After taking the pretest, the
only words of encouragement I have for myself are “It can only get better from
here!” (At least, I seriously hope it does, because otherwise I’m going to be a
very bad AP Literature student.)
A little on my performance before I list my
weaknesses and plans to improve: I finished 38 questions in class and did
surprisingly well on the questions regarding the first poem, The Writer, somehow not missing any. The
fiction passages were a different story – I stumbled dazedly over the Bleak House and Jane Eyre questions. At home, I finished the test and missed three
questions regarding The Pulley, with
an overall score of 37/51. I’m not sure if this merits a pat on the
back for getting a nice shiny C. In general, I’m surprised that I did much
better than I expected on poetry and much worse than I expected on prose; if
anything, I expected the opposite to happen.
After reviewing the questions I
missed, I’ve realized that I’m currently terrible at picking out extended metaphors
and inference questions in prose texts. Almost all of the questions I missed
involved “in the context of the passage…” or “all of the following can be
inferred except…” save for some
questions I missed because I clearly just wasn’t thinking. I figure improving
at my analytical and inferential skills in prose fiction will require one
thing: practice. My three goals manifested themselves as more detailed forms of
practice (since, after all, practice is a pretty vague term.)
First, I will aim to widen my
literary exposure by reading widely. The prospect of reading regularly on top
of assignments sounds extremely ambitious to my own ears (First semester senior
year courseload plus college apps is a deadly combination, or so I hear), but I
think a reasonable goal is actively
reading 1-2 prose and/or drama pieces every week. Carol Jago’s Literature and Composition textbook has
a plethora of excerpts to choose from, so I will likely pick the pieces with
the most interesting titles. The textbook also has handy reading questions I
can skim and (hopefully) answer. I can also reread my classic favorites (Pride and Prejudice and The Beautiful and Damned) with a more
scholarly mindset to draw more from the text. I adore reading – so the reading
itself won’t be painful – just the inevitable sleep deprivation that may result
from avoiding other homework assignments. I will measure improvements through
future AP exams we take in the classroom. Hopefully I will also be able to feel
myself becoming more comfortable with thinking analytically and drawing my own
conclusions as I integrate the extra reading into my weekly routine.
More than just reading and
answering general questions, I hope to
write my own AP-style multiple
choice questions to excerpts from the prose I choose to read. This is a
suggestion I stole from 5 Steps to a 5, and
I think it will be very effective, since writing your own questions forces you
to see from not just the eyes of the test taker but also the test maker. I hope
to do this once a week throughout the entire year leading up to the AP exam,
and maybe even find a fellow Lit comrade who plans on doing the same thing so
we can swap questions every week.
Even though I’m making prose
analysis my primary focus, I can’t totally throw poetry to the side, because it
would be pretty depressing if I did worse on later tests than this initial baseline.
I already receive the Poetry Foundation’s Poem of the Day, so I figure, why not
do more than just read that poem? In turn, I hope to challenge myself by reading each (applicable, quality) Poem of
the Day, analyzing tone, structure, imagery, and possible extended metaphors. A
necessary prerequisite of this will include becoming more familiar with
different poetic structures (ex. figuring out what an iambic trimeter is), so I
will get on that by this weekend as well. I will measure my understanding of
poetry by self-monitoring the ease of my analysis and my performance on
poetry-based multiple choice questions in class over the course of the first
semester.
Let’s see if my plans actually
work. My grades are on a roller coaster that only goes up, my friends.
Hi, Allison! I missed the same type of questions as you, including the inference type! They were really tricky, and I hope that we both improve on them . Also, all the pentameters and trimeters also confused me. I absolutely adore your three goals for improving performance on multiple choice questions! I might "borrow them". I think that it is very important to keep goals that can be strived for on a daily basis so I love the idea of choosing small passages of prose/poems to analyze more in-depth on a daily/weekly basis. One of my goals was also similar to this because I know the importance of daily practice. It would also be very beneficial to be exposed to more works of literature (short as they may be) because you never know where they might show up again. Wouldn't it be wonderful if we saw one on our AP test? I also think that the idea of creating questions for yourself is a great way of testing comprehension. Testing yourself is very important in order to practice skills at a high quality. 5 steps to a 5 knows how it’s done. Stylistically, I love your voice and your little parenthesis comments. They’re pretty hysterical. I’m also taking an excessive amount of APs and I think that if we both keep to our goals (including the ones I steal from you), we can improve greatly. I agree: we’re on a roller coaster that only goes up, my friend (TFIOS reference!).
ReplyDeleteHi, Ruby! Gah, yeah, inference questions are tough. Let's get better at them together. :) And thanks for appreciating my voice, I try to make sure I'm not too bland when I write for school. You're pretty amazing with voice yourself.
DeleteAlso...John Green is life.
Dear Ally,
ReplyDeleteI'm glad you are so optimistic that things will only get better. What a lovely mantra. I actually had the opposite problem: I was more competent at the prose passages than the poetry ones. Maybe we can help each other! I agree with you that discovering the deeper meaning behind the literary devices used and being able to draw conclusions from the passage is difficult. One tip I like to keep in mind is to determine the purpose of the passage while you are reading- like the bigger picture the author is trying to present- and go from there, because basically almost all writing decisions made by the author goes into developing the purpose. This might save you from some of those tricky inference questions. I also agree with you that practice is what's going to make or break your progress in improving your score. And I am very impressed with the specific goals you have set for yourself this year. Utilizing resources like the AP Literature and Composition textbook and the Poetry Foundation's Poem of the Day for practice passages is a very smart idea. Along with your plan of rereading, you are well on your way to building a firm foundation for analyzing various texts. I have also heard that writing your own multiple choice questions will help your performance; I would gladly pair up with you for this endeavor!
Sincerely, Tina
Dearest Tina,
DeleteThanks so much for your advice! You have a great way to approach determining purpose. :) I'll definitely take you up on your swapping questions offer, so let me know how things work out for you! We're going to be fabulous.
Allison
Hello, Allison! I'm really impressed by the ambition and originality in your plan for improvement. They've made me realize that my own are, simply put, too generic. In fact, I like your goals so much that I want to steal them. And I will. :)
ReplyDeleteThis is especially because I share much of your woes. I, too, have more difficulty on prose passages than poetry, and picking out the extended metaphor is a skill I've yet to effectively develop.
Thus, I will follow your lead and read more classics. I will also subscribe to the Poetry Foundation. But most of all, I will take care to analyze each text. As Literature & Composition said, it's important to experience every passage as an observer, but one must also take the next step to examine the patterns and draw conclusions from them. To be honest, I'm forgetting some of the advice it said already, but I'll be sure to review that. After all, this is the nitty gritty of what the AP exam wants us to do.
So thank you for sharing your reflection! By writing it, you not only helped yourself, but many others as well. I, at least, could testify to it. :)
Hi there, Alice! Thank you so much for your compliments...I read your plans and I think they are awesome in their own right, so no worries! And steal at will. :) I hope we can help each other as we continue our AP Lit adventure!
Delete