Some Thoughts on the AP Reading...

Despite my phone dying, almost missing my flight home, and multiple panic attacks, the AP Reading was… fine.


In all honesty, I came into this one bitter, as I felt a little duped into attending the in-person reading instead of reading from home. (Probably more my own fault than anything).
It didn’t help that the in-person reading was essentially the same as reading from home. This year we read from computers again - which we’ve obviously done for two years now - but it made the entire exercise of flying thousands of people to Tampa see pretty foolish if we were just going to sit at computers the entire time.

My bad attitude plus the previously mentioned surprises made for a rough week.

But I made it.

Because of the extension of the Reading when we weren't able to finish, we had a unique experience this year. In the last two days of in person scoring, we trained on all three of the questions - something that has not been done in my five years of reading.

For me, it was a blessing. I was so sick of reading about ethos, pathos, and logos (more on that later) that switching to Question 3 and then to Question 1 was a welcome change of pace. However, a number of my peers were aptly concerned about the accuracy of scoring when we were being jumped around.
Personally, I think it’s a toss up. Like I said, I needed the change so I found myself reinvigorated every time that we switched. I feel my scoring would probably have been just as hindered by the fatigue had I continued with Question 2.

But that’s enough rambling commentary (... my kind word for whining). This post is not about my complaints, but about the suggestions and tips moving into another year of AP Lang instruction.

The following are the observations I took note of for myself. Some of them are mistakes I saw multiple times that I want to correct next year. Others are harder mindset shifts that I'll be mulling over for the next couple months. Additionally, I want to be very clear that I am in no way an expert, and you should look to the Chief Reader's report (Coming Soon!) for that. These are just a few notes and thoughts I kept for myself as I plan a new year.
​

Notes  from  the  AP Language 2022  Reading

#1

​First and foremost, Question 2 was more successful than I have ever seen, having scored it two other times. Students seemed comfortable with the speech and it appeared they found it very accessible. It made me very optimistic about my scores (until I saw Question 3).

#2

Please, please, please… let up on the rhetorical appeals. In particular, I would strongly encourage teachers to stop teaching students to find all three in a single rhetorical analysis passage. I have seen a common method for teaching rhetorical analysis in which teachers instruct students to organize their essay by the three appeals, with each it’s own body paragraph. (Intro > Ethos > Pathos > Logos > Conclusion)
However, this was not successful in most of my encounters. It is very rare that any text will have a strong example of all three appeals, and students struggled to make this model fit. This year,  Justice Sotomayor’s speech had excellent examples of ethos and pathos, but logos was a bit of a stretch. (Could it be done? Of course). Students using this method came to that third body paragraph and tried to make an argument for a logical appeal when the evidence was thin, at best. The issue here is that a student might have had two adequately developed paragraphs on ethos and pathos, but then their third attempt - logos - brought them down to a 3 for Evidence and Commentary because of the inconsistency. I completely understand the functionality of this method, but I would not encourage students to seek out all three appeals. I would instead suggest coaching them to seek out two, or better yet, multiple examples of one. 

#3

Another pattern that came up as I read Question 2 was one I see in my own students every year. Repetition, as a device, is like a comfort blanket for students. They will find ANY type of repetition in a text and cling on for dear life - especially when they are under the duress of a timed exam. However, this usually ends in meaningless analysis of unintentional repetition.
The example I often share with students is the Cesar Chavez prompt from 2015, in which he is writing about nonviolence. Every time I give that prompt, I have students talk about how he repeats the word nonviolence. Which make sense... because it is about nonviolence. It always gives me a "Duh" moment. b
​For this Reading, students clung to Justice Sotomayer repeating the word "Latina." Again, she was writing about being a Latina judge, so naturally, the word is going to come up. Often. While there were some students who were able to derive meaning from this, most who tried were not successful.

#4

Students need a deeper understanding of audience. One thing I noticed as I read was that many students wrote as though Sotomayor was writing for a hostile audience, as though she needed to prove herself to this audience. This came from multiple points of confusion:
1) that she was giving this speech to get into the Supreme Court and
2) that her speech was politically motivated.
Had students read the prompt carefully, they would know that this was a speech for law students at Berkeley, long before her nomination. Therefore, it was unlikely a hostile audience. If anything, it was an admiring audience or at worst, an apathetic audience. There was no need to defend herself so analysis that tried to make this argument fell flat.
Arguments also fell flat when they were too general. She wasn’t writing for the American people (and honestly, didn’t know the Supreme Court was even in this cards yet). For my students, this means I need to increase focus on audience analysis. I am thinking of creating an assignment in which students complete a role play activity in which they visualize the experience of the writer as I walk them through the details of their rhetorical situation. A better analysis of audience will result in better commentary. It can also lead to a sophistication point. (Maybe? More on that in a bit).

#5

On to the other two questions!
​
Question 3 sucked and the Readers quickly realized it. The good news is, because of this, they allowed for a lot of flexibility with the prompt to allow students to succeed. That said, upon reading it, I knew my students  probably had a hard time with it. Particularly, they would struggle to anticipate the argument in opposition. Even I would have struggled to see how you can argue against “timely” decisions. It made it very difficult to create much nuance in that argument.

#6

(I preface this next piece of advice with the caveat that I only scored Question three for one afternoon. I am in no way an expert on the issues and patterns that came up in student work).
​It appeared to me that the expectation for evidence was higher than in the past. Passing essays used specific, detailed examples from history and reading. Personal experience often failed. I have always taught my students to avoid personal experience, but after training and calibration on this year's question, I know I need to do more to diversify their knowledge. Just telling them to pay attention in US history isn’t enough. As I read samples and student essays, I couldn’t help feeling as though I had done my students a disservice by not pushing them to read more rigorous text about science, history, etc. It is definitely a top priority of mine as I reimagine for next year.

#7

Question 1 responses were looooong. And in my time on that question, I definitely saw more 2s than 3s on the commentary. As is usual - at least for my kids - they lost sight of the central question and struggled to link back to their thesis consistently.
​The question evolved to be more about STEM vs humanities, and students failed to see how a focus on both might present challenges. A large number of them simply said: We need more STEM and also more humanities. They weren’t able to see the possible challenges in that since there was not a source available that nudged them in that direction. 

#8

(Another caveat. This one might just be me…)

​After scoring all three questions, I am only further confused on the sophistication point. Every time I wanted to give one, the essay didn’t earn it. Every time I decided against the sophistication point, it was given. I can accept that this might be a shortcoming on my part, but I really did take detailed notes and read samples carefully.
Here is an example: One of the Question 1 essays made the argument that STEM initiatives further the achievement gap between schools, based on socioeconomic status. To me, that felt like a pretty insightful discussion of the broader context that the student developed well. This essay, however, did not get the sophistication point. In this particular example, I am guessing the issue was that this discussion was formulaic, but it deepened my confusion about what “broader context” actually means.
​In another case, I read an essay that I felt was formulaic and that essay was awarded the sophistication point based on a “persuasive, vivid style” alone. Again, I concede that these may be of my own misunderstanding, but I walked away from the reading feeling that the sophistication point was pretty arbitrary.