AP Biology Examination

Important facts and exam analysis

Start with the booklet

• Use the green Released Exam booklet for this session.

• Page one - who and how

• Page two - M. choice and Free Response. Note that they are looking for students to relate content, be novel and put numbers to what they are saying.

Scoring the exam

• By all accounts, the AP exams are scored fairly. I have yet to be surprised by a students score (sometimes a 3 is a 4 on a good day and the other way around).

• Pages 2 & 3 provide details.

• Proper completion of the course and lab objectives is crucial to student success. (page 4 and 5)

Content - Format

• All three units are covered by the following percentages.I Molecules and Cells - 25%II Heredity and Evolution - 25%III Organisms and Populations - 50%

• Section I - 120 M.Choice questions (60%)

• Section II - 4 Free answer questions (40%)

• Labs are important in both sections.

Instructions• The Instructions are very detailed!!

• Skip the details and go to page 14. Examine the instructions for M.choice.

• Students should know M.Choice instructions before the get to the start page. They should just start writing - time is important, these exams are designed not to be finished.

• What is the guess strategy? Very important!

Try Some!

• Give some of the multiple choice a try. I’ll time you for completion of questions 11 - 20 (page 16-18) 7min and 30 seconds.

• Go! Just note your answers in the book.

• Answers: B, D, A, E, B, A, A, D, B, D

• 2 of those 10 were related directly to labs.

• Did you guess. How did it work?

Free Response• Page 49 instructions for the free response.

• Note that they are looking for the students to demonstrate more than knowledge.

• Clearly, knowledge is required to do well in this section. Student must emphasised correct terminology. Buzz words include: hypothesis, control, quantify, steps of scientific method, statistics, model.

• Others?

Free Response

• Take some time to examine one or two essay questions.

• It is very important that students be taught to plan their answers before they start pouring information out the end of a pen.

• See pages 59, 75, 84 and 93 for details relating to teachers.

How Grades are Determined

• This starts on page 94.

• Grades are not raw scores, they are manipulated to make a mark distribution table. (page 97).

• What the mark means as a letter grade is on page 98.

• end