Advanced Placement United States History

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Teacher: Mrs. Montgomery

Department: Social Studies

Room: 238

 

Course Description (excerpted from the College Board):

            The AP U.S. history course is designed to provide students with the analytic skills and factual knowledge necessary to deal critically with problems and materials in U.S. history.  The course is structured by both theme and topic outlines in order to ensure that students see connections between and among time periods and events.  The program prepares students for intermediate and advanced college courses by making demands upon them equivalent to those made by full-year introductory college courses.  Students should learn to assess historical materials – their relevance to a given interpretive problem, reliability, and importance – and to weigh the evidence and interpretations present in historical scholarship.  An AP U.S. history course should thus develop the skills necessary to arrive at conclusions on the basis of an informed judgment and to present reasons and evidence clearly and persuasively in essay format.

           

For a complete course description, please visit: http://apcentral.collegeboard.com/apc/public/repository/ap07_ushist_coursedesc.pdf

 

Course Outcomes:

Students should:

• Master a broad body of historical knowledge.
• Demonstrate an understanding of historical chronology.
• Use historical data to support an argument or position.
• Interpret and apply data from primary source documents, including cartoons, graphs, letters, etc.
• Effectively use analytical skills of evaluation, cause and effect, and compare and contrast.
• Work effectively with others to produce products and solve problems.
• Develop critical thinking, writing, time management, and study skills required to succeed in college courses.
• Prepare for success on the AP U.S. history examination and the SAT II examination.

 

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Required Texts and Materials

 

Text: Divine, Robert, et al. America Past and Present. 8th Ed, AP* Ed. New York: Pearson Longman, 2007. (ISBN: 0-13-134686-5)

 

Three ring binder solely for Presidential Outlines

Three ring binder for class materials

Something upon which to write in class and a writing utensil

Flash Drive

 

 

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Expectations

·         Students are expected to attend each class and to be prepared upon entering the classroom.  This requires arriving promptly, having all homework prepared completely before class, and bringing all relevant materials.

·         Students are expected to work individually on each assignment, including homework, unless given specific instruction to work as a group.

·         Students must be active participants in class. 

·         Students may not eat or drink in class.

·         All students are expected to take the AP test in May.  Test specific materials will be provided throughout the year.

·         Please see me if you need help!  My room is in 238.  Should you need to reach me by phone, my office extension is 1238.

 

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Grading

Assignments will fall into one of three categories and will be weighted as follows:

            70%     Assessments (includes tests, quizzes, debates, essays, DBQs, etc.)

            20%     Homework (includes presidential outlines, identifications, reading quizzes)

            10%     Classwork (includes participation, attendance, assignments done solely in class)

 

Homework

·         Homework will be given every night. 

·         Students read approximately 10 pages per night in their text or another outside source.  Depending upon what is read students may also need to take notes.  If an article is read, there will generally be a short quiz on the article the next day.

·         A presidential outline is due once a week.

·         A homework sheet with assignments for the week will be distributed each Monday.

·         Homework is not accepted late unless the student has an excused absence from school on the day the assignment is due. If a student is in school, but misses class on the day an assignment is due, it must be turned in at some other point that day .

 

Assessments

·         Most essays and DBQs will be written in class.  There is generally one writing assignment per week, usually an essay.

·         A multiple choice quiz is usually given each week.

·         Unit tests will be given.  Each test will consist of 50 multiple choice questions and one essay.  There may also be a map segment in addition. In unit tests, the multiple choice section is worth 100 points and the essay section is worth 40 points.  Copies of answer sheets will be returned to students, but copies of unit tests will not.  Scores on unit tests will be adjusted to correlate to AP distribution.

·         If a student misses an assessment due to an excused absence, he/she has the same number of days to make it up as days that were missed.

 

Students should keep a record of their grades so that they may determine their standing at any time during the quarter.