The FRQ seems to be an almost insurmountable mountain to climb in just 35 short minutes. However, do not fret it has be done for the past decade by students just like you. Yes, that means you can do it too. The FRQ is really just an essay, a logical brain dump of information (now that may be an over simplification, but who cares). The FRQs are dependent on the student analyzing question, not merely regurgitating a story that is somewhat relevant to the prompt. Here are some helpful tips:
1. Have a clear argument that sounds intelligent.
2. Restate the question in the introductory paragraph and include appropriate context to frame the question in a certain time period.
3. Define important words in the prompt.
4. Use examples strictly within the time period that the question poses.
5. Know you facts and do not mix up the difference between the 19th century and the 1900s (along with any other dates).
6. Analyze. Analyze. Analyze.
7. Make sure to connect evidence back to the your thesis statement (i.e. randomly throwing a date, person, or event does not help if you do not relate it to your thesis)
8. Relax, it is just a short essay. You have done it before, you can do it again.
This is definitely a good way of understanding how to do an FRQ. I believe that both forms of essay writing the FRQ and the DBQ have their positives and negatives. However they both have some similarities. One of the biggest one that I think everybody could improve on is that of analyzation. At this point most of us know how to write an essay we know how to outline it and we know what to write. However, what many of us do not do is when it comes time for commentary we do not completely articulate what we are trying to say. For example, in the last FRQ that we did earlier this month a lot of people picked the first topic to write on. Which make sense we had talked about it, read about it, everything however it is very important that you connect your information to the thesis you have written otherwise it is useless. Like the ships for naval bases agreement between the British and America prior to America's involvement. Yet what was the significance what made that so important that it is worth mentioning in an essay about neutrality in pre war America. These are the kind of things that give you As or a high score on the AP test. Anyway to conclude I think what Nic put is really good and we can all improve if we just analyze. Think of it this way you will get an A if you analyze.
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