The Exam
Put your exploration of Spanish to the test—and gain some college credit in the process—with the AP Spanish Language Exam. The exam evaluates your understanding of written and spoken Spanish and your ability to speak and write in correct and idiomatic Spanish.
About the Exam
The exam, which lasts about three hours, includes multiple-choice and free-response sections. During the multiple-choice section, you'll demonstrate your listening and reading comprehension skills. The free-response sections test your productive skills of speaking and writing, and specifically your ability to integrate language skills in the interpretive, interpersonal and presentational modes of communication.
All the directions printed inside the exam books are in both English and Spanish. Remember to respond only in Spanish. You may not use dictionaries or other reference works during the exam.
Since recording equipment is used during the test, you need to make sure you're familiar with the equipment before the test date. Ask your teacher to prepare a trial run of the equipment and procedures used during the test.
Section I: Multiple-Choice
The multiple-choice section tests two skills: listening and reading:
Listening
The listening portion begins with several short dialogues and narratives. For these exercises, the questions are spoken on the master recording but not printed in the exam book, while the answer choices are printed but not spoken.
The listening part continues with two longer selections that may be interviews, cultural communications, broadcasts, or other appropriate spoken materials. You are encouraged to take notes during this part of the exam and are given writing space for that purpose. Your notes will not affect your scores. You can see the printed multiple-choice questions while you listen; these questions are not spoken on the master recording.
The oral stimuli for the listening portion of the exam may be authentic, unabridged sources or rerecorded versions.
Reading
The reading part comprises several passages, each followed by comprehension questions. Passages typically are prose fiction, journalistic articles, or essays. Some of the written texts may include a visual component or a Web page. Students are asked to identify the main points and significant details and make inferences and predictions from the written texts. Some questions may require making cultural inferences or inserting an additional sentence in the appropriate place in the reading passage.
Unlike other multiple-choice tests, random guessing can hurt your final score. While you don't lose anything for leaving a question blank, one third of a point is subtracted for each incorrect answer on the test. But if you have some knowledge of the question and can eliminate one or more answers, it's usually to your advantage to choose what you believe is the best answer from the remaining choices.
Section II: Free-Response
Writing
There are four types of questions on the writing portion:
- You'll read a passage in which several words are replaced by blanks. Fill in the appropriate form of the root word indicated for each blank. Note that exactly one word should be written on each line.
- Another fill-in exercise will consist of two passage-completion sets in which root words will not be provided. You’ll read two brief paragraphs and fill in 10 blanks (5 in each passage) with the most appropriate words. You’ll write only one word in each blank.
- The next exercise is an informal writing task, an example of the interpersonal mode of communication. This task consists of one question that will ask you to write an e-mail message, a letter or a postcard, for example. You’ll have 10 minutes to read the question and write your response.
- The final, formal essay writing exercise is a document-based question that integrates listening, reading, and speaking skills (an example of the interpretive and presentational modes of communication). You will read documents (7 minutes), listen to a related audio source (approx. 3 minutes), plan your response (5 minutes), and then write your essay in response to the written prompt (40 minutes). All sources, both written and aural, are authentic, either in their original format or rerecorded. You are encourages to make reference to and cite all of the sources in your essay.
Speaking
There are two different types of speaking exercises, integrating reading, listening, and speaking skills in both informal and formal contexts.
- The informal speaking exercise is a role-play situation where you will be asked to interact with a recorded conversation. There will be five or six opportunities for you to answer, and each response can be up to 20 seconds in length. You will have time to read an outline of the conversation and the instructions for responding before participating in the exercise.
- In the formal speaking exercise, you will give an oral presentation in a formal or academic setting. You will read one document and listen to a recording, after which you will have 2 minutes to prepare for your presentation and 2 minutes to give your presentation on the topic given. You are encouraged to make reference to and cite both sources.
Scoring the Exam
The multiple-choice section counts for 50 percent of your grade (Listening, 20%; Reading, 30%). The free-response section contributes the remaining 50 percent (Writing, 30%; Speaking, 20%).
