TODD BEACH: Hi, everyone.
My name is Todd Beach.
I teach AP European History at Eastview High School
in Apple Valley, Minnesota.
That's a suburb of Minneapolis in Saint Paul.
And today, we're going to talk to you about the short answer
question.
KATIE LANDSEA: Hi, and I'm Katie Landsea.
I teach at Coral Gables Senior High,
which is in Miami, Florida.
And like Todd said, we're going to go
through the different kinds of short answers
and show you some samples of student answers
that got really full credit.
So the first thing you can see is that the short answer
questions-- you're going to have to write
three of these on the AP exam.
You have 40 minutes to do the three questions that you're
going to write and it constitutes
20% of your total score on the AP exam.
But there are different kinds of questions
that you're going to write, and the first question that we
call SAQ question 1 is going to be based on a secondary source.
Usually a historian's interpretation
of an important event.
And it's going to focus on developments and processes
between the year 1600 and 2001.
It can be one secondary source, or it could actually
be two secondary sources together.
SAQ question 2 is going to be based on a primary source.
It's also going to focus on developments or processes
between the same years--
1600s and 2001.
And then for question 4 or question 4,
you guys get a choice.
You get to choose the question that you prefer.
They're going to focus on developments or processes
between the period either 1450 to 1648, or 1648 to 1815
for question 3.
And for question 4, it's going to focus
on developments or processes from 1815 to 1914
and/or 1914 to 2001.
There are no sources for either question 3 or question 4.
And again, you get to choose the one that you like best
after you've read them both.
Todd, do you want to tell us a little bit about the structure
of the short answer question?
TODD BEACH: Yep, great.
Thanks, Katie.
So that's what you're going to be facing for the SAQ.
So first of all, as Katie mentioned,
there are three parts to every SAQ.
There's an A and a B and a C task.
And so of those three parts, we want to give special attention
to what they're asking us.
Think about the task verb used for each part.
So the task verbs are it could be identify,
which means they indicate or provide
information about a specified topic
without elaboration or explanation.
To identify something means just tell us about it.
It could be to describe, if we're describing something,
again, you're just kind of giving us a relevant narrative
about what happened.
What are the characteristics about a topic and tell us
what happened.
These are really accessible task verbs
and they're meant to be that way.
And they can make the question harder by giving you
something really specific to talk about,
or they can make it really broad with using these kind of task
verbs that are accessible.
If they give you the explain task verb,
this is a higher bar task.
We are going to provide the information
about how or why a relationship, process, pattern, position,
situation or a outcome occurs using evidence
and/or reasoning.
You have to do the reasoning.
You have to tell us what happened,
and you have to give the how, why or because.
The how, why or because.
You get an explain task verb, you must do the how,
why or because.
KATIE LANDSEA: That's great.
TODD BEACH: For a strategy, when you're writing,
these are paragraph responses.
And so first of all, you're going to get a box
and as you're responding in the box, we want you to label,
for the reader, which task you're talking about first.
It should go in order--
A, B, C-- but make sure that you're labeling it.
So label and respond to each task,
use the stem of the prompt to begin your response
to the prompt.
Stem of the prompt to begin your response to the prompt
because you're going to create a topic sentence.
So we're talking about using a TEA structure.
T-E-A structure or something similar.
Your teacher may have given you one
that's something similar to this,
and certainly use the one your teacher has taught you
and that you've been using throughout the year.
If you're not familiar with this,
here's the structure that we're recommending which
is called a TEA structure.
T stands for the topic sentence and use
the stem of the prompt to construct that first topic
sentence.
The E means evidence.
So the next sentence you're going
to introduce evidence or talk about an example that
supports what you said in your topic sentence.
And then the A is your reasoning or analysis.
This is where you say what this means and how,
why or because this is important to this particular historical
development they're tasking you with or to the passage
that they've given you or whatever the stimulus is.
KATIE LANDSEA: OK.
So we're going to look at some short answer practice.
And for this video, we are going to look
at that SAQ 1, the secondary source interpretation.
So we're not going to read this to you
but I invite you to pause the video and take a minute
and read through this secondary source.
And of course, just like we talked about in the last video
for the multiple choice, it's really important
that you have a look at the source
that you see that this is a historian writing
considerations on the principal events
of the French Revolution, right?
It gets you right away in the mindset of what
you're going to be reading.
So take a moment, read the passage,
and we're going to go through the tasks
that you're being asked to do with this secondary source.
OK.
So let's look at the prompt.
If we break down the prompt, you're
going to see that there, again, there
are three parts to every SAQ and this particular SAQ has
three different task verbs that we want you to think about.
So in part A, we have, describe one argument
the author makes regarding the resolutions
discussed in the passage.
So you need to be able to describe that argument,
reading the secondary source, understanding what it's saying
and being able to describe the arguments that's found there.
In part B, we have a different task verb,
and that is identify.
So we're identifying one piece of evidence not found
in the source.
That's really important.
We see students that try to grab things
that are from the source to answer these kinds of questions
and that's not what the question is asking you to do.
So you're providing-- you're identifying a piece of evidence
not found in the source that would
support the author's claim regarding
representative government.
So you have to read it, understand what the claim is
and then bring in a piece of your own knowledge not found
in the source to answer part B.
And in part C, just like Todd was saying,
we have that higher bar task verb of explain.
So this one is asking for an explanation
of one limitation of the author's
view of the French Revolution.
So that's needing to bring in information
that you know but also doing that second part of explaining
how or why, right?
Really, really important here.
TODD BEACH: OK.
Great job, Katie, breaking down the task.
This is task A. Let's look at a sample response.
So again, the task is describe one argument
the author makes regarding the revolutions discussed
in the passage.
And the scoring commentary, the samples
we're going to give you, the responses we're expected
to describe one argument made within the passage
that demonstrates comprehension of the ideas
de Stael presents regarding the revolutions in England
and France.
Very straightforward.
OK.
So we're going to remember the TEA structure
that we were talking about.
Can we do that T-E-A structure in developing a response?
So here's the response.
One argument the author makes regarding the revolutions
discussed in the passage is--
remember now they're using the stem of the prompt
to respond to the prompt--
that both revolutions come about because
of a desire from the people to establish
a representative government.
So the yellow represents that T. We have our topic
sentence we've started there.
We're using the stem of the prompt
to respond to the prompt.
Then the blue that's being animated,
that both revolutions come about because of a desire
from the people to establish a representative government,
they're pulling straight from the passage
the answer that the task is asking for.
That is our evidence or an example that we want.
So we're achieving that E of the T-E and A structure.
Finally, they give us a sentence for reasoning.
The author says that they wanted to progress society
by instituting a new, more just government.
So we have a final sentence there that gives us
that analysis and that is that they're just
saying why this is important and the response is going
to earn the point for part A because it
argues that both the English and French revolutions arose
from a popular desire to have a representative government.
So there you see that T-E-A structure in this sample
response for task A.
KATIE LANDSEA: OK.
So looking at task B, we have identify one piece
of evidence-- again, not found in the source--
that would support the author's claim regarding
representative government.
So we have a look at our sample.
We're going to see that the responses were expected
to name, they had to identify.
Again, that's the task verb.
A piece of evidence that relates to representative government
either before, during, or after the French Revolution
that would support de Stael's claims.
So here we have the answer that was given by the student
and we're looking, again, for that structure
that will really help them to organize their answer.
We can see the answer starts off with the stem of the question.
I really like that.
One piece of evidence that would support
the author's claim regarding representative government is--
and then we have that topic sentence.
And now we have the identification
of the piece of evidence, the success of the British
Parliament and their history.
Being a representative government
allowed Britain to advance quickly,
urbanized successfully and excelled during the Industrial
Revolution.
That's a really nice, rich piece of evidence.
And then the student even goes further with this analysis
piece because parliament was elected by the people,
it represented their needs and led
to a more prosperous society than most other countries.
So this is a really nice response for task B.
It uses that TEA structure.
It earned one point because it identified the British
Parliament as representing the needs of the people,
and it did a really nice job with the evidence
and the analysis that it used.
TODD BEACH: Great.
Thank you, Katie.
KATIE LANDSEA: Yep.
TODD BEACH: Let's take a look at task C for this SAQ--
the short answer question.
Task C, explain one limitation of de Stael's view
of the French Revolution.
So these responses are expected to provide evidence and explain
a major flaw that would challenge
de Stael's argument concerning the French Revolution.
So you need to know something about French Revolution.
That's part of what's being assessed here.
So here we go with our students-- our sample response.
One limitation of de Stael's view of the French Revolution
is the rise of Napoleon.
So you see we have that T--
topic sentence structure-- right there.
The rise of Napoleon being, here's my answer.
Now it's an explain task so we need to come up with evidence
and we need to have reasoning.
So the student response continues.
Though during the Revolution, they
created a representative government,
the result was the rise of a dictator.
That's a reference then to Napoleon.
That represents the E or evidence
of this structure of this response.
And then we have to have a how, why or because.
The French Revolution's representative government
was not successful and didn't lead
to progress like de Stael's claims.
So that is our analysis.
We're saying that it doesn't do this.
It is the major flaw in de Stael's claim.
So the response is going to earn 1 point for part C
because it offers the rise of Napoleon as dictator,
as a piece of evidence for the lack of progress
of French representative government.
KATIE LANDSEA: All right.
That's a really good example.
So what do we want your key takeaways to be about this SAQ?
We want you to have some strategies
and we'd really like you to label your different parts A, B
and C and make sure that you're responding
clearly and specifically to each of the different three tasks.
All right.
Label and respond.
We really like you to use the stem of the prompt
to begin your response.
We just find that it helps keep you focused
and make sure that you're answering the question that
has been asked.
So use those words in the prompt and turn them around
and provide your answer and your evidence and your analysis.
So use the stem.
And then we really like you to use a TEA structure
like we've been showing you or something similar.
It just helps to have structure to make sure
that you're hitting the different parts of the task
verb that you need to hit.
So consider using this TEA structure, or maybe
it's something else that your teacher has taught you to use.
But you want to have some structure
with the short answers.
They're short, but they aren't without structure.
So you're going to have your topic sentence,
you're going to provide your evidence
or your specific example, and you're
going to follow that up with analysis.
And remembering that the explain task must have analysis.
A how, a why or a because.
TODD BEACH: Thanks so much for watching for the SAQ.
Please watch our other videos for more help
preparing for the AP exam.
KATIE LANDSEA: All right.
Bye bye.