AP® Seminar

This Advanced Placement AP® Seminar course is an interdisciplinary course that encourages students to demonstrate critical thinking, collaboration, and academic research skills on topics of the student’s choosing. To accommodate the wide range of student topics, typical college course equivalents include interdisciplinary or general elective courses. The rigor of this course is consistent with colleges and universities and will prepare students for the Advanced Placement exam in May. Upon successful completion of the exam, students may receive college credit and will be well-prepared for advanced coursework. Additional details on this course from the College Board can be found here: AP Seminar.

AP® Seminar is an Advanced Placement course that focuses on skills, such as research and collaboration, that are used in all academic disciplines. AP® Seminar is a foundational Advanced Placement® course that engages students in academic and real-world topics. Students will write research-based essays, deliver dynamic presentations, and study a variety of topics and subject-areas. Using an inquiry framework, students practice reading and analyzing articles, research studies, and foundational literary and philosophical texts; listening to and viewing speeches, broadcasts, and personal accounts. Students learn to synthesize information from multiple sources, develop their own perspectives in research-based written essays, and design and deliver oral and visual presentations, both individually and as part of a team. Ultimately, the course aims to equip students with the power to analyze and evaluate information with accuracy and precision in order to craft and communicate evidence-based arguments. (College Board)

The course is centered around five big ideas, embodied in the QUEST framework:

Question and Explore: Challenge and explore the boundaries of your current knowledge.
Understand and Analyze: Contextualize arguments and comprehend authors’ claims.
Evaluate Multiple Perspectives: Consider individual perspectives and the larger conversation of varied points of view.
Synthesize Ideas: Combine knowledge, ideas and your perspective into an argument.
Team, Transform and Transmit: Collaborate, reflect, and communicate your argument in a method suited to your audience.

Students use this Quest framework to conduct both individual and team research projects in this course. The AP® Seminar course requires students to demonstrate research skills through two Performance Tasks, completed during the course, as well as on a more traditional AP exam in May. The AP® Score is calculated as a combination of these three elements:

Performance Task 1: Team Project and Presentation (20% of AP exam score). Students form teams of three to five people. The team identifies, investigates and analyzes a real-world or academic problem or issue. This task consists of an Individual Research Report and a Team Multimedia Presentation and Defense.

Performance Task 2: Individual Research-Based Essay and Presentation (35% of AP exam score). Students work individually to address a research question associated with the theme that the College Board provides each year. Students analyze and identify connections among the provided texts to develop an area of inquiry. Students then pose a question, conduct research, analyze, evaluate, and select evidence to write a paper in which they develop an argument and form a conclusion. Students will then present their findings in an Individual Written Argument and an Individual Multimedia Presentation and Oral Defense.

End-of-Course Exam: 3 short-answer questions and 1 long essay (45% of AP exam score). In the fall semester, students practice all elements of both the team and individual research projects. They apply the QUEST framework, line of reasoning and argumentation as they learn how to do proper academic research, work together in teams, create and present information through presentations, and think on their feet by answering oral defense questions. In the spring semester students are guided to complete their performance tasks to submit to the College Board.

Students are required to meet synchronously with one another for planning, practice and peer review meetings, and with their teacher for check-ins, practice and formal presentations, using an online meeting tool provided through the course. These meetings will be one to three times a week for most weeks throughout the course, though students may choose to meet more at times.

Students will be expected to enroll in My AP Classroom through their VHS Learning AP course and will be guided to complete review work in My AP Classroom throughout the year. My AP Classroom resources include AP Daily Videos and unit-based Personal Progress Checks, which include AP-style multiple choice and free response questions.

Students enrolled in VHS Learning Advanced Placement courses with a passing grade are expected to take the AP Exam. Students register for AP exams through their local school or testing site as “Exam Only” students. AP exam scores will be reported to VHS Learning through My AP Classroom; exam results will not affect the student’s VHS Learning grade or future enrollment in VHS Learning courses.

This AP course has a required summer assignment. The summer assignment is a review of prerequisite content and critical concepts students must be comfortable with before beginning the course. Students are expected to complete their summer assignment before the course begins and submit their work by the end of Week 1. Students who register on or after September 1 will receive an extension to complete the summer assignment by the end of Week 3.

In this AP-level course, students are expected to invest approximately 10 hours per week on their course work.

Acknowledgements

This course requires an extensive number of synchronous meetings between student teams and between students and teachers. Meeting times will generally be scheduled between 7 AM and 8 PM ET, Monday - Friday. Student groups that wish to meet outside this timeframe must have unanimous agreement between the group.
In addition to the enrollment fee, this course has an Additional Course Fee of $80.
The required summer assignment for AP® Seminar will be found in our AP® Summer Work Directory by June 1st.

Course Objectives

Course Essential Questions:

How does the process of asking and answering questions lead to meaningful research?
How can we understand and analyze texts to recognize the implications and predict the consequences of an argument?
How do we understand the complexity of an issue or problem by evaluating multiple perspectives?
How do we think critically about the information and then add to the ideas of others while avoiding plagiarism?
How do we collaborate, communicate and reflect to effectively convey an argument through an appropriate medium?

Course Learning Objectives:

Contextualize and identify the complexities of a problem or issue.
Pose questions and seek answers that reflect multiple perspectives and evaluate the relevance and credibility of sources.
Read sources critically for a specific purpose and explain the main idea.
Analyze the line of reasoning and evaluate the credibility of evidence in an argument.
Identify, compare, and interpret multiple perspectives on or arguments about an issue.
Evaluate alternate, opposing, or competing perspectives or arguments, by considering their implications and limitations.
Formulate a well reasoned argument to interpret and synthesize quantitative/qualitative information from various perspectives to provide insightful commentary that links evidence and claims.
Attribute knowledge and ideas accurately and ethically using an appropriate citation style while being able to offer resolutions, conclusions and/or solutions based on evidence while limitations and implications are considered.
Adapt an argument for context, purpose and audience and then plan, produce and present a cohesive argument to be communicated through appropriate media. Engage an audience through effective techniques and delivery while reflecting on experiences of collaborative and individual effort.
Adhere to established conventions of grammar, mechanics, usage and style.

Additional Requirements

Students enrolled in AP Seminar are required to use Google Workspace and Google Meet through VHS Learning to complete their individual and team projects in the course. The following outlines the technical requirements for using these tools.

Technical Requirements:

Students must have a Google account, but do not need a gmail address. Students who wish to use their Google account through their school may find that permissions do not allow for this and may need to create a second Google account.
To participate in Google Meet sessions, students must have a device with a camera and microphone.
Google Meet requires 4 GB of available memory.
Google Meet is compatible with the two most recent versions of these operating systems: Apple macOS, Microsoft Windows, Chrome OS, Ubuntu, and other Devian-based Linux distributions. Accessible mobile operating systems are Android 2.0 and up or iOS 14 and up.

Required Texts: Students will need to obtain a copy of the following text which is available at many school or local libraries or for purchase online for a small fee: I am Malala: The Girl Who Stood Up for Education and Was Shot by the Taliban by Malala Yousafzai (needed in Week 1).