BRIANNA PRICE, KIARA KENNEDY, AND ISAIAH KEMP
P6

Thematic and Analytical  Focus of the "Multiple Choice Section of the AP English Exam"

Analytical Focus:

• Literary Elements Actual Definition: the components of a literary piece: character, setting, plot, theme, and ending/resolution

    Our Definition:  Devices or techniques used to produce a specific effect on a question or      literary work.

• One most common literary element that is used during the AP English Exam is author’s purpose. The Author’s purpose is basically the way the author chose to act or phrase something in a piece of literature. You can attack this element by isolating key/clue words. Pulling out key words can assist in identifying the author’s purpose.

        Example: Compare: Author wanted to show similarities between ideas

  Clue Words: both, similarly, in the same way, like, just as

• Tone is the way of wording or expressing things that expresses an attitude. You can tell a question is about tone when it asks about narrator’s attitude or characters. One method to attack a tone question is to look for keywords that help to show the author;s feelings toward a subject.

        Example: What is the speaker’s attitude toward America?

              The speaker is best characterized as..

• Organization and Structure test you on how well you can understand the way the text is formed. To answer these questions, you must be aware of how one paragraph relates to the others.

    Example: The speaker's mention of "      " is appropriate to the development of his             argument by . . .

• Rhetoric is when an author uses words in their writing to persuade or influence. These questions are one of the most occurring questions on the AP exam. Rhetoric questions are there to make sure you understand how the language works in the literary work. Rhetoric questions appear in many different forms of questions. It can appear in the form of a sentence structure, diction, point of view, and figurative language.You can attack these questions by realizing what the question is asking you, and to specifically target the question type , since it could be any one of the listedf devices above.

        Example: The shift in point of view has the effect of . . .

Thematic Focus:

• One of the most beneficial strategies to use when answering the multiple choice questions is figuring out what the question is asking. Once you know what the question is asking it’ll be easier to figure what the right answer is.
• For example when a question is asking about the tone of a passage it would be very helpful to figure out if the passage is negative or positive, which will then bring you to your best answer choice.
• The purpose for multiple choice questions is so that reader can analyze the form and content of the passage. As a result of this there are four categories all questions fall under.  The four categories include factual, technical, analytical, and inferential. You can identify a factual question because the evidence is always in the passage. You can identify a technical question because a technical question always asks about the structure of the passage. You can identify an analytical question because it focuses more on the literary elements of the passage. Whenever there is a comparison involved with the question is more likely to be an analytical question. You can identify a inferential question when it says for example “the author suggests” or “author implies” in the question. In order for it to be an inferential question you have to be able to put your input relevant to the passage in order to pick the correct answer.
• -use process of elimination to eliminate answer choices that aren’t likely to be the correct answer.

-eliminate answer choices that are irrelevant, and obviously wrong.

-eliminate answers choices that are extreme.

-element answer choices that cancel each other out

-element answer choices that are vague and broad unless a question asks that.

-if you come across two answer choices that you think are possible answers, find the one that is general enough to cover all aspects of the questions,

-remember that it is okay to make an educated guess when you feel you don’t know the answer. However you should not be making educated guesses thoroughly. Trust yourself enough to believe your educated guess is the correct answer.

• Main Ideas/Strategies:

• Vocabulary: Understanding the high-standard language and not having too much discomfort college/SAT like words. It is also a big boost to be able to comprehend some of the phases from other foreign languages and pious references.  
• Timing: There is one hour for this section. With at most 55-60 questions can be given. Take approximately 30secs-1min a question. Or, if there is four parts for this section, then take 13-15 minutes for each part. Know also you should not take more than 5 minutes to read a passage. If time is running out, there’s nothing wrong with guessing as you will not be penalized for it.   
• Referring to literary terms: It is always useful to know four categories of kinds of questions that can be manifested. Factual, Technical, Analytical and Inferential
• Noticing different styles: Some passages will be from certain time periods, eras, etc. It is important to understand aspects such as the Victorian era, Shakespeare period and some philosophical periods like the Renaissance and the Enlightenment; opposed to just knowing one of them because they will not put two of the same kind of passages in one exam.