AP United States History

AP United States History: 2010-11 Syllabus Mr. Klipfel / jklipfel@hartdistrict.org

Texts and Readings:

The American Pageant (12^th edition): issued by library

Kennedy, David M., Lizabeth Cohen, and Thomas A. Bailey. The American Pageant: A History of the Republic. Twelfth Edition. Boston: McDougal Littell/Houghton Mifflin. 2002.

The American Spirit Voumes. 1 and 2: classroom copies (available for student checkout)

Bailey, Thomas A. and David M. Kennedy. The American Spirit: United States History as Seen by Contemporaries. Ninth Edition. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company. 1998.

The Harper Single Volume American Literature: issued by library

McQuade, Donald, Ed. The Harper Single Volume American Literature. Third Edition. Menlo Park, California: Longman. 1999.

Assigned articles, works, and novels: issued by the instructor, library or checked out/purchased on own.

The Course:

“Students should learn to assess historical materials--their relevance to a given interpretive problem, their reliability, and their importance--and to weigh the evidence and interpretations presented in historical scholarship. An AP US History course should thus develop the skills necessary to arrive at conclusions on the basis of an informed judgment and to present reasons and evidence clearly and persuasively in essay format. Although there is little to be gained by rote memorization of names and dates in an encyclopedic manner, a student must be able to draw upon a reservoir of systematic factual knowledge in order to exercise analytic skills intelligently. Striking a balance between teaching factual knowledge and critical analysis is a demanding but crucial task in the design of a successful AP course in history. In addition to exposing students to the historical content, an AP course should also train students to analyze and interpret primary sources. Students should learn to take notes from both printed materials and lectures or discussions, write essay examinations, and write analytical and research papers. They should be able to express themselves with clarity and precision and know how to cite sources and credit the phrases and ideas of others.” ---The College Board

This course is a one-year survey of American history from the late 1400s to the present. Students who dedicate themselves to the course should be prepared to take the AP exam in May. The volume of material necessitates a pace that will require students to do an extensive amount of work.

· Students should plan to read about four chapters (about 100 pages) every three weeks. See the attached calendar to keep up.

· Students are expected to generate a form of Cornell Notes as they read each chapter. These will be checked for quality and completion.

· Students are expected to make an essay outline for each chapter in the text.

· Frequent short answer and multiple choice quizzes will be given to assess the mastery of each chapter. See the attached calendar for these dates.

· In-class essays exams (FRQ’s and DBQ’s) will be given at the conclusion of nearly every unit. See the attached calendar for these dates.

· Other significant assignments will be given periodically to promote student acquisition of the content and skill of the course. For example, the fall semester will include a term paper and a protest rally. The spring semester will include an acting assignment, an oral book report, and an interview assignment.

· A comprehensive mid-term exam will be given at the end of the first quarter, and comprehensive final exams will be given at the end of both semesters.

· Extra credit assignments are available from the teacher until the second progress report of each semester—15 weeks. These generally involve producing a written or oral assessment of multiple readings/sources on course topics.

Grades:

The semester grade will roughly match the following: 60% exams (one third of this will be the final exam), 20% term paper (fall) or acting, interview, and oral bookreport (spring), and 15% homework, and 5% participation. Participation tickets are rewarded at the instructors discretion during most lessons. Students must earn a minimum of two per week to receive full credit in this area. Also, extra credit assignments will not exceed 5% of the total points.

The Exam:

“The exam is three hours and five minutes in length. It consists of a 55-minute multiple-choice section and a 130-minute free-response section. The free-response section begins with a mandatory 15-minute reading period. You are advised to spend most of that time analyzing the documents and planning your answer to the Document-Based essay question (DBQ) in Part A. Suggested writing time for the DBQ is 45 minutes. Parts B and C each include two standard essay questions that, taken together, cover the period from the first European explorations of the Americas to the present. You are required to answer one essay question in each part in a total of 70 minutes. Suggested time to be spent on each of the essay questions you choose to answer in Parts B and C is 5 minutes for planning and 30 minutes for writing your answer.

“Scores earned on the multiple-choice and free-response sections each account for half of your examination grade. Within the free-response section, the DBQ counts for 45 percent, the two standard essays for 27.5 percent each. Both the multiple-choice and free-response sections cover the period from the first European explorations of the Americas to the present, although the majority of questions are on the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. In the multiple-choice section, approximately one-sixth of the questions deal with the period through 1789, one-half with the period 1790-1914, and one-third with the period of 1915 to the present. The multiple-choice section may include a few questions on the period since 1975, but neither the DBQ nor the essay questions in Parts B and C deal exclusively with this period. The free-response section is designed to allow students from widely differing courses to demonstrate their mastery of historical interpretation and their ability to express their views and knowledge in writing. The standard essay questions may require you to describe a relationship between developments in different areas (e.g. the political implications of an economic issue such as the panic of 1837). They may also ask you to analyze common themes in different time periods (e.g., the concept of isolationism in United States foreign policy), or to compare individual or group experiences that reflect social, economic, ethnic, racial, or gender differences (e.g., the culture that Black slaves developed). You are also expected to have a general understanding of key interpretations of major historical events, and you should be able to relate literary materials, when included in a question, to politics, social and economic life, or related cultural and intellectual movements. Answers to standard essay questions will be judged on the strength of the thesis developed, the quality of the historical argument, and the relevance of examples, rather than on coverage alone. The 80 questions in the multiple-choice section of the exam measure your knowledge of the subject matter commonly covered in introductory college courses in United States history. These questions test your factual knowledge, breadth of preparation, and knowledge-based analytical skills. To receive a grade of 3, you must answer about 60 percent of the questions correctly, in addition to doing acceptable work on the broader questions in the free-response section.” ---The College Board

The calendar below will be subject to revision as the year progresses. The dates listed are the approximate dates that a chapter’s coverage will begin. Chapters should be read and study guide assignments should be started or even completed by that date!

Unit #1: Colonization

August 12 Chapter 1: New World Beginnings

August 17 Chapter 2: The Planting of English America, 1500-1733

August 20 Chapter 3: Settling the Northern Colonies, 1619-1700

August 25 Chapter 4: American Life in the Seventeenth Century, 1607-1692

August 30 Chapter 5: Colonial Society on the Eve of Revolution, 1700-1775

September 2……………….………………………………….…... 30 minute unit #1 essay exam

Unit #2: New Nation

September 3 Chapter 6: The Duel for North America, 1608-1763

September 8 Chapter 7: The Road to Revolution, 1763-1775

September 13 Chapter 8: America Secedes from the Empire, 1775-1783

September 16 Chapter 9: The Confederation and the Constitution, 1776-1790

September 23…………………….………………………..….…... 30 minute unit #2 essay exam

Unit #3: The Early Years

September 24 Chapter 10: Launching the New Ship of State, 1789-1800

September 29 Chapter 11: The Triumph and Travails of the Jeffersonian Republic, 1800-1812

October 6 Chapter 12: The Second War for Independence and Upsurge of Nationalism, 1812-1824

October 13………………………………………………………… Midterm: DBQ #1—In-class 60 minute essay

Unit #4: Reform

October 14 Chapter 13: The Rise of Mass Democracy, 1824-1840

October 19 Chapter 14: Forging the National Economy, 1790-1860

October 22 Chapter 15: The Ferment of Reform and Culture, 1790-1860

October 27 Chapter 16: The South and the Slavery Controversy, 1793-1860

November 2………………………………………………………. 30 minute essay or 60 minute DBQ Unit Exam

Friday, November 5………………….………………………….. Acting Presentations in the MPR at 7pm (Final date TBA)

Unit #5: Growth, Sectionalism, and Civil War

November 3 Chapter 17: Manifest Destiny and Its Legacy, 1841-1848

November 8 Chapter 18: Renewing the Sectional Struggle, 1848-1854

November 15 (Combine Ch. 18-19 quizzes?) Chapter 19: Drifting Toward Disunion, 1854-1861

November 19…………..………………………………………… 30 minute essay or 60 minute DBQ Unit Exam

November 22 (Chapters 20 and 21 done largely on your own) Chapters 20-21: Girding for War: The North and South / The Furnace of Civil War

Unit #6: Reconstruction and the Early Gilded Age

November 23 Chapter 22: The Ordeal of Reconstruction, 1865-1877

November 30 (Combine Ch. 22-23 quizzes?) Chapter 23: Political Paralysis in the Gilded Age, 1869-1896

December 3 Chapter 24: Industry comes of Age, 1865-1900

December 8 Chapter 25: America Moves to the City, 1865-1900

December 14, 15, and 16………………………………………..... Final Exam (~250 Questions/Scan-tron: Ch. 1-25)

WINTER BREAK ASSIGNMENT: Read and make study guides for chapters 26, 23B, 27, and 28

Unit #7: The Gilded Age Part II and Imperialism

January 10 (Chapters 26 and 23b) Chapter 26 and 23b: The Great West and the Agricultural Revolution (Also, reread 520-526.)

January 14………………………………………………………… DBQ—In-class 60 minute essay

January 18 (Chapters 27 and 28) Chapter 27: The Path of Empire, 1890-1899

Chapter 28: America on the World Stage, 1899-1909

January 27…………..……………………………………………. DBQ or 30 minute essay: Gilded Age and/or Imperialism (Ch. 23-28)

Unit #8: Progressivism, WWI, and the Boom and Bust

January 28 (Chapters 29 and 30a) Chapter 29: Progressivism and the Republican Roosevelt, 1901-1912

Chapter 30a: Wilsonian Progressivism at Home and Abroad, 1912-1916 (pp. 687-696)

February 7 (Chapters 30b and 31) Chapter 30b: Wilsonian Progressivism at Home and Abroad, 1912-1916 (pp. 696-703)

Chapter 31: The War to End War, 1917-1918

February 15 (Chapters 32-33a) Chapter 32: American Life in the Roaring Twenties, 1919-1929

Chapter 33a: The Politics of Boom and Bust, 1920-1932 (pp. 753-767)

February 25 (Chapters 33b-34) Chapter 33b: The Politics of Boom and Bust, 1920-1932 (pp. 767-776)

Chapter 34: The Great Depression and the New Deal, 1933-1938

March 8………..…………………………………………………. DBQ or 30 minute essay: Progressivism, 1920’s, Depression, and/or New Deal

Unit #9: Final Stretch

March 9 (Chapters 35 and 36) Chapter 35 and 36: Franklin D. Roosevelt and the Shadow of War / America in WWII, 1941-1945

March 21 Chapter 37: The Cold War Begins, 1945-1952

March 24 Chapter 38: The Eisenhower Era, 1952-1960

March 31………………………………………………………….. DBQ or 30 minute essay: WWII, Early Cold War, and/or Civil Rights

SPRING BREAK: April 4-8 à Finish all remaining chapters and study guides. Continue intensive review and practice tests.

April 1 Chapter 39: The Stormy Sixties, 1960-1968

April 15 Chapter 40: The Stalemated Seventies, 1968-1980

April 25 Chapter 41: The Resurgence of Conservatism, 1980-2000