The TEST is coming! The TEST is coming!

Reviewing for the AP Exam 

Two weeks away from the AP Exam, and I had finally finished the curriculum for my Environmental Science class. My CT and I wanted to spend two weeks reviewing the material for the year to get the students prepared, but how? We knew that we needed to make it student engaged and interactive to keep them interested, but there was a lot of material to cover. The other problem was making the students accountable in our class for all the material as well. Our solution was two-fold, a jigsaw and an exam.

First, we divided the main content areas for the exam into 21 parts (the number of students in each class). We had each student become the expert for one of the sections of material. The students had to create a study sheet for the other students in the class and they had to give a short presentation in class on the material using Powerpoint, Prezi, or a similar tool.

Second, to make the students accountable and ensure they were paying attention and following along, we decided to give them their final exam during this two-week period. We broke the final exam into four parts which were given on four different days. Each final exam part was given after the material for that part had been presented by the students. We also decided to design the exam to be like the AP Exam, so that they could also practice their test taking skills. Each part of the final exam consisted of 25 multiple-choice questions and one free response question.

I was extremely impressed with the quality and depth of the presentations and materials produced by my students. The study sheets were well prepared and easy to follow. The students used multiple sources to gather material, including the text, AP study guides, and the internet. Their visual presentations were fantastic, with lots of pictures and solid information. Some of their presentations were better than mine!

The students also did well on the final exam and stated that they thought that adding the free response questions helped them get ready for the AP Exam. They also liked having the final exam broken into smaller parts that allowed them to fully concentrate their study time to those parts of the material.

They took their AP exam on Monday and all of them felt confident that they will get a passing score.

Now that they are finished with exams and materials – what do I do with them? Read my blog post on Senioritis to find out!