Barron's AP Biology

By WWHS student

I love this book. It helped me get great grades on tests in class and a 5 on the AP exam! Our textbook was more than 1200 pages -- too long! I bought this review book a few months after the class started. But I should have bought it at the beginning of the year because once I began to study from it, I started to do better on class tests.

My teacher always gave us essay questions on her tests and the Free-Response Questions and Answers at the end of every chapter are really great. They really explain the material clearly. Also, the review book has 1 diagnostic test and 2 practice tests. That's more than any other review book that I saw.

English is my second language and got a 5 in the exam. Before I got this book in April, I always had 3 in practice exams (finals at school). In class, my grades were C (first semester) and B (second semester).

The best thing about this review was that it was well-organized unlike many other reviews that the topics were all-over. This review started off with diagnostic test that had higher standard than the AP exam and finished off with answers in detail. In every chapter, it had enough graphs and figures to remember the detail figuratively rather than memorizing word-for-word. (Someone said that the number of diagrams was superfluous but I learnt much quicker with detail AND diagrams) For every important terms, it was in bold or italics so that I was more aware of what I was expected in the exam. The chapters finished off with multiple-choice questions which I knew whether that chapter was dead easy or I needed to reread the chapter pedantically. There were also few...Read more

So I got this book about 2 months before the AP test. I opened it like 5 days before the AP test and started cramming and cramming non-stop. Please do not use this approach unless you find the world of Biology fascinating. The five days with this book, I must say, were torturous but very helpful. Now you need to understand that I probably have the worst AP Biology teacher imaginable, he covered 30% of the topics and did pointless labs the entire time. Anyway about the book, it is very well organized, no mistakes, errors, and probably the best substitute for a textbook. I got a 4 on the AP exam using this book and some released exams in 5 days work.

Now for many of you who can't settle for anything but a 5, I will tell you what you need.

Getting a 5:

- Get this Book
- Get released exams (easy to find, try this site:[...]) and do them all.
- Read this book once throughout the year. Then read the book again 3 weeks before the test...Read more