After the APUSH Reading, which I also attended, I compiled a list of the suggestions and

ongoing concerns that have been expressed on the EDG. I think this could help create a
more official list of tips to guide teachers in the coming year. All of the suggestions so far
have been from readers this year (I apologize for not including the sources, though I will
happily cite you if you are the original author of the tip or concern). Some of the concerns are
from those same readers while most are from a few teachers that did not attend the reading.
**Please keep the formatting standard and do not change headings.

Short Answer Specific

Know the the skill that the question is asking and make sure the answer completes that skill.
A teacher who was grading the causes of the American Revolution SAQ specified this for
me. She said students defined a term, but never explained how it caused a change in the
relationship between the colonies and Great Britain.
Also, be certain to apply the skill in the way the question asked. I had some table leaders
who wouldnt give credit to the Tea Act led to the Boston Tea Party because the question
required a cause of the American Revolution.

General Writing Suggestions

Make sure students understand exactly what skill the question is employing and make sure
students address that skill. Many students wrote essays on completely different skills, thus
writing a different essay than what was asked.
Students should move away from the standard categories of analysis (social, political,
economic). I saw many students trying to "jam" that into their thesis and it was not effective
at all.
Thesis needs to be specific in terms what they are going to address
Use class time to teach writing skills, using the course content as a basis. They get to review
the content they read/learned, apply it to the skills, and learn how to write well. Its a winwin-win. Break it up into steps: thesis statements, topic sentences, constructing paragraphs
that make an argument and support it with specific information including sourcing material,
etc.
My suggestion is to go back to the basic formula for the five paragraph essay. State your
reasons (in this case reasons that the women's movement grew from 1940-1975) briefly but
specifically, in the thesis and then restate those reasons as the topic sentences in the
following paragraphs.

Skill Specific
Synthesis

This year, a new trend where some students seemed to be trying to synthesize every
document? ("This document is similar to....") If you have kids who are doing that, I would
strongly advise against it; it made the essay disjointed and usually didn't rise to the level of
analysis necessary for the synthesis point. I'm definitely going to keep teaching my kids that
their synthesis needs to parallel their thesis argument as by far the best attempts at this
point that I saw took that approach.
Synthesis needs to be a parallel, not a continuation (what happened next?). In other words,
synthesizing a Civil War essay by saying that slaves would finally get their freedom during
Reconstruction is not synthesis. They also need to spend time explaining it, not just naming
it
Clear Explanation and examples of Extending the argument through synthesis
Although the rubric says only that synthesis needs to "extend the argument" I really felt like
my kids started getting the concept once I started teaching it as taking your thesis and
applying it to a different era.
So, thesis: The causes of the rise of the women's rights movement in the mid-twentieth
century included the social and economic shifts resulting from World War II and the catalyst
of the African American Civil Rights movement.
Synthesis: In the same way that the women's rights movement grew out of social and
economic changes resulting from WWII, so too did [arguably similar social
movement] grow out of [some other war that caused social/economic upheaval].
[then a sentence or two containing some specific historical evidence to back this
argument up]
Or, thesis: Although WWI could have marked a dramatic turning point in America's role in
world affairs, the political aftermath of the war - both in the US and abroad - ensured that
America returned to its long-standing policy of isolationism. In fact, the war merely reinforced Americans existing commitment to their foreign policy of non-involvement in
alliances.

Synthesis: In the same way that WWI had the potential to be a turning point in
American foreign policy, so too did [another war]. In both cases, however, the politics
of the time encouraged a quick return to the status quo post-war. [several sentences
with specific historical details backing the comparison up].
Table Leaders stressed that the synthesis argument needed to be parallel to the position
taken in the thesis. Not all agreed that a parallel argument was necessary, that showing
similar circumstances was all the rubric required. So, on the Q2 LEQ about the 14th and
15th amendments, students need to find another time period where legislation or
constitutional changes did or did not amount to a turning point. Showing the long term
implications for the amendments like the Warren Court or the civil rights acts of 1964-65 fit
the bill, but students did need to show how they were or were not turning points. This is
where the parallel element came up.

Contextualization

The students that did well on contextualization, for the most part, were the ones that applied
the skill to the overall essay and not to one part of the argument. And they made it very
clear that they were providing context for their argument, usually in the introduction or in a
separate paragraph.
One schools essays that I read included the contextualization and outside information in a
paragraph after the introduction. And then followed that with the body of the essay. I really
liked the format, and those students all scored in the 5+ range

Document Use and Analysis

Have your students use all of the documents. Many students left one out, which was
allowed, but was disastrous if the student mis-analyzed one of the documents that they did
use - and one of the documents were misused by MANY students.
Some students were addressing how the essay would be better if there was a document
about [insert topic here]. I think this is an old WH requirement and did nothing for their
essays at all, so they should refrain from doing that.
Please teach students not to quote the documents. Although there are times when it might
be warranted, most students don't have the skill to do it well and end up quoting too much of
the content and in the end, it does nothing for their essay
Teach your students how to write in a sophisticated manner when it comes to sourcing.
Refrain from, "the purpose is," or "the historical context is"
Don't have students label all the tasks on their essay in the margins, underlining and
labeling them, or circling them. It makes it very confusing for the reader.
Spend time teaching students to interpret what they read, not just read for content. So many
students lost points because they thought the document said the complete opposite of what
it actually did.
Use all the documents, and they should try to source as many as they can (more than 4) so
in case they miss one, they don't lose the entire point.
Point of view is not a summary of the document. Many students just summarized the
content of the document and did not consider what about the author's background would
influence their view of the topic. For that matter, purpose is not a summary either.

Outside Information

Didn't see much outside information, and when it was there, it wasn't enough to earn the
point. Teach student that the outside information is like having another document to use - it
should be that important.
I kind of liked the obvious lead ins. One that I liked was One piece of information that is not
mentioned in the documents that shows (argument) is
Every year there is one piece of factual information that students surprise me by
misinterpreting. This year, for me, it was the concept of Republican Motherhood. Students
remembered the heck out of this phrase - I saw it very frequently - and I would say that at
least 85% of the time it was mis-used. Students either seemed to a) conflate it with the Cult
of Domesticity or b) have the concept right, but be convinced that the ideal extended well

into the 20th century (with lots of students making the argument that WWII caused a shift
away from Republican Motherhood)
Women's history is a popular exam topic, so I know I'm definitely going to be giving
Republican Motherhood some more nuanced attention in class and during review next year,
after seeing how frequently it was mis-used.

Remaining Concerns

I am very frustrated with extended analysis because I was teaching it correctly at the
beginning of the year (the way I taught it in AP Euro Since Jefferson is a Democratic
Republican, it makes sense that or Since the document was from a private diary, the
author is likely to be sharing his true feelings regarding the use of the atomic bombs in
Japan, showing that Truman thought their use was necessary), but so many of the examples
CB released that earned points did it completely differently. So I changed how I taught my
students and now I dont think that they will get those points.
The biggest controversy, if that is the right word, was over connecting synthesis and
contextualization to the argument presented in the essay. For both LEQ and DBQ, students
had to make clear the connection between their thesis/argument and the topic chosen for
contextualization/synthesis. Effectively, this meant that if a student wrote an expanded
introduction to their thesis using developments in a different time period (synthesis) or a
larger picture within the time period (contextualization) they still needed to make the
connection clear.
I have a clarification question on how synthesis was interpreted at this reading. Did it have
to parallel the skill of the essay (the examples people seem to be giving seem to suggest this
- ex. if the question was about amendments as turning points, did the synthesis have to be
about something else that was not a turning point (ex. the Constitution) or could they be
topical connections (ex. both LBJ and Lincoln passed legislation intended to improve Civil
Rights etc.)?
On the thesis, am I correct in thinking the point is now for both the 1-2 sentence thesis AND
implementation of it (so a larger argument point?). If so, how is that then distinct from some
of the other points (ex. argument development in the DBQ or some of the historical thinking
skill points in the LEQ)?
Are the changes in scoring going to be presented in some clear and public way for teachers
who were not at the reading?
Finally, I thought I had heard that this year's reading was going to continue last year's level
of skill and we'd have much higher expectations for the 2016-17 reading. It seems like we
had a ramping of expectations THIS year. For those of us not "in the know" with the College
Board, having a moving target makes interpreting these new rubric so much harder! Will
next year have higher expectations again, or are this year's expectations going to "keep"?
After reading the discussions on contextualisation and synthesis...I have absolutely NO
IDEA how to apply any of it. IMHO, the discussion has become one of whose jargon sounds
more plausible. What I think started as a sincere attempt to make the scoring more uniform
has become an exercise in who is better able to train his/her labradors to jump through the
hoops quickly and with style to pick up the points. I looked and looked again for any mention
of "good writing" and/or "writing historically," and unless I missed something
I was heartened to hear, during the Open Forum that the testing committee is aware of the
concerns regarding the shortened amount of time for the DBQ (especially given the number
of tasks students are being asked to complete). It sounded like there might be some serious

discussion going on behind the scenes about lengthening the time allotted for the DBQ,
which I would definitely be in favor of.