As part of our study guide for the AP® Physics 1 and AP® Physics 2, we now reveal winning strategies for success on the multiple-choice section.
Most students are a little overwhelmed to say the least, when faced with 50 physics multiple-choice questions. However, if you take our advice, study carefully and work consistently, you’ll dramatically increase your chances of scoring a 5!
We’ll give you some tips for studying for the AP® Physics 1 and 2 multiple-choice as well as some killer advice which will make you a winner on the exam!
And now for the good stuff read the following sections.
Understanding the Format of the Exams
You can read the official description here. The main thing I want to point out is that there are two kinds of multiple-choice questions:
1. 45 “single-select” questions with only one correct answer
2. New for AP® Physics 1 and 2! Five “multi-correct” questions with two correct answers. You have to select both correct answers to get credit for the question.
How to Prepare for the Multiple-Choice Section
1. Review the material. This is important, but make sure that you don’t spend too long on it, because you might not leave enough time for the next step!
2. Practice, Practice, Practice! This is the most important You can find practice questions in a few places:
– Official sample questions from the College Board here and here
– The Albert.io website also has hundreds of practice questions
– Review books like Barron’s also have many practice questions and practice exams
We recommend that for each topic you review, you should do a few practice multiple-choice (and free-response) questions. In the final stage of your exam prep, take a few timed full-length practice exams.
How to Answer AP® Physics 1 and 2 Multiple-Choice Questions
1. Read, and reread the question. Make sure you understand what you’re being asked. The exams ask questions in many different ways. Students have lost many points by rushing to answer a question without reading it carefully.
2. Pace yourself. If a question takes too long, move on! It’s not worth it to spend too much time on hard questions if it means you run out of time for the easy ones!
3. If you don’t know the answer, make a guess and mark the question. You can come back to it if you have time.
4. Set a target of 10 questions every 15 minutes. Then you’ll be left with 15 minutes spare, if you need more time or if you want to review questions.
5. Answer every question. There’s no negative grading, so there’s no reason for leaving an answer out. If you just can’t figure it out, guess! At least you’ll have a chance of getting it right!
6. Use the formula sheet. These will be provided at the exam, but you can download one for AP® Physics 1 and AP® Physics 2.
7. Use a calculator. Most scientific and graphing calculators (except those with a qwerty keyboard) are allowed for the entire exam.
Sample AP® Physics 1 & 2 Multiple-Choice Questions
For your study guide to AP® Physics 1 and 2 multiple-choice, we’ll now go through a few practice questions from the official AP® sample questions.
AP® Physics 1
First, one from AP® Physics 1: question 13 (on page 166) at this link. Here you need to rank magnitudes of acceleration by examining the graph. You should note two things, which show you how important it is to read the question carefully. Firstly, this is a velocity-time graph. If you mistook it for a position-time graph, you probably wouldn’t get the right answer. Secondly, it’s asking you to compare the sizes of the average acceleration, not the instantaneous acceleration. The instantaneous acceleration is the slope of the graph. It has its largest value at the beginning of AB, but the average velocity is not biggest during this segment. To find the average velocity, find the slope of a straight line drawn from A to B.
So to answer the question, we need to rank the slopes of the above straight line from A to B and the slopes of the lines in the other three segments. Right off the bat, we can see that BC has a slope of zero, which means that { a }_{ BC } is the smallest acceleration. The only choice for which this is true is (D), so this is sufficient to tell us that (D) is the right answer. We didn’t have to do any calculation at all! If you want to, you can check, by inspection that (D) has the other accelerations in the right order.
AP® Physics 2
Now, let’s take a gander at a sample question from AP® Physics 2. Note that this question is one of the new multi-correct questions, where you must mark two correct answer choices in order to get credit for the question. We’ll look at question 23 on page 207 at this link. Again, you have to read the question carefully and understand what it’s asking. It deals with the ideal gas law and how to relate it to a graph of the pressure vs temperature.
When you read the question, did you notice that the temperature is in Celsius, not kelvin? If you didn’t notice this and take it into account, you would get the wrong answer! The ideal gas law, PV = nRT, is only true for temperatures in kelvin, not Celsius. For an ideal gas at zero kelvin (absolute zero), the pressure is zero. Therefore, the graph of P vs T would go through the origin, which would lead you to believe (falsely) that (B) is correct. Since the temperature is in Celsius, the graph would go through the origin at a negative temperature (-273 °C, corresponding to 0 K), so that (C) is a correct choice. The other correct choice is (A); since an increase in temperature corresponds to an increase in pressure, the slope must be positive. So, you would have to mark both (A) and (C) to get credit for this question.
That’s all for now, folks! Did you find our study guide for the AP® Physics 1 and 2 multiple-choice useful? What are your favorite exam strategies? Let us know!
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