Lessons Learned at the AP Stats Reading

1. "AP Reading" is a fancy (and somewhat pretentious) way of saying "AP Grading". We graded exams from 8:00-5:00 with two breaks and lunch. On a good day, I probably saw 1000 exams. I was trained on 2 questions and spent 7 days on just those two questions.
2. Life is WAY easier when you answer correctly. We spent 99%+ of our time siftin gthrough incorrect responses, trying to find some way to grant credit. The perfect (or even just really good) papers were a delight to score.
3. We celebrate top scores of 4 on a given question (each QUESTION gets a score of 0-4, the EXAM is scored 1-5). On Question 4, I saw about one 4 every set of 25 papers. On Question 2, it was more like 1 in 100. That means out of every 100 0r more papers, I would hope to see one that scored a 4. Once I went 286 tests without seeing one response that I could give a 4 to. Also, we noticed when runs of scores (good and bad) came from the same school. It was very cool when one school produced a run of really good tests. I would like people to say that about us next year.
4. Jokes, pictures, cartoons, etc. really aren't that funny...unless your answr is really good, which doesn't usually happen. When it does, it's very cool.
5. When you don't know the answer, or what to do, writing notes, drawing pictures, rambling about your life, begging for a point, etc. doesn't ever get you credit. But it does break up the monotony, which is nice. Reading 1000 versions of the same question in one day gets a little old. It was nice to see someone bail on the question, but write something kind of funny.
6. Don't be casual in your answer. It blew me away how many students answered the question convinced they were going to get a perfect score and ended up with a 0 or 1 because they were sloppy.
7. Don't start any response with the word "Well, ...". Nothing good EVER follows an opening like that.
8. Good responses are SO nice to see and read so well! Give your reader a break and let him/her celebrate a 4.
9. No one really cares how bad your teacher is/was.
10. The wrong WORD (or the right one) can make all the difference. Seriously. Learn your terms!
11. Many of the readers are old and very nerdy - I kid you not. Many are college professors who don't believe in calculators or any of the other conveniences we take for granted. They don't live in your world, but you have to (want to) shine in theirs. Make a concerted effort to impress the old, nerdy, stats professors and you will be very pleased with your results.

Bottom line - I learned a lot of stuff that I am going to teach you. Please believe in me - I already believe in you. Peace.