Your APUSH exam will begin with a 55-minute section containing 80 multiple-choice questions. These questions typically begin with the founding of Jamestown in 1607 and end with Reaganomics in the early 1980s. There may be a general question or two about major demographic trends since the 1980s.
Each multiple-choice question is worth 1.125 points. The 80 multiple-choice questions are thus worth a total of 90 points or half of the 180 points that are on the APUSH exam. Beginning with the May 2011 administration of the APUSH exam, the College Board has changed the scoring of the multiple-choice section. The score achieved on the multiple-choice section of the exam will be based on the number of questions answered correctly. Points will no longer be deducted for incorrect answers or unanswered questions.
With this change, the "guessing penalty" is eliminated, but don't waste precious time. If you do not have any idea how to answer a question, skip it and move on. If you can eliminate two or more answers, you should use the process of elimination to take an educated guess.
The multiple-choice questions are vital to achieving a high score. Although they account for just under one-third of the APUSH exam's total time, they are worth 50 percent of the exam's total points. Never forget that on the 2006 exam you only needed 111 points to score a 5 and 91 points to score a 4.
The multiple-choice questions cover very predictable topics. At least one-fourth of the questions will be devoted to African American and women's history. Another ten questions will cover key terms and key Supreme Court cases and trials. In addition, most exams devote four to six questions to charts, political cartoons, pictures, and maps. These graphic questions are particularly straightforward, since all of the information you need is provided in the chart, cartoon, picture, or map.
Chapters 2-32 in this book contain all of the information you will need to ace the multiple-choice questions. If you carefully review these chapters, you should be able to correctly answer at least 60 of the 80 multiple-choice questions. If you miss 12 questions and leave 8 blank, this will give you a raw score of 67.50 points. You will then only need another 43.50 points to score a 5 and just 23.50 points to score a 4!
Most APUSH multiple-choice questions are straightforward. However, test writers do use two formats that require closer examination:
"EXCEPT" QUESTIONS
Between six and eight questions on each exam will provide you with four answers that are correct and one answer that is incorrect. Known as EXCEPT questions, these problems ask you to find the answer that does not fit or is incorrect. The best strategy is to treat these questions as if they were five-part true-false questions. Simply go through the question and label each answer choice "true" or "false." The correct answer is the one that is false. Here are three examples:
1. Booker T. Washington stressed the importance of all of the following EXCEPT
(A) pursuing vocational education
(B) developing racial solidarity
(C) avoiding public protests
(D) integrating restaurants and schools
(E) gaining Black political power
Answer choices A, B, C, and D are all true. Since only E is false, it is the correct answer. Booker T. Washington advocated a policy of racial accommodation and economic self-help.
He stressed the importance of avoiding a struggle for political power.
2. All of the following reformers are correctly paired with the reform issue with which they were most involved EXCEPT
(A) Ida B. Wells ... lynching in the South
(B) Betty Friedan ... gender roles
(C) Dorothea Dix ... women's suffrage
(D) Margaret Sanger ... birth control
(E) Rachel Carson ... overuse of chemical insecticides
Answer choices A, B, D, and E are all true. Since only C is false, it is the correct answer. Dorothea Dix focused her attention on reforming the condition and treatment of the mentally ill. She was not actively involved in the fight for women's rights.
3. All of the following were accomplishments of the New Deal EXCEPT
(A) desegregating the armed forces
(B) granting labor the right to organize and bargain collectively
(C) establishing short-term programs to reduce unemployment
(D) reforming aspects of the nation's banking system and stock market
(E) creating a Social Security system financed by a payroll tax on both employees and employers
Answer choices B, C, D, and E are all true. Since only A is false, it is the correct answer. President Truman desegregated the armed forces in 1948.
QUOTE QUESTIONS
Between three to four questions on each exam will provide you with a quote and ask you to link the quote to a key person, term, or document. Many of the quotes are well known, while others are not. Regardless of whether the quote is famous or obscure, it will have a key word, phrase, or definition that will clearly establish its purpose. Your job is to find the key parts of the quote and connect them to the answer. Here are three examples:
1. "The very basis of our individual rights and freedoms rests upon the certainty that the President and the Executive Branch of government will support and insure the carrying out of the decisions of the federal courts, even, when necessary, with all the means at the President's command."
This statement was most likely made by which of the following Presidents and under what circumstances?
(A) Andrew Jackson, as he sent troops to enforce the Supreme Court's decision in Worcester v. Georgia
(B) Theodore Roosevelt, as he sent troops to end the Anthracite Coal Strike
(C) Franklin Roosevelt, as he sent troops to evict the Bonus Expeditionary Force
(D) Dwight Eisenhower, as he sent troops to Little Rock to enforce desegregation orders
(E) John F. Kennedy, as he sent troops to assist Governor Wallace's promise to block the admission of Black students to the University of Alabama
The key phrase in this quote states that the President "will support and insure the carrying out of the decisions of the federal courts." You therefore should look for an answer in which a president used troops to carry out a court order. Choice A can be eliminatedsince Andrew Jackson refused to carry out the Supreme Court's decision in Worcester v. Georgia. Choice B can be eliminated since Theodore Roosevelt used arbitration to settle the Anthracite Coal Strike. Choice C can be eliminated since Herbert Hoover, not Franklin Roosevelt, used force to evict the Bonus Marchers. And finally, choice E can be eliminated since John F. Kennedy did not send troops to support Governor Wallace. President Kennedy did send troops to Oxford, Mississippi. Only choice D is correct.
2. "When the people elected Tammany, they knew just what they were doin'. We didn't put up any false pretenses. We didn't go in for humbug civil service and all that rot. We stood as we have always stood, for rewardin' the men that won the victory. ... When we go in, we fire every anti-Tammany man from office that can be fired under the law."
In the statement above, a New York City politician defends
(A) the Electoral College
(B) the system of checks and balances
(C) Civil Service reform
(D) initiative, recall, and referendum
(E) the spoils system
The key phrase in this quote states, "We stood as we have always stood, for rewardin' the men that won the victory." Rewarding the victors would clearly indicate that the New York City politician is defending the spoils system. Choice E is the answer.
3. "Our policy is directed not against any country or doctrine, but against hunger, poverty, desperation, and chaos. Its purpose should be the revival of a working economy in the world so as to permit the emergence of political and social conditions in which free institutions can exist. ... Any government that is willing to assist in the task of recovery will find full cooperation, I am sure, on the part of the United States government."
The passage expresses the rationale for
(A) the Monroe Doctrine
(B) the Open Door Policy
(C) Dollar Diplomacy
(D) the Marshall Plan
(E) the Camp David Accords
The key phrase in this quote states that "Its purpose should be the revival of a working economy in the world so as to permit the emergence of political and social conditions in which free institutions can exist." The goal of reviving the global economy in the name of promoting free institutions clearly indicates that the passage is taken from the Marshall Plan. Choice D is the correct answer.