Tips for Self-studying APUSH

I just want to preface this by saying that if a thread like mine already exists (which is astronomically likely), please link me to it.

I’m a junior and my school doesn’t offer an APUSH course but they do offer the test in May. There is an Honors USH class that I’m currently taking, but my teacher made it clear that while it’s graded at the college level, they don’t follow the AP curriculum and there would need to be some fairly substantial outside studying on my part.

Nevertheless, a good portion of students take it each year and usually do well (4’s and 5’s). And I’ve done very well in all my History classes before so I think I have what it takes to do well on the test. But I still think I’ll need to do some degree of self-studying to prepare myself.

So my questions are, what do I do and when do I start. None of my teachers could offer me much advice on preparing for the exam since they don’t teach AP anymore. How should I go about studying for it? I’m getting a prep book, but how do I use it? Should self-studying for this test be a consistent thing or is it ok if I maybe look at the book sometimes but save the intense studying for February, April, and March? (The latter would be ideal for me just because I don’t want to have to consistently carve out time to read a textbook, but if consistent study is recommended, then I’ll make it work.)

Aside from those questions, are there any other tips I should know for the exam and self-studying? What will be the hardest part of this process? What will be the hardest content I learn? I should mention that my Honors USH class definitely does in-depth analysis but doesn’t focus too much on the actual names, dates, places, etc. What will this mean for me? Valuable resources, perhaps online?

Hi! I am also taking AP US History as an international student (Canada) this year! Based on the research I’ve been doing (which is how I found this post), we should purchase 2 prep books to fully prepare for the exam (Princeton Review and one of your choice, I’ve been using Barron’s). I recommend you try consistently studying but in increasing increments. I’m planning to block it like this, November/December = 1 hour/week, January/February = 2 hours/week, March/April = 3 hours/week, May = 4 hours/week. If you are planning to forego studying until March you will need to do a higher amount of weekly studying for all three months. The AP US History exam is at the beginning of the month so there won’t be much time to study during May.