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All right, so I thought I was going to take the AP Economics(both micro and macro) exam in May, right? Well, it turns out I might not be, because I have to pass an AP qualifying test first. I had no idea about such a qualifying test, and the test is IN 5 DAYS. I've only been taking this class for 2 months on mondays and wednesdays for 2 hours at a time. The other kids that are taking it are kids that didn't get good scores the last time. So basically, they've already taken the AP exam once, and taking it again. They've had almost a year and a half to study. Now, the reason why this happened is because I moved to Korea to go to an International school, and the school system is quite different here. So please don't ask me how it works because i'm not even really sure i understand. The things that I do understand is that I have to take this test in 5 days. What makes it worse is that the teachers think I'm a good student and expect me to do well, the kids told me that the first test leaves an important first impression for all teachers, and the test results are going to be online for the whole school to see. FML. I had no idea I had to take an AP qualifying exam. So does anyone have any tips on AP econ that I can use? I didn't have time to read Mankiw's book, and I never read textbooks anyway, so I bought a review book. I'm on like page 80 now after two days.
edit: sorry for the mistakes, I wrote this really fast. To clarify, I'm in second year of high school in Korea. Most kids took AP econ in first year. The kids that are taking these additional classes during winter break with me are the kids that got a 4(lol) and want to take the test again. In Korea, the winter break is longer, and that's when you move up a grade.
   
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1.) Get masses of coffee, Energy Drink and Pizza,
2.) Learn like there is no tomorrow (all the effin time)
3.) Get at least 7 hours sleep before the test
--> See results.
Best of luck to you, man :-o
(on a sidenote, maybe you shouldnt be surfing TL.net but learning, kekekeke? )
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On February 22 2011 23:22 FetTerBender wrote:1.) Get masses of coffee, Energy Drink and Pizza, 2.) Learn like there is no tomorrow (all the effin time) 3.) Get at least 7 hours sleep before the test --> See results. Best of luck to you, man :-o (on a sidenote, maybe you shouldnt be surfing TL.net but learning, kekekeke?  )
Actually it has been proven that a lack of sleep impedes your learning capabilities, so pulling all nighters and eating crappy food isn't going to be better than if he were to stay go to bed at normal times.
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On February 22 2011 23:25 SolHeiM wrote:Show nested quote +On February 22 2011 23:22 FetTerBender wrote:1.) Get masses of coffee, Energy Drink and Pizza, 2.) Learn like there is no tomorrow (all the effin time) 3.) Get at least 7 hours sleep before the test --> See results. Best of luck to you, man :-o (on a sidenote, maybe you shouldnt be surfing TL.net but learning, kekekeke?  ) Actually it has been proven that a lack of sleep impedes your learning capabilities, so pulling all nighters and eating crappy food isn't going to be better than if he were to stay go to bed at normal times.
I never mentioned not sleeping on a regular basis, but learning under the influence of caffeine or other stuff that helps you to boost your concentration was the only thing that helped me get over some really crappy courses in university (procastinateing to learn sucks, i still did it way too often)
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Good luck and don't come to this site (or any other for that matter) until test is done. See you in 5 days.
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you better start reading soon. some coffee and easy food and gogo.
good luck to you!
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On February 22 2011 23:25 SolHeiM wrote:Show nested quote +On February 22 2011 23:22 FetTerBender wrote:1.) Get masses of coffee, Energy Drink and Pizza, 2.) Learn like there is no tomorrow (all the effin time) 3.) Get at least 7 hours sleep before the test --> See results. Best of luck to you, man :-o (on a sidenote, maybe you shouldnt be surfing TL.net but learning, kekekeke?  ) Actually it has been proven that a lack of sleep impedes your learning capabilities, so pulling all nighters and eating crappy food isn't going to be better than if he were to stay go to bed at normal times.
While that is true, lack of time can impede your learning process more than lack of sleep. If you are only opening the textbook 3 days before the exam (lets face it we've all been there), knowing that extra equation you've never seen before is quite likely a lot more valuable than an extra hours sleep, even if it might make you slower for the exam or make you forget a few things.
To me it always seems like a tradeoff between how much I'll forget due to lack of sleep against how much I can learn from some extra study. OP should know all about marginal utility since hes doing economics 
Moral of the story : procrastination is bad, and I feel for OP since its not his fault, but 5 days of solid studies you can probably get a pass provided you don't have other commitments, but those 5 are going to be hell
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United Kingdom3685 Posts
Is the qualifying test unique to your school or is it a Korean thing? Because I took a bunch of APs at a US high school and none of them required me to take a qualifying test beforehand. I didn't do AP Econ though.
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To be honest, I never thought AP Macro/Micro (SC joke in here somewhere) was one of the harder APs, and despite not taking the course and only using a review book, I still got the top score. That's not too difficult relatively speaking (since around 18% of the population iirc get a 5, and that includes everybody), and I'm of the sincere belief I have only the most average intellect among my peers. In that case, I think you'll do fine with what you have. I spent my spring break prior to the test going through the review book and that was all the prep I did.
I used Barron's, if that helps, and I think that while it's notorious for overexaggerating the difficulty level of APs, as long as you know everything in it, you'll usually ace the AP.
However, all of that being said, do you know if the AP qualifying test is similar to what the AP test actually is? If it is, I suggest that it's much more important to go to collegeboard.com and dig up all the past FRQ's and study them instead. It gives you a much better idea of what to expect and consequently search for. The MC questions are a bit harder to find (since they aren't legally released except to instructors), but I'm sure with enough digging and enough google expertise you could find it all just fine.
tl;dr version: AP Macro/Micro isn't one of the more diffcult APs, relax a bit. I used Barron's review book to great effect. Find out if the AP qualifying test is ~ similar to the AP test. If it is, go to collegeboard to find FRQs + use google to find MC questions.
glhf!
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You should look into holistic learning. There's a lot of ambiguous mumbo-jumbo but the basic ideas of forming diagrams with the material you are studying, drawing connections, thinking with metaphors and quizzing yourself help a lot. This guy's blog talks about it a little http://www.scotthyoung.com/blog/2007/03/25/how-to-ace-your-finals-without-studying/ but if you are feeling the crunch it may be better not to add new things to learn 
And on sleep: I agree with disquiet, no amount of sleep will make material you haven't read magically appear in your brain. Also, if you study while on caffeine, take caffeine before the test (your body/brain will build an association between caffeine and studying, and every edge counts).
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On February 23 2011 00:26 Disquiet wrote:Show nested quote +On February 22 2011 23:25 SolHeiM wrote:On February 22 2011 23:22 FetTerBender wrote:1.) Get masses of coffee, Energy Drink and Pizza, 2.) Learn like there is no tomorrow (all the effin time) 3.) Get at least 7 hours sleep before the test --> See results. Best of luck to you, man :-o (on a sidenote, maybe you shouldnt be surfing TL.net but learning, kekekeke?  ) Actually it has been proven that a lack of sleep impedes your learning capabilities, so pulling all nighters and eating crappy food isn't going to be better than if he were to stay go to bed at normal times. While that is true, lack of time can impede your learning process more than lack of sleep. If you are only opening the textbook 3 days before the exam (lets face it we've all been there), knowing that extra equation you've never seen before is quite likely a lot more valuable than an extra hours sleep, even if it might make you slower for the exam or make you forget a few things. To me it always seems like a tradeoff between how much I'll forget due to lack of sleep against how much I can learn from some extra study. OP should know all about marginal utility since hes doing economics  Moral of the story : procrastination is bad, and I feel for OP since its not his fault, but 5 days of solid studies you can probably get a pass provided you don't have other commitments, but those 5 are going to be hell 
Actually, the lack of sleep causes your brain not to learn, because what you study during the day gets to some king of a /temp folder in your brain, and only during the sleep it's copied to your /root folder and only if you complete your sleep cycle.
I would recommend you sleep al least 8 hours, and then study the rest of the day, but taking a small break every two hours of study to clear you head.
Also do not study in your room! Otherwise your brain will associate your room with "study" and you will have a really bad sleep. The same is true for other places: if you define a place to study and do nothing nothing but studying there, your brain will associate it with "study" and it will become easier and easier to focus in that place.
+ Show Spoiler +http://www.supermemo.com/articles/sleep.htm#Physiological function of sleep
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Hm. I don't know about Micro, but Macro is pretty damn easy IMO. You got 5 days though, OP. Plenty of time to at least review everything! You should do fine. Optimism. You need some.
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Don't worry about textbooks. The Princeton Review and similar review books is all you'll need.
I took both AP Econ exams in high school without taking the class (as in, just took the exams on my own). Read the Princeton Review and did 3-5 practice exams in the ~2 weeks before the exam, graded myself, corrected errors, and went on to get 5s in both macroeconomics and microeconomics. Power studying and cramming it all in with just 5 days will be tough, but it's certainly doable.
I'd strongly recommend you take and self-grade some of the practice tests--a lot of the open answered graphing questions or w/e have very similar "themes," as in like the question is pretty much the same but the numbers and a few details are changed. The first time you see one it can be really confusing, but if you've done like 10-15 of the questions before and know how the question works, then it's really easy.
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On February 22 2011 23:25 SolHeiM wrote:Show nested quote +On February 22 2011 23:22 FetTerBender wrote:1.) Get masses of coffee, Energy Drink and Pizza, 2.) Learn like there is no tomorrow (all the effin time) 3.) Get at least 7 hours sleep before the test --> See results. Best of luck to you, man :-o (on a sidenote, maybe you shouldnt be surfing TL.net but learning, kekekeke?  ) Actually it has been proven that a lack of sleep impedes your learning capabilities, so pulling all nighters and eating crappy food isn't going to be better than if he were to stay go to bed at normal times.
A lack of sleep may impede your learning capability, but not studying impedes it infinitely. I've pulled more all-nighters in my life than anyone I know, and if you have the will to do it, do it. It's definitely worth having the chance at doing well on the test, even if you're tired, than having no chance whatsoever because the information has never crossed your brain.
And I've proven that myself. That beats your second hand test
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TBH 5 days is more than enough if you do nothing but study. I mean 85 hours of hardwork will get you past most tests.
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Yeah the sleep thing is for good students who study throughout the year. But try since you have more than one day, try and do your late nights earlier and get a bit of sleep before the test. Honestly 5 days is plenty of time. Also studying under pressure isn't that bad; mood-congruent memory means your mind focuses on stuff you learned in similar emotional states, and it'll be easier to recall stuff during a high-pressure situation like the test. Don't bother reading the whole book, focus on important concepts and then just do practice exams. Eat a banana before the exam.
no problem ^_^
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Just try and get your hands on as many practice tests as possible and be brutally honest with yourself, it will show you what areas are your strengths and weaknesses as well as show what topics come up the most frequently, and it will give you a feel for the mark scheme and the style of questions. With micro and macro economics in general I find that knowing the basic principles is essential, and building on those fundamentals isn't too much of a problem.
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