AP ENGLISH LANGUAGE AND COMPOSITION

'Advanced Placement English Language and Composition' (or 'AP English Language and Composition', 'AP Lang and Comp' or 'AP Lang') is a course and examination offered by the College Board as part of the Advanced Placement Program.

Contents

The Course

Purpose

Emphasized skills

The Exam

Format

Scoring

Grade Distributions

References

Popular Textbooks

External links

The Course

AP English Language and Composition is a course in the study of English language structure and writing. Because the AP English and Composition course is one of the highest level English classes, it is usually taken in a student's junior year, followed by the AP English Literature and Composition the following year, or as an alternative to AP English Literature and Composition in a student's senior year. Alternatively, many schools choose not to offer AP Language and Composition, and students interested in higher level English courses often take an honors or pre-AP English Literature and Composition course their junior year.

Purpose

"The AP English Language and Composition course is designed to help students become skilled readers of prose written in a variety of periods, disciplines, and rhetorical contexts and to become skilled writers who can compose for a variety of purposes. By their writing and reading in this course, students should become aware of the interactions among a writer's purposes, audience expectations, and subjects, as well as the way generic conventions and the resources of language contribute to effective writing... Students are strongly encouraged to take the AP examination at the end of the course."^[1]

Emphasized skills

The College Board's suggested curriculum for the course places a strong emphasis on the development of proficient reading and writing skills. In particular, thorough, efficient reading and contextual understanding of difficult historical material^[2], and the ability to spontaneously write an organized and developed essay that demonstrates a strong stylistic and expressive command over the English language^[3].

The Exam

Format

The AP English Language and Composition exam consists of two sections, a one-hour multiple-choice section and a two-hour free-response section^[4]. The exam is further divided as follows:

	Section I: Multiple-Choice	Section II: Free-Response
# of Questions	55	3
Percentage of score	45	55

Scoring

The multiple-choice section is scored by computer, with a correct answer receiving 1 point, an incorrect answer losing 1/4 of a point, and a blank answer receiving 0 points. These numbers are used to calculate the adjusted multiple-choice score.
The free-response section is scored by hundreds of educators each June. Each essay is read by two readers. Barring a significant discrepancy, their scores are averaged and added to the adjusted multiple-choice score to receive the composite score. The composite is converted into a an AP score of 1-5 using a scale for that year's exam^[5].
Students generally receive their scores by mail in mid-July of the year they took the test. Alternately, they can receive their scores by phone as early as July 1 for a fee^[6]. Subs-scores are not available for the Language and Composition Exam.

Grade Distributions

In the 2006 administration 256,722 students took the exam from 8,168 schools. The mean score was a 2.65^[7]
The grade distribution for 2006 was:

Score	Percent
5	5.4%
4	15.9%
3	29.6%
2	36.7%
1	12.4%

For the 2006 administration, the Advanced Placement English Language and Composition exam had the lowest percentage of top scores, or 5, out of all of the Advanced Placement Exams.

References

1. http://collegeboard.com/student/testing/ap/sub_englang.html?englang
2. http://collegeboard.com/student/testing/ap/english_lang/reading.html?englang
3. http://collegeboard.com/student/testing/ap/english_lang/writing.html?englang
4. http://collegeboard.com/student/testing/ap/english_lang/exam.html?englang
5. http://www.collegeboard.com/student/testing/ap/exgrd_set.html
6. http://www.collegeboard.com/student/testing/ap/exgrd.html
7. http://collegeboard.com/student/testing/ap/english_lang/dist.html?englang

Popular Textbooks

''The Bedford Reader'' edited by X. J. Kennedy, Dorothy M. Kennedy, and Jane E. Aaron

External links

★ AP English Language and Composition at CollegeBoard.com