<p>I'm not a procrastinator, however I need to work more efficiently. I'm a freshman taking all honors classes and AP HUG. The AP textbook is longer than I'm used to, and I feel the need to take notes on everything since we can use our notes on the test. Does anyone have tips for cutting the workload down?</p>
<p>Oh and my AP HUG teacher has been going off topic a lot ( talking about bands and other odd things. He seems to assign a lot of tests ( chapter tests, vocab tests, free response, and open book free response tests every week or so.)</p>
<p>Read the book by sections, and then take down notes on the big ideas - my biggest problem with APUSH was that I actively wrote down notes as I read which meant that I ended up writing tedious, and often irrelevant, pages of notes. If your book is divided by chapters, and each chapter is divided into five sections, read the section in its entirety before even touching your pen/pencil, and then take notes on what you determine to be the most important things.</p>
<p>Mine talks about sports teams <em>sigh</em></p>
<p>But since I’m taking other APs, it’s easier to deal with. Try focusing on ‘whys’ and ‘hows’ rather than memorizing dates and people, and if you’re allowed to, highlight the book. There might be online material that you can print out and study from, as well. Try a google search- last year I found some really good notes scattered around online for my world history course.</p>
<p>I don’t have a “real” history class this year (I’m taking AP Economics), but for Honors World Geo, WHAP, and APUSH, I would have a word doc open and would type my notes as I read. After I finished reading, I would go back to my word doc and delete everything that wasn’t important. This worked really well for me in efficiency, because while I’m reading, everything seems important.</p>
<p>Other general tips when it comes to note-taking are to never use articles, never write complete sentences, use abbreviations whenever you can / come up with your own abbreviations, for APUSH / WHAP: don’t write the details of the actual war, just the main causes and effects, and try to curb verb usage.</p>
<p>Heather’s right.
Plus, I’m a freshman and the youngest in my class so taking this AP class was a risk. It’s a waste of time if he goes of topic.
I hope he gets better.
Thanks to everyone else!</p>