General Test Structure
The AP test is 3 hours, 5
minutes long and is divided into two sections. The first section consists of 80
multiple-choice questions and lasts 55 minutes. The second section (called free
response) includes the document-based question and two additional essay
questions. Students get a total of 130 minutes to work on this section,
including the mandatory 15 minutes of reading/planning time. There is a short
break between the two sections of the test, so you CANNOT start on the essays if
you finish the multiple-choice questions early. Each of the two halves of the
test is worth half of the final AP grade. The Document-Based Question is 45% of
the free response section grade, and each of the other two essays is 27.5%.
The AP test covers all of
American history from the European exploration to the present, but most of the
questions deal with the 1800s-1900s. The historical make-up of the questions is
as follows:
17% - European exploration -
50% -
33% -
The AP test covers the
following topics in American history:
35% - politics, government,
and laws
35% - social movements and
social change
15% - wars, treaties, and
international affairs
10% - economic history and
technology
5% - art and culture
AP test scores range from 5
(highest) to 1 (lowest). Depending upon your school, either 2 or 3 is the
cut-off for college credit. AP tests are graded on a curve, so there is no way
to determine exactly how many points you need for a 5, for a 4, for a 3, etc.
In general, the grade curve on an AP test is not as high as on a regular test
(rather than needing 90%-100% for a 5, you might need only 75% or above).
Multiple-Choice Questions
There are 80 multiple-choice
questions and a time limit of 55 minutes, which works out to about 40 seconds
per question. You get one point for each correct answer on this section, and
lose a fraction of a point for each wrong answer. You neither gain nor lose any
points for questions you skip.
To receive a grade of 3, you
must answer about 60 percent of the questions correctly, in addition to doing
acceptable work on the broader questions in the free-response section.
Document Based Question
60 minutes are allotted to the
document-based question. The first 15 minutes are for reading the question and
documents and planning your essay. The last 45 minutes are for writing the
essay. During 15 minutes, you can (and probably should) take a look at the next
four essay questions and start thinking about which two you would like to
answer. However, you cannot start writing your essay until the 15 minutes are
up.
The D.B.Q. question consists
of a statement and a time period, such as, "To what extent did the status
of Blacks in
There are generally nine
documents following the question, all of which date from the time period of the
question. You can choose which to use, but you should use most of them. Most of
the documents are short written excerpts, about 1-3 paragraphs in length. They
may be parts of laws, court case rulings, official declarations, presidential
addresses, editorials, speeches, books, or personal letters. Not all of the
documents will be written excerpts; generally a D.B.Q. will include at least
one or two political cartoons, pictures, charts,
graphs, or maps.
When answering the D.B.Q., you
should refer to the documents and also include historical details from your own
knowledge. The graders look primarily for a thoughtful thesis statement, sound
historical support, and good use of the documents to support your answer.
The Free-Response Section
There are four additional
essay questions following the document-based question, numbered 2 through 5.
You must answer two of the four questions (either 2 or 3, and either 4 or 5).
Which question you answer in each pair is entirely up to you.
This section of the test is 70 minutes long; it is recommended that you spend 5
minutes planning and 30 minutes writing each essay.
The two essay questions in
each pair ask about different time periods and cover different aspects of
history.