AP Course Help

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Dear WrongPlanet,

Right now I am a senior in high school and am taking two AP courses first semester, with a third one (Macroeconomics) next semester. The two AP courses I am in are European History and Government, at the end of first quarter my grades were:

European History - 81.3% (B-)
Government and Politics - 88% (B+)

However, I was lucky to finish the quarter with these grades because on the exams I scored anywhere from an F to a C - which depending on the homework level the teacher assigns for that class, can probably boost the grade significantly, usually at least one grade level more than the average of the exams.

I am hoping that I can average out an A for the semester, or at least in my AP Government class since that I would only need a 91% to do so. However, I don't feel that that goal is feasible unless I get better exam grades.

For those of you that have taken an AP course before, I have a few questions.

1. How many hours per night do you spend studying?

2. Do you do so on the last few nights before the test or right when the chapter starts?

3. I am a visual learner, what study method(s) would be most efficient to help me learn?

4. For those of you that have taken Macroeconomics, how hard is it in comparison to EHAP?
Although it is a social sciences class, is there any mathematics involved?

Thanks for the help everybody! (sarcasm)

For high school AP classes, 0. Unless the subject was biology, in which case I read the entire textbook straight through. That took probably an hour or two a night.


It's better to read the chapter the day before the teacher starts presenting it. That way you already know what they're talking about and can follow much better.


Euro History and AP Gov are basically just memorization of assorted facts, so there is no study method other than brute memorization. Some people like to make flash cards.


I have no idea what EHAP is, bu macroeconomics is fairly easy. There is no significant mathematics involved (you should have a basic idea of what a function is, but beyond that everything should be simple enough).

It varied typically from 1-3 hours per night, but some nights went up to 5+ hours.


At the beginning of the quarter I tried to read the book ahead of time, but eventually I'd fall behind such that I'd have to cram before tests!


Writing and drawing charts and diagrams should help considerably. Although I'm primarily a kinesthetic learner, I especially like flow charts because they can make it easier to see a relationship between two things (A leads to B, which leads to C, etc.).


Sorry, I never took AP Macroeconomics. I took AP English Composition and AP US History.

Good luck!!

Okay thanks! I'll keep your advice in mind.

By the way, "EHAP" is "European History AP".