State of AP Lang Address Or, how to be successful during the second semester of AP Lang

Stress I’ve been teaching since ‘03, and I’ve never seen such stressed-out kids. The level of anxiety and pressure is high, and while I can’t change the nature of the course or its curriculum, I have a few observations and recommendations. Brace yourselves, however; I don’t think these are the type of recommendations that you’d expect. #aframkeepingitreal

Think Before Speaking The answers to these questions are always the same: Do we need to annotate? (Yes) Does this essay need a title? (Yes) Do we need to use MLA format? (Yes) Insert oft-repeated question here… Major lesson: Don’t make yourself more anxious by thinking that the expectations have changed or that I’m asking for something completely different.

Too Much “Sharing,” Not Enough Original Thinking I appreciate the collaborative approach, but most of you have taken it too far. For example, with your Gatsby Socratic Seminar forms, most of the quotations were the SAME. FOR 108 HANDOUTS. Verdict: This means that you’re not doing the hard work yourself, and you’re cheating yourself of valuable prep for the AP exam. (Don’t make the exam more stressful than it already is.)

Patience, Grasshopper People want their questions answered immediately, but they seem to forget that I have 36 students to teach. The other day was a perfect example: I needed to set up the movie for the entire class, but I had nearly 10 kids in each class who wanted me to replace a lost viewing guide. Obviously, my priority was for the entire class. My recommendation: Be patient, wait your turn, and speak to me AFTER class. Don’t feed the “urgent animal.” It can wait—it’s not worth freaking out about.

Keep Your Handouts People continually lose/misplace/forget critical handouts. For example, on several occasions I told students that we’d turn in the Gatsby viewing guide on the first class session after finals. Students still forgot to bring the handout. I also mentioned—on several occasions—that the “Nick is gay” article needed to be annotated. People still lost it. And didn’t annotate it. Lesson: Don’t create additional stress by having to look for papers. Follow directions and keep your work.

No MLA = Points Off ‘Nuff said.

Write Specific Thesis Statements and Topic Sentences Nearly all of you need to write more direct and specific thesis statements and topic sentences. The topic sentences, in particular, are rough. Direct topic sentences that answer the prompt are better than flowery introductions any day of the week.

In Conclusion… I realize that this is not gentle advice, but I do believe that if you change your behavior, take responsibility, and come prepared, you will experience less anxiety. I am genuinely concerned about your emotional health and wellbeing, and I’ll continue to assign a reasonable amount of HW and practice mindfulness exercises in class, but following these tips will help, too. How do I know? I practice them myself.