Prosepective AP Teacher

I was lucky and had a great Ap teacher. the one thing you have to stress is lots of practice MC tests, free response essays, key terms, and most importantly the DBQ. the only thing i wish my teacher got more involved with was the DBQ writing process. we also did a few debates, but i didn't enjoy them that much. group projects were always a good way to retain info and have fun with my friends. the most helpful thing to do is to give really in depth lectures on the current chapter, but also force the students to read the book. if they just listen to your lectures on the chapter they will be missing so much and probably fail the test.
Best of luck teaching,
Jake

In my class we didn't focus much on any type of essays. Which definitely would have been helpful. We did do quarterly projects that amounted to over 1/3 of our grade for that quarter. We had to do an analysis of a book, another one at the end analyzing 3 books, an analysis of a film, and a student led class on any topic of our choice. That was my favorite project as it allowed me to "strut my stuff" on a topic that I really loved and understood. I would also suggest making the class as interesting as possible. My teacher tells a lot of little factual information that you wouldn't find in a textbook, stuff that keeps people interested. Sometimes we do go off on tangents that distract us for a while and keeps us from the book, but the class atmosphere was good.
Another HUGE recommendation..... when it gets down to crunch-time on the AP exam, have review sessions. My teacher won't hold any after school sessions.... bummer.

i lucked out and got a really good teacher. He's hard, but really good. he didnt build up the difficulty as the year went by, he set it as hard as its going to get from the beginning. it was a little bit of a strugle, but it helped in the long run (i think). Also any movies/overhead pictures that you could show (movies meaning documentaries, or a short clip from some primary source) are always interesting. Also try to use alot of primary sources, they really make history alot easier to understand when you understand that the people in it are REAL people.

i agree with cocunitcreampie, review sessions help alot. Even if alot of students dont come, if its just 4 or 5 it helps the students ALOT. Some of the things i remember most came from afterschool reviews where it was me, one other kid, and the teacher. It really helps.

Good luck with everything.

US Teach wrote:I want to thank you for the time you have taken to respond to my post. It is helpful and I appreciate it. Please keep them coming. I am going to an AP workshop this summer and begin teaching my first AP class this fall. Good luck on the exam!
Give them plenty of practice in prepration for essays, dbqs, and the mc test. When reviewing, give plenty of time for debates and talking. Also remember, people learn differetnly, so give not only test, but some fun, take home projects too.

Also, make your class feel like you care for them, like your their friend. My teahcer takes us out to eat all the time and pays for it and jokes around with us alot. He even took us on a overnight fieldtrip to Springfield, IL the day after the Lincoln Museum opened. (We live about a couple hours away from their.)

Hope that helps some.

My best teacher this year is AP US hist. teacher. It makes me sad that the course is over cos it was such a great class. He ONLY gave a very thorough lecture in every events,decades, election, etc, put some humor in the class that sometimes we just laughing the whole time. IT didn't feel like a class but like a conversation. We have project every month for every president--->very helpful. But other than that he didn't give much homework except reading. That's all. But everything he did was to give us the best preparation. Though I think it's better if he keep outlines for the lecture for people who absent. Cos it's hard to catch up when we're doing 20 years of history in one class. oh, one last thing that I think the most helpful is the test. His test is awfully hard. if you could pass, you're very lucky, cos very few people could pass with comfortable margin ^_^. He put old AP MC and essay sometimes DBQ, so he never make his own test. Also we're put under AP test condition in every test so you're getting used to it.
Best of Luck and be the best AP teacher ^__^

I strongly agree with the advice from the posts above. Another thing to keep in mind.. After your students have finished reading a chapter, have a discussion about it (analyse events, etc.) and give them a quiz consisting of short free responses and multiple choices. Also have themes when giving out notes, that always helps. My teacher never gave us any projects to do, so what we did was focus mainly on the textbook chapters. When it comes down to the last two months before the AP exam, hold mandatory review sessions, give them practice MC tests, DBQs, and FR essays. Oh! And review books! If you happen to get any, lend them out to the students so that they can study on their own, too. Don't forget to ease the tension and have some fun, too!

I think its great that you would come to ask for the students perspectives :)

Best of luck to you,

-Chris

One thing that my teacher did that really helped was give us a DBQ almost every other test. Then he would take the highest grade and read it, tell what the student could have done better, and what he did right. It helped me a lot. One thing that he didnt do which I wish he had was help with time management skills. We would have almost all the time we needed to finish the DBQ, so I found myself spending too much time on it on the AP test.

Please i need your help

The American Declaration of independence occurred exactly 169 years between what other two major events in american history