections are similar. To the best of my understanding, he is saying that the US history AP test has a DBQ part that is similar to the DBQ part in the english AP. I took AP world and know that the DBQ part was really easy. I self studied and recieved a 4. The DBQ was the easiest of the three essays. The thematic one was the hardest in my opinion, but I think this was due to the fact that I did not take the class but rather read/memorized a prep book. And used a friends outlines that she made from the reading.</p>
<p>From what I heard, the new AP Eng. Lang test will have more emphasis on proper citation and such with new MC questions and a DBQ. That, imho, is much easier to study for than say...the difference between a sardonic, a sarcastic, and an ironic tone in the works of shakespeare...blah blah blah. (yeah my AP eng. lang teacher was a bit nuts, but she made sure we were 130% prepared lol)</p>
<p>DeafeningHorn: gl on the retakes and your next year's APs, don't kill yourself over them ;)</p>