‘About Me’ Profiles
3 years ago
Wednesday, November 12, 2008
AP US History: Is this our best model?
My daughter, just like several of your children, is taking AP US History. After watching her race through chapter after chapter of material and hearing her teacher say that the goal is to give broad, but shallow, coverage of history in order to do well on the AP test, it just makes me wonder why our educational system holds these classes up as the gold standard of high school education. Because of the frenetic pace necessary to cover all the material by the May test date, there is little time to process the material, and almost no time for discussion of different points of view. After reading “Lies that my Teacher Told Me” last year in Amber’s class, I can hardly stand to look at the narrow focus of the textbook being used, knowing that there is no supplemental materials or activities being provided to help the students process the material from multiple angles. Why is having all kids taking AP classes our goal? In US News’ high school report each year, high schools are rated solely on how many of their students are taking AP classes. Is this really the social constructivist, differentiated instruction that we are striving for?
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3 comments:
My son is in the same situation. When I suggested to the teacher that the students form study groups and do a jigsaw approach to all the material she was not pleased. She said that would definitely hurt then on the "test". I don't care about the test. I want them to be able to process the information and think about it and discuss it. If this is truly a "college" level class, treat it like that and find a way to make the readings meaningful and use the class time for relevant discussion.
As a parent, I have to step back and look at why my son is in this class? To look good for college; to be in a "better" learning environment, without the classroom management issues of the "regular" social studies class? I looked at the AP course as the best place for my son to learn. In reality, the AP tests are all bunched together in 2 weeks in May, and the pass rates are pretty low (30-40 percent). What's the point? I was hopeful that the curriculum would be interesting and challenging, and I really don't care if he takes the test or not.
I couldn't agree more. I watch my daughter face hours of homework every day in her AP classes, and I'm not sure how much information she is retaining. I can't keep track of her group projects; all I know is that she's constantly stressed out and she and a few others in the group are spending too much time editing each other's work so that it will be "acceptable"....I'm not sure that taking this class was a good idea.
My son was in AP history last year until he bailed out. I thought the teacher was an arrogant "college teacher wannabe." It really was all about the test. Since I was taking virtually the same course at Cascadia, we compared notes. What a difference! I found my class to be both demanding and interesting. We both found his coursework to be tedious and boring. Much of it was memorization of countless facts, suitable as preparation for a multiple choice test, I suppose. How very sad it all seemed.
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