AP U.S

AP U.S. Review Packet

  • Informational material compiled by Keith Wood, Margaret Bramlett, and Lizz Bramlett.
  • Activities are from the Center for Learning.

Planning Your Score Goal

  • Formula to estimate AP exam score (not exact, not sanctioned by the AP Board):
    1. Multiply correct multiple-choice answers by 1.1251.125.
    2. Subtract 0.250.25 for each incorrect multiple-choice answer.
    3. Multiply DBQ score (1-9) by 4.54.5 and add to the total.
    4. Multiply each FRQ score (1-9) by 2.752.75 and add to the total.
  • Approximate score ranges:
    • 3 = 65-73 points
    • 4 = 100 points
    • 5 = 117-122 points

Reviewing The Material

  • Recommended steps for AP U.S. exam review (order of importance):
    1. Review the format of the AP exam.
    2. Study unit charts in the textbook (6 units).
    3. Read unit summaries in the textbook.
    4. Learn information on charts and lists in the packet and from the school year.
    5. Do the activities in the packet.
    6. Take practice tests and review activities to find weaknesses.
    7. Review lecture notes from class.

AP U.S. Exam Overview

  • Test day essentials: watch, multiple pens, multiple pencils.
  • Test duration: 3 hours and 15 minutes.
  • Final score (1-5) is based on performance compared to other students.
  • It's normal not to know everything on the test.
Section One: Multiple Choice
  • 55 Minutes, 80 Questions, 50% of Score
  • A. Question Spread
    1. Questions divided by difficulty level.
    2. About 17% cover 1600-1789.
    3. About 50% cover 1790-1914.
    4. About 33% cover 1915-present.
    5. Typically, 35% on political themes.
    6. Typically, 35% on social change.
    7. Typically, 15% on diplomatic relations and international affairs.
    8. Typically, 10% on economic themes.
    9. Typically, 5% on cultural and intellectual themes.
  • B. What Isn’t on the Test
    1. Obscure Trivia
    2. Military History
Section Two: Free-Response Questions
  • 130 Minutes, 3 Essays, 50% of Score
  • A. General Advice
    1. 15-minute mandatory reading period: plan essays.
    2. Read each question multiple times to ensure understanding.
    3. Most questions have two parts: underline them.
    4. Use standard five-paragraph form.
    5. Thesis statement is most important:
      • a. Put it in the first paragraph.
      • b. Make it explicit and detailed: answer the essay question in a single sentence.
      • c. Underline it.
Document-Based Question (DBQ)
  • 45 Minutes
    1. Most important question on the test.
    2. Counts as 45% of the free-response section score.
    3. Take notes on the documents as you read them.
    4. Try to find bias in as many documents as possible.
    5. Remember that the bulk of the essay should come from your own knowledge. If your essay is based only on the documents, it will not earn a high score.
Two Regular FRQ Questions
  • 70 Minutes
    1. Together these count as 55% of the free-response section score.
    2. You are given two groups of two questions each. You must select and answer one question from each group.
      • a. Group 1: Before the Civil War
      • b. Group 2: After the Civil War
    3. Pack as many relevant facts as possible into the essays to show that you know the material. Be explicit. Give examples for everything you can. Being vague is a death sentence.

Famous American Authors

  • James Fennimore Cooper
    • First great American author; wrote in the early 19th century; wrote The Last of the Mohicans; popularized naturalist literature; explored the line between civilization and nature.
  • Washington Irving
    • Another famous American author writing in early 19th century; often wrote about New York or the Hudson River Valley; created “Rip Van Winkle” and “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.”
  • Ralph Waldo Emerson
    • Transcendentalist essayist and philosopher from New England; icon of the Romantic Age; wanted people to embrace change and value individuality; wrote “Self Reliance.”
  • Henry David Thoreau
    • Follower of Emerson and a believer in the power of the individual to triumph over evil social pressures; wrote “Civil Disobedience” and Walden.
  • Nathaniel Hawthorne
    • Romantic Age writer of the mid-19th century; often wrote about colonial New England; most famous for House of Seven Gables and The Scarlet Letter.
  • Edgar Allan Poe
    • Romantic Age writer and poet; wrote about the dark side of mid-19th-century society; famous short stories include “The Tell-Tale Heart” and “The Pit and the Pendulum.”
  • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
    • Poet of the mid-19th century; wrote “Hiawatha” and “Paul Revere’s Ride.”
  • Herman Melville
    • Writer of the late 19th century; most books had a nautical theme; wrote Moby Dick.
  • Walt Whitman
    • Romantic poet and essayist of the mid-19th century; most famous work is Leaves of Grass, a free verse collection reveling in emotions and sensations.
  • Harriet Beecher Stowe
    • Northeastern political writer; her international hit Uncle Tom’s Cabin dramatized slave society and became a weapon used by abolitionists to alert people to the evils of slavery.
  • Mark Twain
    • Perhaps the most famous American author; rooted in the realist tradition, Twain used humor and satire to dramatize life during the Gilded Age; works include Huckleberry Finn, Tom Sawyer, The Innocents Abroad.
  • Henry James
    • A contemporary of Twain, James depicted the complexities of characters in sophisticated post-bellum society; works include The Portrait of a Lady and The Bostonians.
  • Upton Sinclair
    • Used novels to alert readers to social ills; The Jungle sensationalized and dramatized the lack of safety and sanitary conditions in the meatpacking industry.
  • Edith Wharton
    • First great female writer of the modern era; her 1920 book The Age of Innocence details the vanishing world of “old money” New York society.
  • F. Scott Fitzgerald
    • The most famous of the Jazz Age authors; hard-working and hard-partying; chronicled the reckless abandon and spiritual hollowness of the twenties; famous works include The Great Gatsby and This Side of Paradise.
  • Sinclair Lewis
    • A contemporary of Fitzgerald; his work Main Street focused on exposing the provinciality and middle-class meanness of small-town society.
  • William Faulkner
    • Described complexities of life in the South; first to succeed with the modern technique of multiple points of view; famous works include The Sound and the Fury and Absalom, Absalom.
  • John Steinbeck
    • Most important of the Depression Era authors; most famous book The Grapes of Wrath chronicled the Joad family's migration from Oklahoma to California.
  • Ernest Hemingway
    • Famed for his hard living, his masculine prose, and his spare writing style; wrote A Farewell to Arms, The Sun Also Rises, and The Old Man and the Sea.
  • J.D. Salinger
    • Reclusive author; careful and studious style; most famous work is The Catcher in the Rye, a story about youth and disillusionment in postwar America.
  • Jack Kerouac
    • Most famous of the