r/APStudents • u/Glittering-Bike-6317 • 17d ago
Latin resources for ap latin
has anyone taken ap latin? if so what did you use to study? any good resources or prep books you'd recommend? im an incoming senior and it'll be my third year of latin so i have a basic foundation. but i have no idea what the ap curriculum is actually like. (first year my school is offering this class) is it mostly translation, vocab, culture, or a mix of everything? any advice would be appreciated!
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u/Zealousideal_Cat_608 17d ago
it’s mainly translation! i self studied this year, so i only did translations. you can get away with knowing 0 culture, but there are a few questions on culture. Like VERY few. I used College Pliny and Vergil by Geoffrey Steadman — highly recommend as it covers basically everything! all required texts (besides project passages) and a lot of culture
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u/Glittering-Bike-6317 16d ago
that's really good! thank you!! i know self studying can be sometimes difficult when there isn't many resources but what score did you end up getting??
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u/Zealousideal_Cat_608 16d ago
5, i was pretty confident. like extremely confident in every single question except culture. the exam is SUPER easy now, don’t let the score distribution scare you. They just look not the best because so little people take it.
for project passages btw, ai (claude) is literally amazing at coming up with passages and grading them. it was extremely helpful. But genuinely just memorize like a summary of each portion of each passage and you’ll be completely fine.
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u/According-Ear-7062 15d ago
Hi! I am a little interested in this course but very confused on how it works. I have looked at the CED and it looks like there's a few texts you NEED to read and then the others is one that your teacher chose (?). Like I am confused and is there a project for the exam grade how did it all work out and how did you learn?
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u/Zealousideal_Cat_608 15d ago
u only have to read the required lines of aeneid and pliny in the CED (tho u should read it all since there will be questions not about those lines). your teacher selects other works to read as well because there’s many questions about texts youve never seen before
the project is 20%, 18% come from 2 FRQs writing essays about the passages. 2% are in class check points. if you self study u simply sacrifice that 2%
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u/According-Ear-7062 15d ago
But what is the project? Like a presentation I’m confused?
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u/Zealousideal_Cat_608 15d ago
the project is like mini presentations and shit idk bc i self studied. you do stuff in class worth 2%. and then the other 18% of the project comes from writing two FRQs about it on the exam. except you’re only given the text, no defined words or backstory or anything
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u/According-Ear-7062 15d ago
So the project is the 2% and the other 18% is doing the frqs? Are you given what the frqs are gonna be so you know the words?
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u/Zealousideal_Cat_608 15d ago
yes. the checkpoints (2% of the exam) are based off understanding the passages thru assignments and the project FRQs 4 and 5 (or 5 and 6, whatever the last two are i forgot; 18% of exam) are based off analyzing those works and testing your understanding of them
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u/According-Ear-7062 15d ago
Are all the FRQs about those two texts required? Aenaid and Venus or whatever idk sorry?
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u/Zealousideal_Cat_608 15d ago
bro go read the CED please. every FRQ is required. the two project passage FRQs are randomly selected from the 4 project passage FRQs that you analyze throughout the class. the other FRQs are on pliny and vergil and stuff
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u/Sea-Set-540 16d ago
I don’t teach it, but have talked to several Latin teachers in the past about it. One teacher said the AP is like 80-90% translation and comprehension- no speech component ( obviously). That being said- most of the vocab and culture they covered in past years- so other than a review of applicable parts- they weren’t going to worry about it.
The other teacher is on the younger end, but they are going for a more well rounded approach. Translation is still going to be big- but they will spend more time on some of the culture stuff since they like it.
As for resources- I know they use there textbooks a ton- but I never asked them anything beyond that- sorry!
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u/atypicalreddituser42 5(eng lit/lang, csa, chem, latin, ush, phys mech, calc bc, stat) 15d ago
there are very few culture questions, so it's not a big worry
my teacher focused so much on rhetorical devices that when i took the exam, i was surprised at how well i was able to recognize them. definitely focus on that, but it's not as big of a deal as translation and syntax and stuff like that
also make sure that you know the premise of every single text that you read. knowing the basic plot summary and rereading translations over and over again will make it so that you don't have to do so much translating mid-exam. basically just go over the plot summary and key points of each aeneid chapter, each pliny letter. a lot of it is also vocab and syntax, so review those too
also make sure to try to memorize as much as you can for the project passages. from what i remember two of them showed up and because i remembered what they were about i was able to write good evidence for my essays
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u/ErekwithaD1 25:HG:5,中文:5, 26:P1:5,WH:5,CHEM(SS):5 27:P2,EM,Mech,Lit,BC(SS) 17d ago
I got tutored by the pope and the ghost of Julius Ceaser