Score Higher on AP Human Geography 2024: MCQ Tips from Students

Multiple Choice Questions

This guide organizes advice from past students who got 4s and 5s on their exams. We hope it gives you some new ideas and tools for your study sessions. But remember, everyone's different—what works for one student might not work for you. If you've got a study method that's doing the trick, stick with it. Think of this as extra help, not a must-do overhaul.

📌 Overview

• Students are given 60 multiple choice questions and asked to analyze geographical concepts, interpret maps and figures, and explain data
• 50% of Exam Score
• Spend about 1 min per question

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💭 General Advice

Tips on mindset, strategy, structure, time management, and any other high level things to know:

📓 Studying and Preparation

• Creating a study group between your peers is very beneficial to further your understanding on an unfamiliar topic and subject. You also gain insight on someone else’s strategy and learning method.
• You should create group chat with peers to chat about study materials where you share resources and chat about any confusing materials.
• Make a calendar and start preparing about 4 weeks ahead of the test, and make sure to put in breaks in between so you have a period of time where you’re not studying.
  • Plan so that you can review the whole course twice in the 4 weeks.
  • The last week can be set aside for just doing practice questions
  • However, since the day of the test till the 4th of July until the scores came out were miserable. Everyone thought they had failed because for many of us it was our first AP exam. However you would be surprised how high of a score you can achieve despite how bad you think you did on the test. At the end of the day everyone that I knew that actually put in the work got a 3+ with some even being able to get a 5.
• Creating your own study guides is a great way to review the material in addition to studying your notes. It helps you to recall the more important topics and visualize them in a better way.
• Make a collection of all your old notes and assignments so that you have more to reference when it comes time to take the test.
• Making flash cards for your vocabulary terms will definitely come in handy as this is a very vocab heavy test. So, learn your vocab by heart! Vocab will take you very, very far in this exam.
• Many teachers don’t allocate the proper amount of time on each unit, and students have to rush and learn the last couple of units in a short amount of time before the AP Exam. Therefore it is important to self-pace yourself before the exam to make sure that you have enough time to go through all the units before test day.
• Do a practice test at least once a day in the week before the AP exam. All that studying you’ve been doing should showcase itself in the practice tests
• Practice, practice, practice! Don’t just reread your notes or watch videos. Take practice quizzes on the College Board website (ask your teacher to assign them) practice writing FRQS and grade them using the rubrics provided, and in general activate your brain and actually practice the material rather than just recall it.
• Active recall will save your life in this class! Find a friend in your class and ask each other questions from a textbook, notes, etc. Don’t just ask easy vocab questions, but focus on explaining broader events, developments, processes, and concepts in detail.
• Use various study guides to give you a different perspective on each subject area. Use apps such as iScore5 and Quizlet to help you practice multiple choice questions and vocabulary. Do not be afraid to go over vocabulary over and over.
• At the end of each AP Human Geo unit, review your notes on that unit not just for the test, but to retain knowledge so that studying for the final AP exam is less stressful.
• Watch as many video sources as possible such as on Youtube or AP Classroom.
• If you have limited time to study, work on vocabulary! This goes for unit tests as well as the exam. Some of the questions directly ask about to vocabulary, and others require you to know vocab words to select the correct answer choice.
• For a review of the whole course material, look into getting test prep workbooks from “Barron’s Review,” “The Princeton Review,” or using Fiveable’s study guides. Ask your teacher if they have any workbooks that they can lend you.
• Make sure you know which types of questions they might ask (ex.compare-contrast, stimulus response, definitional, hypothetical situation, generalization). Exposing yourself to each type of question and learning how to identify the different types might help you identify what they are specifically asking for.
• Do not start studying the day before the exam. This isn’t a normal exam, this is a college-level class. Yup, you got that right. College. It is important to take studying seriously and to not miss out on the opportunities you get. Now, I’m not telling you to study every moment you get, but rather start studying about a month before the exam.

🧩 Test-Taking Strategies

• Skipping a question is okay but make sure that you remember to come back to it and also check whether you’re bubbling in the right answer for the right question.
• Pace yourself on the test. 1 minute per question means that you need to be checking the time. If your rate is any slower than 1 question per minute, you need to lock in! Whether this involves sitting at the edge of your seat or striking out wrong answers or whatever you have to do, you need to keep pacing yourself.
• You only have a limited amount of time to answer each MCQ (1 min per question). If you are clueless on a question, skip it and go back to it at the end.
• One of the biggest mistakes you can make is leaving MCQ questions unanswered or just filling in a bubble without looking at the questions. Because more often than not there are easier questions than the one you may be stuck on further down the test.
  • Before you start the test choose a letter of the day and if you have no idea on the question, circle it, and fill in your letter of the day. Most of the time you will have limited time to come back to questions, and you have 20% of getting it right if you choose your letter of the day.
• Read graphs carefully. Some questions might ask you to answer the question based on a graph, chart, or image. You should become comfortable with analyzing graphs and look at all the information that the images are trying to convey.
• It is important to answer only what the FRQ are asking. Students often answer in paragraphs that ask them to identify a state, but you should be direct and to the point.

😌 Mindset

• Taking things easy is a great way to reduce stress as you spend less time thinking about what could go wrong and instead focus on making things right in the present situation.
• Don't overthink the question or second guess yourself. You don't want to have the right answer and then trick yourself into changing it. Go with your instincts!
• Use your bathroom break! Even though it may be awkward for you to be escorted to the bathroom during the test, it is much better for you to take a minute or two to catch a breather than work under pressure on the test. Even washing your face can help a lot.
• Don’t procrastinate! I know this is simple, but the earlier you start prepping for the exam, the easier your life will be.
• The exam is easier than you think. In-class tests are typically harder, to prepare you for the exam, so don’t get anxious! If you are able to relax, you will do much better on the exam.
• Be confident as you enter testing.
• Try explaining different terms and concepts to people who haven’t taken the class, or even to yourself. Teaching is one of the best ways to learn and can help cement the information in your mind for the exam.
• Don’t be worried that you didn’t know the answer for a single one. You don’t need a perfect score to get a 5. They curve the test so you even missing a couple won’t hurt you that much. The most important thing is to keep moving on and stay in the right mindset despite not knowing the answer to some. There’s even a chance that you guessed that one right.
• Don’t panic during the test! There will likely be a few questions and examples you could not have possibly prepared for, and if you see something you don’t know, stressing about it could cause you to miss the remaining questions you do know.

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🫧 Before you Bubble

What should a student do in the first few minutes, before they start answering?

• Read the question thoroughly and highlight/annotate key terms of what the question is asking you.
• Identify if the question is one you can fully answer or not. If not, skip it and come back to it with your remaining time.
• If the question is dealing with data sets, make sure you read through the numbers and make sure you fully understand what the data is showing you.
• Rule out the answers that you know are incorrect first. If you’ve never heard of it, chances are it’s not the answer. And always go with your gut instinct once you get the choices narrowed down.

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📜 Understanding the Sources/Data

• Always look for the date and title of the source, usually listed below the source, to gain further entail on the information provided.
• Make sure to look for a key, especially if it's a map. This can provide context into what the map is representing and can help you answer the question.
• If a source is historical it is very helpful to look for the date and remind yourself of other important events that happened around that time, it kind of provides a mental map of context for the question.
• Link dates to the unit-specific time periods.
• Read and look at everything. Every piece of information on the sources can help you, whether it be author, time period, location, etc. You can often almost answer a question based on the title of the source alone.
• Not all the information it gives you is useful. Read the question first and then search the source for the answers based on that. You don’t need to reread parts that aren’t related to the question.
• You may be able to answer questions already from your background knowledge and vocabulary.
• Find every vocabulary word in the answers, and underline/circle them. Sometimes a small change in definition can make an answer choice entirely wrong. If you have never seen a word before (assuming you have studied your vocab thoroughly), it is probably not the correct answer!

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🤔 Choosing the Best Answer

• Focus on eliminating the wrong answers before choosing the right answer.
  • Look for dates, numbers, or words that make an answer immediately wrong. All it takes is one incorrect word to immediately disqualify an answer.
• Avoid answers that have extreme language (e.g. “always, never”) unless you’re sure it’s correct.
• Some questions include both an answer and an explanation, so read them carefully to make sure they match!
• Choose the answer that aligns most closely with your understanding of the material and/or question.
• Narrow it down to 2 options before you choose one. In general, there will be one that is just wrong, one that is a correct statement but doesn’t answer/have to do with the question, and then two that are possible correct answers. Find the answer that most closely answers the question.
• Some answer choices might have extremely similar wording with just one or two words different, make sure you read each one carefully because even if an answer choice sounds right, those few different words are often the difference between a correct and an incorrect question.
• There are usually 2 answers that are very similar. These 2 answers may only be a few words apart, but the difference is huge.
  • When you’re down to two answer choices, make sure you are answering the question they are asking. What I mean by this is that even though both the questions may have facts that are correct, one will apply better to the question than the other. The answer choice that is both true and applicable is likely going to be most helpful.
  • For the tie figure out what the differences are between both of the options you have. Think about what the difference in the wording could mean for the question as a whole. Then take the most informed decision.