When is a Q1 not a Q1?

Here are the instructions for a recent Part B on the AP Seminar exam.

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With all of your practice with Q1 on the AP Lang test, you can see a lot of similarities. They're giving you sources (4 instead of 6 or 7 but all of them will be wordy) and you only need to include two sources in your writing (it's 3 on AP Lang). Similarly, you'll need to cite your sources with parentheticals (Source A) or by giving According to tags.

Also, you can see that what they want is an argument. Convince them of something on a "theme or issue you identified." Obviously, you won't be able to argue that The Batman is a superior movie to The Dark Knight if there's no Batman-related material in the sources, but otherwise you have wide latitude about what you want to argue.

Here's the rubric they're using:

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You have 90 minutes to complete this.

Let's use the rubric to break down the advice:

Rubric 1: Establish Argument--They want to see that your argument doesn't just steal it's argument from one of the sources but instead finds an interesting combination between at least two sources. Take the peanut butter from one source and add it to the jelly of another to generate a new thesis/main claim.

Rubric 2: Establish Argument--They also, obviously, want a strong argument. This means that you have reasons (they keep calling them claims) that are different from each other which you support with evidence and explain with commentary. Normal argument-y stuff.

Rubric 3: Select and Use Evidence--Pull evidence from at least two sources (quotes, summaries, ideas--always credited) and use it show why your reasons are correct. Just like in the synthesis essay, you're going to want to have two different pieces of evidence per body paragraph.

Rubric 4: Conventions--First, this is just straightforward spelling, grammar, punctuation stuff. But they also want to know that you know how to integrate quotes into your argument. Give According to tags and explain who is saying what in the evidence.

See the test to understand what we're talking about.

See the graded student versions here.

Then read the Commentary on what they want to see here.