This summer I spend quite a few hours pouring over College Board guidance docs trying to get to know the four new FRQ structures. They are, in no particular order:
Each FRQ has an additional brief posting that has a link to the Prezi. You will find below the four videos and a copy of all of the FRQs I created for this project. Finally, there are several student back check rubrics at the end for you to use in class. I hope it helps you and your kids! Good luck! And special thanks to assistance from Dr. Terri Fine. The student self-check rubrics are adapted from materials created by Dr. Fine and College Board. (Any materials downloaded before 9/11/19 on the Q4 Student rubric have a glaring error. The tips section should read "Do not include contextualizing information or background before thesis." and Not "Do not include thesis." All apologies for confusion; I did not catch my error in my posting.)
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College Board's attention to Supreme Court cases is about to get a lot more regular and consistent as students will be forced to make good on their briefs of hundreds of cases. Veteran teachers can attest to the fact that we never really knew what to teach in SCOTUS cases... there were definite cases, sure, but we didn't know how the cases would be treated. Debate among teachers pitted the merits of briefing cases versus students just memorizing the outcomes of cases. Now we can anticipate that there is a regular and anticipated treatment of all 15 required Supreme Court cases. The standard practice still rewards teachers who choose to look at fan favorites or obscure gems, as students will need to know how to apply precedent established in the core 15 to unknowns. In this FRQ, students have four points up for grabs across three components:
Check out the prezi link or watch the video for all the info on how to tackle this FRQ. What do you think? Fun assessment or just so-so? Leave a comment below! College Board's Content Application FRQ is, in my opinion, the hardest and highest stakes FRQ. Even putting together this video was a bit challenging, but I do think that spending some time reviewing this sleeper of an essay prompt is really important. Aside from the fact that the FRQ is worth THREE POINTS. That is it. This means that when factored so it is evenly weighted against the other three FRQs, each point on this FRQ is worth far more than the other three. Your kids have to have this FRQ down pat. In essence, points are awarded for:
So kids will have to show mastery of up to three different scenarios, concepts, or processes. This requires close reading, clear and deliberate use of language, and lots of critical thinking. I envision a lot of 2s and 1s on this one. For that reason, I used a prompt that was easy to goof up to show kids how to focus their attention in the video and prezi introducing this skill. What do you think? Is this a piece of cake or a whale of a mountain? Feel free to leave comments below. The longest FRQ on the AP Gov exam is the Argumentation Essay. Borrowing from essay structures in APUSH and APWH, the argumentation is an exploration into great writing skills in the college course. I have so many assignments that require me to take a defendable position with well reasoned evidence. I am very happy to see my students required to write this easy-to-do essay in the AP Gov classroom, too. Continuity in skill sets with AP Gov reasoning skills helps students achieve more, as well as introducing my rookie governerds to these written expressions. This will probably require the most effort (6 points over four components) but has the biggest room for error, which I think is important to emphasize. Sitting down and taking a look at these skills, students need to:
A note about claim: If the claim is not a fully qualified and defensible thesis, meaning the student did not take a position, they are capped at earning one point: just B1. Another way of saying this: B2, B2, C, and D cannot be earned. This is a critical skill. If you need more suggestions on how to approach the claim, head to this article. A note about evidence: One piece should come from the given docs, one can be from docs external to the prompt. While either approach is preferred by College Board, I try to teach my kids to use evidence for B1/B1 and B3 from off the list that CB provides. Why? Knowing how hard it is to score the FRQ, using the evidence incentivizes a deep understanding of the documents and hopefully will curry favor with a rater who does not have to find the unfamiliar example students cite. It goes without saying, there is NO PENALTY for giving external evidence. I use the claim-evidence-commentary writing structure, as it is the standard in feeder courses like 11th grade US History as well as in English across my school. This is exactly like Assertion-evidence-commentary, but CB likes to call assertions claims. I wanted to break down this in a manageable presentation, so I have included my prezi and a video discussion how to be successful on the Argumentation Essay. I hope it is helpful, and I wish you the best of luck! Here is another way of thinking about the essay. |
Jen's bookshelf: nerdcation
I want to start by thanking Mr. Snowden and Mr. Greenwald for their uncompromising dedication to giving the NSA violations air time and transparency.
I wanted to share some of the most important things I have learned from this book bef...
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nerdcation
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nerdcation and to-read
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nerdcation and to-read
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nerdcation and to-read
AuthorI lovgov. LOVE IT! I love teaching government, learning about it, debating, discussing, asking questions about government. And not the standard boiler plate questions, but the hard ones that are NOT in the books. Archives
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