<p>I have a Senior who is taking this class and absolutely loathes it. There is no handbook or printout that covers what they are learning, according to my son. He has an overload of essay writing each week but never gets any of his work back with commentary. </p>
<p>He normally hates to write anything, but he slogs away at it. Being a minimalist naturally, it is hard for him to write a lot. (I am the type that always writes too much. Filling space is no problem for me.) He always believes he has written enough.</p>
<p>One his problems is speed. He is a very slow reader, then has to cogitate about what he has read before writing. He just had his mid-term results back and had the lowest score–a 29. He says he couldn’t finish and the teacher pulled the paper out of his hand. I asked him if he understood the class and this particular test. Yes, he claims, but it was new material and it takes time to analyze.</p>
<p>He’s been doing really well in his other classes, but this one has him developing ulcers. He hates it THAT much and can’t bear to take another semester. I tried talking to the GC after sending an e-mail to this teacher and getting no response earlier in the year. She simply raved on about how the kids found his class to be so animated last year. Ack.</p>
<p>So, we have a guy who is a slow reader, a minimalist writer and no regular feedback. I’m worried about my kid’s poor performance on this exam affecting his college choices even though he had an A to that point according to posted grades. Any advice?</p>
<p>Drop it or transfer out of it. Life is too short!!! It will not impact his college acceptances to transfer out of it, but he could get his admission revoked with a C or D in the class (if it is a selective college.) Not to mention - if he hates it, why let him suffer?</p>
<p>if your son really is a slow reader and a minimalist writer, maybe the ap language exam is not right for him at all. i mean, there is poetry/prose analysis in the multiple choice section. then three essays on new material in the writing section…</p>
<p>As a student in AP Comp (which I think is the same, if not a very similar class), I have to say that this is honestly the hardest english class I’ve ever taken. The skills are soo tough to pick up after years of random rules thrown out by teachers. Before this year, I was taught the standard five paragraph format, length was important, never use “you” or “I”, must have clear introduction and thesis statement, and a conclusion as well… etc. This year, if I write an intro and conclusion, I get negative comments about being redundant, if I use “you” or “I” it is okay. In addition, short and more concise essays are encouraged (cut out the fluff) and… it is just completely different. Just today I had my midterm, and it is sooo tought to get through rhetorical analysis of four passage and 50+ multiple choice in an hour, and then right away write analytical essays for three passages in 2 hours (40 minutes for each essay –> long compared to SAT writing, but SO much planning has to go in it). I really sympathize with your son and while I do have to mention there are a few (not very good) review books out there, chances are he is simply not a writer. I just hope I manage a good score on the AP test so I don’t have to spend another semester struggling through rhetorical analysis. It might be best to drop the class and admit that it is simply not for him… good luck!</p>
<p>okay Dawn, i took the language and comp exam last year and got a 5. my old teacher was an ap grader. and i know for a fact that the use of “I” and “you” is looked down upon. but redundancy is also frowned upon.</p>
<p>My daughter is/was in a similar situation in her AP English lit class – she told me that she was so stressed out that she was unable to sleep at night and unabe to concentrate, obsessing about the AP class during all her other classes. Her school has a policy that no one is allowed to drop an AP class. At my suggestion, my d. went to our family doctor to discuss the class situation, and got a note to take to school to support a request to drop the class for medical reasons. That achieved the desired result – permission to drop - but unfortunately it turned out that there it was not possible to get into another Senior English course with her schedule… so she has ended up with the decision to (a) stick with the class, and (b) blow off worrying about the grade. </p>
<p>In other words, the only way for my daughter to maintain sanity is to give up on the idea of getting an A. There are some very unfair and unexplicable grading practices going on in the classroom that I won’t get into here – but the basic idea is that she is one of the top students at her high school and writes exceptionally well; the class should not be a struggle for her.</p>
<p>So I don’t have a solution – I’m just posting to to let you know you are not alone. </p>
<p>I don’t know what the solution is. I think that teachers in some AP courses are unnecessarily demanding – I don’t know what their rationale is, but I do know that too much pressure is not conducive to learning for anyone. Challenge is good, but not when it overwhelms.</p>
<p>“Challenge is good, but not when it overwhelms.”</p>
<p>How does a teacher assess this with 30+ students in a class? It may well be that the course is appropriately challenging, but not for your child. An AP class is supposed to replicate a comparable college course. If the teacher is teaching to this level (and I have no idea if that is, in fact, being done), then he/she is doing the right thing. It may well be that some students are overwhelmed, but that does not necessarily mean that the teacher is being overwhelmingly challenging.</p>
<h2>If students take an AP course, they (and their parents) must understand the rigor of the course.</h2>
<p>“I think that teachers in some AP courses are unnecessarily demanding.”</p>
<p>That may well be. There is a fine line between being appropriately challenging and unnecessarily challenging. It takes a while to develop just the right touch. But how many times do we hear of “failing schools” that aren’t challenging our kids enough? How many times do we hear of how far behind our kids are compared to kids in other countries? Teachers get so many mixed messages that it drives them crazy.</p>
<p>Thanks for the replies. Earlier in the year, I tried to help him out by using the 'Net and looking for rhetorical devices, etc. I can’t believe how difficult it is to find information beyond just a few devices. There are loads of AP Rhet Anal course teacher pages though–just no help!</p>
<p>Our school is pretty podunk and is really pushing the the students to take AP classes to raise its’ creds. The principal doesn’t want any AP droppers. Son is somehow signed up for AP Spanish and knows he can’t do the workload for both the lang and Spanish (he knows the teacher from previous classes). I have to go in and beg the principal to let him out of Spanish now. Sigh. And his college choices are very competitive-but we haven’t heard back yet. Double sigh.</p>
<p>I really think that the AP thing has gotten out of hand. I had an interesting conversation with a high school history teacher last night – she teaches in one of the top school districts in the area. I asked her if she taught APUSH - she said she used to, but she didn’t like teaching it because there wasn’t time to really delve into issues or explore them in depth. Too much information to cram in. </p>
<p>At least at my daughter’s school, it seems like the teachers go kind of overboard with the AP classes – my son went to a different high school and never had the same load with his AP classes. My daughter’s school has better test scores, is ranked higher in the California system for grading school performance… but now that she is finishing senior year and I look back, I feel very strongly that my son got a much better education in a less competitive environment. D. is so busy taking in information and regurgitating for her teachers that she really doesn’t have time to integrate or reflect on what she is learning. The thing I hate about her AP Lit class is that it seems like the teacher is dead set on making sure that the process of literary analysis is so painful and the volume of reading so onerous that these kids will never want to read for pleasure again in their lives. </p>
<p>Fortunately, my daughter had the sense last year to opt out of AP Comp - she took the AP exam anyway and scored a 4. She spent maybe an hour with an AP review book, just reviewing terminology – and she did better than most of the kids in her high school who took the AP course.</p>