1. CRACKING THE MULTIPLE-CHOICE SECTION
By: Geisy Sanz and Sarai Trenhs

2. The Basics The multiple-choice section consists of 80 questions.
You have 55 minutes to work on the section.
Multiple-choice questions focus on students’ knowledge, and their ability to interpret quotations, maps, graphs, and visual sources.
If you want to get a:
Answer this many:
And leave this many blank: 2 45 35 3 60 20 4 70 10 5
As many as you can
As few as possible

3. Breakdown by Era Breakdown by Era Era Approximate Percent of Questions
Approximate Number of Questions
1600 to 1789 20 16
1790 to 1914 45 36
1915 to present 35 28

4. Breakdown by General Subject Matter
Approximate Percent of Questions
Approximate Number of Questions
Political Institutions and Behavior, public policy 35 28
Social change, cultural and intellectual developments 40 32
Diplomacy and International Relations 15 12
Economic Developments 10 8

5. Types of Questions
The majority of the questions are straightforward, you either know the facts or you don’t.
There’s also the NOT/EXCEPT questions, where you have to eliminate the correct answers to get your final answer.
Another type of questions you’ll come across is an illustration (often a map or political cartoon that must be interpreted).
Questions on the exam will not ask about details of military history or trivial facts that just require memorization.

6. Example: Straightforward Questions
Anglo-American women in colonial times
could own property or execute legal documents only if they were widowed or unmarried.
enjoyed more liberties than did Native American women.
attended church less frequently than did Anglo-American men.
were more likely than men to do agricultural work.
were required by law to learn to read and write, in order to teach their children.

7. Example: Straightforward Questions Cont.
2. Which of the following reformers fought for the rights of the mentally ill? a) Ralph Waldo Emerson b) Horace Mann c) Dorothea Dix d) Lucretia Mott e) Helen Hunt Jackson

8. Example: Straightforward Questions (Answers)
A)Those few women who reached maturity and remained unmarried had the same legal standing as men, except that they were denied the right to vote in colonial legislatures.
2. Answer:
C) Dorothea Dix fought for the rights of the mentally ill by calling for the establishment of insane asylums and reform in prisons.

9. Example: NOT/EXCEPT Questions
All of the following increased government power during World War I EXCEPT the
a) War Industries Board
b) Creel Committee
c) Food Administration
d) Espionage Act
e) Dawes Plan

10. Example: NOT/EXCEPT Questions Cont.
4. All of the following were prominent antislavery leavers, EXCEPT a) Nat Turner b) John Brown c) William Lloyd Garrison d) Sojourner Truth e) Preston Brooks

11. Example: NOT/EXCEPT Questions (Answers)
3. Answer: E)The Dawes Plan attempted to facilitate German reparation payments by loaning $200 million in gold bullion to Germany, the United States hoped to stabilize the German economy and enable Germany to pay off its debts. 4. Answer: E) Preston Brooks was the South Carolinian Representative who beat Massachusetts Senator Charles Sumner with a cane after Sumner blamed the South for the “Bleeding Kansas” incident.

12. Example: Illustration Questions
5. The cartoon above served as a) Ben Franklin’s exhortation to the colonies to unite against British authorities b) Ben Franklin’s exhortation to the colonies to unite against the French c) the Committee of Correspondence’s warning of impending attack against the colonies d) the slogan of the Sons of Liberty after the Boston Tea Party e) Thomas Paine’s warning against political repression

13. Example: Illustration Questions Cont.
6. Which of the following best explains the changes in immigration patterns reflected in the chart above?
a) The Depression resulted in a massive wave of Canadian emigration.
b) After World War I ended, the Austrian and Hungarian economies improved.
c) Between 1920 and 1930, Congress passed immigration restrictions that discriminated against southern and eastern Europeans.
d) During the years represented on the chart, relations between the United States and Germany improved greatly.
e) Between the years 1900 and 1910, the Italian government instituted a number of measures restricting emigration.

14. Example: Illustration Questions (Answers)
B) Ben Franklin drew this cartoon in 1754, to try to convince the colonies to unite against the French during the French and Indian War.
6. Answer:
C) The “Second Wave” of immigration starting in 1890 brought fewer northern and western Europeans and more southern and eastern Europeans.

15. Chronological Order and Order of Difficulty
The exam is organized in a predictable way.
Questions will be organized in groups of 8-12 with each group presented in chronological order.
Each group of questions will be a little bit more difficult than the group that preceded it.
Think of the first 20 questions as easy, questions 21 through 60 as being of medium difficulty, and 61 through 80 as difficult.

16. The Guessing Penalty and Process of Elimination
Guessing after you have eliminated two or more incorrect answer choices will improve your final score on the multiple-choice section
DO NOT RANDOMLY GUESS because every question wrong will deduct 0.25 points off your final score while answers omitted will receive 0 points and therefore, do not help nor harm you.
The most efficient way to take the multiple-choice exam is by using process of elimination in which you can eliminate answer choices that are obviously incorrect.

17. Strategies: Big Picture
Always keep the big picture in mind. You should be able to answer the question by remembering the general social and political trends of the era.
Example:
During the Harding and Coolidge administrations, the Federal Trade Commission
a) Greatly increased the number of court cases it brought against unethical businesses
b) controlled the rationing of food, rubber, and gasoline
c) generally worked to assist businesses rather than regulate them
d) was permanently eliminated
e) saw its regulatory powers expanded

18. Strategies: Big Picture (Answer)
- Choice C is the correct answer because it illustrates the “big picture” principle that the 1920s were a pro-business era.
- A and E can be eliminated because pro- business governments weaken regulations.
- B is incorrect because rationing occurred during World War II and D is also incorrect because the Federal Trade Commission still exists today.

19. Strategies: Common Sense
Sometimes an answer on the multiple-choice section contradicts common sense; when you come across one of these, eliminate it.
Example:
Which of the following best explains the most important effect tobacco cultivation had on the development of the Chesapeake Bay settlements during the 17th century?
a) Because tobacco cultivation requires large tracts of fertile land, it led to the rapid expansion of settled areas in the region.
b) The immediate commercial success of tobacco forced the settlers to defend against attacks by Spanish and French settlers, who wanted to take control of the tobacco trade.
c) Tobacco provided the settlers a lucrative crop to trade with nearby Native American tribes.
d) Dependence on tobacco as their only cash crop brought the settlements to financial ruin in the early 1600s.
e) British customs houses established in the region to regulate tobacco trade led to wide-spread resentment of the British by the colonists.

20. Strategies: Common Sense (Answer)
- Choice A is the correct answer.
- Common sense should allow you to eliminate choice C immediately. Nearby Native American tribes lived on farmland similar to that held by the Chesapeake Bay settlers; why would they trade for something that they could have easily grown themselves?
- For the other answer choices, you can ask yourself: Did the Spanish or the French attack the Maryland/Virginia region during the 17th century? It would have been a pretty big deal if they had. You would remember if there had been a war for the control of Virginia in the 1600s, so choice B can be eliminated. Also choice D can be eliminated because tobacco saved the Chesapeake Bay settlements from ruin and answer choice E is anachronistic; the period of colonial resentment towards England was still 100 years away during the 17th century.

21. Strategies: Context Clues
Some questions contain context clues or vocabulary words that will either lead you to the correct answer or at the least help you eliminate an incorrect answer. Example: The Confiscation Act of 1861 authorized the Union to a) divert commercial production in the North toward the war effort b) negotiate a settlement to the Civil War with ambassadors from the Confederacy c) liberate those slaves used by the Confederacy “for insurrectionary purposes” d) stop merchant ships headed for Europe and seize their cargo e) arrest those advocating secession and hold them without a write of habeas corpus

22. Strategies: Context Clues (Answer)
- Choice C is the correct answer because slaves were private property of slaveholders and in order to liberate them, the Union had to “confiscate” them.
- If you don’t remember the exact purpose of the confiscation act of 1861, the word “confiscation” might give you enough of a context clue to answer this question correctly.
- Answer choice B and E have nothing to do with confiscation.
- Choice A seems unlikely because it doesn’t indicate that the government used industry to confiscate the factories and choice D would be more likely if the question discussed the confiscation of property headed for the Confederacy.

23. LAST MINUTE TIPS! RELAX! Pace yourself. Work consistently.
Skip questions that give you trouble and leave difficult questions until the end.
If a question seems difficult but do-able, put a + next to it and come back to it later. If a questions seems impossible, you’re better off skipping it.
If you skip a question, note it on your answer sheet so that you do not bubble in the rest of your answers in the incorrect numbers.
Make sure to read ALL answer choices before bubbling in an answer.
Don’t focus on learning details the week before the exam. Focus on understanding the “big picture” of each era.
DO NOT CRAM the week before the exam.
Eliminate as many surprises as you can.
Make sure you know where the test will be given, when it started, the type of questions asked, and how long it will take.

24. “APUSH (AP U.S. History) is better than a shove.”

25. THANK AGUILAR FOR PREPARING YOU THROUGHOUT THE YEAR!
GOODLUCK!!!!
THE END