With 45 questions in an hour, five answer choices per question, it’s understandable why the multiple-choice section can be intimidating. 

In working with my own students, I’ve found that allowing students to collaborate in small groups and practice with low-pressure, timed situations helps them gain confidence with their pacing and accuracy. 

Here are three activities to help demystify the AP Lang MCQ section.

Activity 1: Create Your Own Questions

This activity is a great way to introduce students to AP Lang passages and question stems. After students have read the passage, have students work in groups (ideally of three to four students) to use a list of prepared question stems to create their own questions. 

Why This Works

Providing students with question stems introduces them to the key concepts of the course. Since the goal of this activity is to help students become familiar with the types of questions on the AP Lang multiple-choice section, have students focus on creating just the questions, not the answer choices. Providing question stems guides students as they focus on the significant movements of the passage, a skill that will greatly help them when writing a rhetorical analysis essay.

Which Question Stems Should I Give My Students?

Here are some question stems that can work with a variety of nonfiction reading passages. With these question stems, students are able to input passage-specific information where they see ___ or …

• In the opening paragraph, the writer…primarily to…
• In context, lines __ - ___ could be used to support which of the following claims about the writer’s tone?
• In the ____ paragraph, the writer… primarily to…
• The speaker's attitude toward _____ is best described as one of … 
• What is the function of _____ ? 
• The phrase, “__” functions primarily as … 

Activity 2: Create Your Own Answer Choices

One of the most common frustrations with multiple-choice on standardized tests is that students can use the process of elimination to narrow the options down to two. However, deciding which of the two answers is the correct answer and which is the lead distractor (an answer choice that is close but not correct) can be tricky.

Give student groups question stems for a passage and have them think like the test creators. Let them write the answer choices. You can even have groups trade with each other and complete the other group’s questions when they are done.

Why This Works

Having students create answer choices helps them learn to recognize (and ultimately avoid) common answer traps. For example, students will need to focus on the precision of their wording, possibly creating one answer choice that might be “true” but not as precise as another answer choice. Additionally, students might create an incorrect answer choice that is “true” but is found in the wrong portion of the passage or isn’t truly answering the question being asked.

Activity 3: I Do Then We Do

According to my students, the “I do the we do” format has been the most helpful in preparing for the ACT and the AP Lang exam. In order to help my students prepare for the time constraints of their upcoming standardized tests, I provide them with one passage and time them as they answer the questions independently. 

Initially, I try to give them more time than what they would receive on the exam. Think of it like someone who is learning to run a 5K: at first the runner’s time is slower, but as they become more adept at the race, their pacing improves. Students’ pacing improves with more timed practice. It helps for them to get used to an activity with light pressure, such as answering questions for one passage, so they are more adept at pacing when taking a full practice exam. 

After students have answered the questions independently, have them review their answers in a small group. From here, there are a few options for instruction. I’ll include a couple of my favorites below:

Option 1: I like to provide students with the correct answers and then assign each group one to two questions. As a group, they discuss the correct answer and explain to the class the rationale for the correct answer. They also explain why two other answer choices were incorrect. 

This option allows students to collaborate as they discuss the answer rationales. Plus, they know the correct answer, so if anyone in the group answered incorrectly during the independent portion, other group members who answered correctly can help explain the rationale. If no one answered correctly when working independently, group members now know the correct answer and can “work backwards” to determine why it is correct. 

One of the reasons I love this activity is because it creates an environment where students can learn from each other. In order to ease potential apprehension, I let students select their own groups, and I tell them at the start of the independent portion that it is a completion grade. This tends to limit the temptation for students to change answers.

Option 2: Have students discuss their answers and agree on a final answer key. As with the previous option, this is an excellent way for students to discuss answer rationales and learn from each other. Personally, I like to take the answer key for a relatively low point value grade, but this could also be a completion activity if desired.

Bonus Tip: At the beginning of the year, when students are answering MCQ independently, I encourage my students to add smiley faces beside the question number: a smile if they are confident with their answer, a “flat smile” if they are somewhat unsure with their answer, and a frown if they are very unsure of their answer. 

This is a quick way for students to gauge how they felt about the questions. It also helps them recognize potential trends. For example, are they answering the “flat smile” questions correctly, even if they aren’t confident in their answer? If so, it shows them to trust their instincts. Are they putting smiles next to questions with similar question stems? This helps students realize their strengths. 

The smiley face method also helps if students answer incorrectly. Did they put a smiley face because they were confident when answering the question, but the answer choice was incorrect? This means the student needs to review the rationale for the correct answer so they can learn from it.  

Final Thoughts

• Don’t be afraid to start with the basics like understanding the question stems.
• Focus on one passage at a time before building to a full-length practice test.
• Set a time limit for answering the questions to help students work on pacing. (Consider giving students more time than they would receive on the exam when they are first beginning their MCQ practice. You can reduce the time as the year progresses.)
• Allow students opportunities to answer questions individually and review as a group so they can learn from each other.
• Encourage students to reflect on the rationale behind the correct answer and why the other options were incorrect to help students be more aware of answer traps.

Looking for more teacher tips for AP Lang MCQ? Check out this video!