Parent of an older student advised us when my kid was a rising freshman and APs have been easy.

Since, teachers will not be able to fully cover the AP curriculum in the classroom before the exam and AP tests happen a month before school ends so the window of learning in classroom is very short, it is best to get a Barron's book from Amazon in summer and begin during summer. During the school year, study for the assignments and tests using it for few minutes daily, and it will be a breeze to score well in school as well for AP exams.

My kid ended up taking 12 APs and scored 5s in all except 1 where he got a 4. If you plan a bit better and start early, APs are easy. But most kids procrastinate and get so stressed. APs is all about time management and routine. Also, do not skip the online AP classroom.

This thread has been hilarious.

Just be aware that teachers this year might not have covered all the material that might be on the AP exam, or taught it that well, because school systems have had to scrounge around for subpar teachers when all the good ones left, after being hounded out of schools due to the conditions imposed during the pandemic.

Also, there is a thread on DCUM right now about whether AP exam scores matter at all for college admission, and of course posters assure one another that they don't. So you don't care that your kid gets a low score anyway!

I assume you approach all their education like this. It's your kids' problem, not yours. What's important is that they're happy and get to have fun in high school. Colleges look for well-rounded applicants anyway. You're not on the Ivy train like those sick Tiger parents. Your kid's safety is State U and they expect to go to a nice SLAC.

Unsurprisingly, you will also be one of those very disappointed parents who thought your kid had a great shot at X college, but got turned down.

And you will not see the relation, at all, among all these completely unrelated things.

Anonymous wrote:I bought a book with practice tests and helped them figure out a schedule to run through them. Don’t know what else there is to do.

Same.

For heaven's sake. Every kid is different--some need more help or more direction; others bristle when the parents even remind them of an upcoming deadline. Every family is different. Parents' motivations are different (often, parents who set expectations of study time are doing so more to create good long-lasting study habits than for a grade on a particular test).

Let families decide what works best for their kid.

And incidentally, a question like this to DCUM gives a hugely skewed set of responses because there's so much criticism of people who set out rules for their kids. You're getting answers from people who want to tout whatever strong belief system they may have rather than a random set of responses.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OMG. No involvement. I have a senior who has taken a handful of AP exams. It was her job to learn the material. If your student goes to class, pays attention, and does well on the work there, he or she should do fine.

Your kid is in high school. It time to back off and bit and let your kid take the reins of his or her own success. Your kid needs that for college.

This. X1000

People will bend over backwards to justify their “involvement” but really, it’s time to let your kids do the work. It’s not your success/failure, it’s theirs.

For an anxious freshman taking their first exam, I don't think that helping them think through how they might go about studying, or helping them by quizing on some of the information is bad parenting, or will lead to them not being able to succeed on their own in college.

No, it won't and they may look back on this fondly. My parents weren't that involved in my school work but they were supportive. I appreciated that they were always there for me.

I am very glad we bought our kid a practice book, since there was quite a bit of material that hadn’t been covered in class. So his 99% average grade this year didn’t necessarily mean much. And there was still an essay on an unfamiliar topic.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OMG. No involvement. I have a senior who has taken a handful of AP exams. It was her job to learn the material. If your student goes to class, pays attention, and does well on the work there, he or she should do fine.

Your kid is in high school. It time to back off and bit and let your kid take the reins of his or her own success. Your kid needs that for college.

This. X1000

People will bend over backwards to justify their “involvement” but really, it’s time to let your kids do the work. It’s not your success/failure, it’s theirs.

For an anxious freshman taking their first exam, I don't think that helping them think through how they might go about studying, or helping them by quizing on some of the information is bad parenting, or will lead to them not being able to succeed on their own in college.

APUSH tomorrow. Teacher has been working her as off with the kids. I really hope my kid does well for her teacher's sake more than hers, actually. But at the end of the day, as everyone said, it's on the kid.

Anonymous wrote:OMG. No involvement. I have a senior who has taken a handful of AP exams. It was her job to learn the material. If your student goes to class, pays attention, and does well on the work there, he or she should do fine.

Your kid is in high school. It time to back off and bit and let your kid take the reins of his or her own success. Your kid needs that for college.

This. X1000

People will bend over backwards to justify their “involvement” but really, it’s time to let your kids do the work. It’s not your success/failure, it’s theirs.