Trying to prepare for the AP Lit exam can be very stressful and aggravating. When I decided I was planning on taking the AP exam, I had absolutely no idea what I was signing up for. However, as the year has gone on I've become more confident in my essays and multiple choice.
Practice
Studying outside of class is critical for the AP Exam. Personally, I don't like watching videos on "how to study" or studying techniques off of a random web page. I like to study by looking at a piece of paper and writing my thoughts down. For me, the most helpful worksheet I've been given the "AP Essay Writing Strategy." Not only did it allow me to put my thoughts and questions on paper, it taught me the strategy "Rule of Two" which I've tried to use on almost every essay since learning about it.
Although I hate watching videos about the AP Exam, the most helpful one that I actually enjoy came from a past AP Lit student. Not only is it funny, it gives good reminders about small important things we might forget about while preparing for the AP Exam, for example eat a good breakfast, sleep well the night before, and don't over study.
For me, the multiple choice is the most dreadful, painful, awful part of the test. Every time we do a practice for it, my mind says "what the ****" and I freeze. Although I hate it so much, I've learned strategies that have helped me become more confident.
1.Annotate: Since English 1 I have always annotated--I just didn't know there was an actual right way to do it. I would annotate things like "that's cool!" "or "wow I like that." I've learned what to annotate when reading a passage. I've learned to look for key words, make connections and ask questions. I always highlight the part in the passage that I'm talking about so it stands out to me. I've become more organized with my thinking and pushed myself to ask deeper question and think deeper thoughts while reading.
2. Read the questions first: Just like I said before, I annotate everything. Reading the questions and highlighting themes and key words I find while reading them. It helps me focus better when it comes to reading the passage--paying attention to themes for example. If you find a common theme in the questions, that is most likely going to be the theme of the passage. 3. Don't go in order: When answering questions, I personally like to skip all over the place. I may do the first two questions, and then the last two questions. Going in order makes me feel like I'm a robot and makes me stress out--thinking "I need to find the answer to question 2 before I move on to question 3." If you have a flow, just let it go.
Essay Practice
The essay part of the test for me is slightly less difficult. When I took my first AP essay, I didn't finish and my thoughts were all over the place. I've come up with different techniques that have helped me time better and organize better. 1. Plan/organize: At the beginning of the year, planning to me was writing a claim and calling it good. Over the year I've learned there's much more to it. I've learned that you should plan for each character you're going to talk about. You should write down themes to mentions in your writing, and write down different ideas that could work for your prompt and pick which one feels right to you. 2. Time Management: I'm still not 100% on time management, but I've come up with different ways to help me spread my time out to each essay. Having a few hours isn't a lot of time to write three essays. The most important thing to me when worrying about not having enough time, is reminding yourself to plan, but don't plan too much. Planning helps create a path for your essay. You save time trying to come up with a claim and finding themes when you start your writing. However, if you spend 20 minutes trying to plan you essay word for word, you're not going to have enough time. I give myself seven minutes for planning, and 30-40 minutes for writing. 3. Go with your gut: When trying to find out what you're going to write about for your free essay, don't try to push yourself past your limits. If you know that you can write a strong essay about how Gatsby's ruins love for himself, but you feel that writing about how Beloved destroys love and builds it again by reminding people of the past would make you sound smarter, write about Gatsby. If you don't feel confident in your writing, it is going to be unorganized and you will sound too forced.
as we go our SEPARATE ways...
I hope my advice for you has helped. Good luck on the test. Don't cry too much.