AP United States History textbooks are very thick and contain thousands of names, dates, places, people, and events. If all of these facts had an equal chance of appearing on your Advanced Placement United States History (APUSH) exam, studying would be a nightmare. Where would you begin? What would you emphasize? Is there any information you can safely omit? Or must you study everything?
Fortunately, preparing for the APUSH exam does not have to be a nightmare. By studying efficiently and strategically, you can score a 4 or a 5 on the exam. This book will help you understand and use the following seven keys for success:
1. Understanding the APUSH Scale
Many students believe they must make close to a perfect score to receive a 5. Nothing could be further from the truth. Each APUSH exam contains a total of 180 points—90 from the multiple-choice and 90 from the free-response questions. Here is the score range from the 2006 Released Exam:
Score Range |
AP Grade |
Minimum Percent Right |
111-180 |
5 |
62 percent |
91-110 |
4 |
51 percent |
76-90 |
3 |
42 percent |
57-75 |
2 |
32 percent |
0-56 |
1 |
31 percent |
This chart is not a misprint. As is clearly shown, you can achieve a 5 by correctly answering just 62 percent of the questions and a 4 by correctly answering just 51 percent of the questions!
2. Understanding the APUSH Topical Outline
Many students believe that members of the APUSH exam development committee have the freedom to write any question they wish. This widespread belief is not true. APUSH test writers use a detailed topical outline that tells them what they can ask and what they cannot ask. Believe it or not, the topical outline is freely available. You can see it in the AP U.S. History Course Description Booklet.
Every question on your APUSH exam can be linked to a specific point in the topical outline. For example, many students were caught by surprise when the 2006 exam included a Document-Based Essay Question (DBQ) on Republican Motherhood. They should not have been surprised. Topic 5—"The Early Republic, 1789-1815"— specifically includes the topic, "Republican Motherhood and education for women."
3. Understanding the Importance of the Released Exams
The College Board has released APUSH exams for the years 1984, 1988, 1996, 2001, and 2006. In addition, they provided an online exam for all teachers who participated in the AP course audit. Taken together, these six exams contain 520 released multiple-choice questions. These questions can be used to understand the priorities and patterns of the APUSH test writers. For example, no specific dates and only three military battles (Saratoga, Antietam, and Pearl Harbor) have appeared on the exam. Instead, the questions cluster around highly specific topics such as the Monroe Doctrine and broad themes such as immigration.
4. Understanding the Importance of Key Topics
A content analysis of multiple-choice questions on the 2006 and 2001 released exams reveals important clusters of questions on these five key topics:
Topic |
2006 Exam |
2001 Exam |
African American History |
11 questions |
21 questions |
Key Terms |
6 questions |
5 questions |
Women's History |
6 questions |
5 questions |
Supreme Court Cases |
5 questions |
4 questions |
Vietnam War |
3 questions |
2 questions |
These five topics generated 31 multiple-choice questions on the 2006 exam and 37 multiple-choice questions on the 2001 exam. Since each multiple-choice question is worth 1.125 points, these five topics were worth 34.87 points on the 2006 exam and 41.62 points on the 2001 exam. Remember, you only need a minimum of 111 points to earn a 5 and 91 points to earn a 4. These five topics and the multiple- choice questions they generated would put you well on your way toward earning a 4 or a 5.
5. Understanding the Overlap Between the Multiple-Choice Questions and the Free-Response Questions
Both the multiple-choice questions and the free-response questions are taken from the topical outline in the Course Description Booklet As a result, studying for the multiple- choice questions is tantamount to studying for the free- response questions. Most students fail to grasp the significance of this point. Since the multiple-choice questions are highly predictable, so are the free-response questions. The two types of questions are, in fact, highly related, since they both come from the same topical outline.
6. Using Your Crash Course to Build a Winning Strategy
This Crash Course book is based on a careful analysis of the Course Description topical outline and the released questions. Chapter 2 contains 41 key terms that you absolutely, positively have to know. Chapters 3-21 provide you with a detailed chronological review of key points derived from the Course Description's topical outline. And finally, Chapters 22-32 give you detailed information about key themes and facts.
If you have the time, review the entire book. This is desirable, but not mandatory. The chapters can be studied in any order. Each chapter provides you with a digest of key information that is repeatedly tested. Acts of Congress, Supreme Court cases, and works of literature that have never been asked about have been omitted. Unlike most review books, the digests are not meant to be exhaustive. Instead, they are meant to focus your attention on the vital material you must study.
Focus your attention on building a coalition of topics that will generate the points you need to score a 4 or a 5. African American history, women's history, and the key vocabulary terms are the essential building blocks of any successful coalition. For example, these three topics generated 90 points on the 2006 exam—enough to earn a 4!
Although they are important, the great triumvirate (African American history, women's history, and key terms) is just the beginning. The Vietnam War (Chapter 32), key Supreme Court cases and trials (Chapter 26), and immigration and migration (Chapter 30) arevery focused topics that typically generate three to five questions each.
Many students also find it useful to use the chronological chapters to concentrate on a specific period of time. Keep in mind that two essay questions are taken from before the Civil War, and two are taken from after the Civil War.
The multiple-choice questions are distributed as follows:
Pre-Columbian to 1789 |
20 percent or 16 questions |
1790-1914 |
45 percent or 36 questions |
1915-Present |
35 percent or 28 questions |
As you devise your chronological strategy, keep in mind that very few questions cover the period before the founding of Jamestown, and very few questions cover the period from 1970 to the present. If you are pressed for time, both periods can be safely skipped.
7. Using College Board and REA Materials to Supplement Your Crash Course
Your Crash Course contains everything you need to know to score a 4 or a 5. You should, however, supplement it with materials provided by the College Board. The AP United States History Course Description Booklet, the 2006 AP United States History Released Exam, and the 2001 AP United States History Released Exam can all be ordered from the College Board's Online Store. In addition, the College Board's AP Central site contains a wealth of materials, including essay questions, DBQs, and sample student essays from the past several years. And finally, REA's AP U.S. History test preparation guide (8th edition) contains excellent narrative chapters that supplement the Crash Course chapters.