APCS: AP Computer Science A @sfhs

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The first quarter exam will be Monday October 10, 2022(60 min) and Tuesday October 11, 2022 (30 min) in class. It will be similar to the other tests that we have had. On Monday you have an hour to answer around 40 questions which are a combination of true/false, multiple choice, and short answer questions. On Tuesday you will have 30 minutes to answer 2 Free Response questions. The first question will ask you to write a method (much like a codingbat.com warmup exercise), and the second question will ask you to write a class. I will give you a choice of methods and classes, and you just need select one of each to write.

The average of the two quarter exams is worth 20% of your grade. The first quarter exam is a cumulative exam that covers

1. The summer assignment
2. Karel the Robot
3. classroom labs (including the SFHS exercises)
4. chapters 3 through 5 of the Litvin textbook.

On the actual AP Exam, the multiple choice question pace is 2 minutes, 15 seconds each, and the free response questions pace is about 15 minutes each. If you log in at https://apclassroom.collegeboard.org/ there is “Qtr 1 MC Practice 1” with some multiple choice questions.

Practice FRQs' for Qtr 1

It is also a good idea to practice writing code. Don't forget if you are away from your computer, you can still practice writing code on your phone or iPad at https://codingbat.com/java. "Warm up" and "logic" are good categories to practice. You also may wish to try these practice free response quizzes from the past, and the reading and exercises we've done at Java2021-SFHS.

You may wish to review your homework, labs, and the powerpoint slides (in Google Classroom).

Things to watch out for:

1. Constructors should initialize the class's fields (fields are private, to encapsulate)
2. When initialzing fields in a constructor, Do not mention its type- this accidentally makes a local variable instead of initializing the classes field that has the same name.
3. Remember to make fields private and methods public,
4. Remember local variables are never public nor private
5. Remember method names should use () for the parameter list, even if there are no parameters
6. Watch for dangling else statements (p 148) - without brackets, the last else belongs to the previous if
7. Do not add a System.out.print when no printing is requested (This can be a 1 or 2 point Extraneous code that causes side effect penalty on the AP Exam)
8. Do not use local variables before first declaring them ( also a AP scoring penalty).
9. Variables are declared ONLY ONCE, not every time.
10. Do not assign a value to a parameter inside a method unless you are asked to (also a AP scoring penalty called Destruction of data)
11. Never use return in a constructor
12. Remember to return something of the same type as a method's header.
13. Do not return something when writing a void method ( a method that isn't supposed to return something (This too has a AP scoring penalty)

Finally, please remember to get a good night's rest and a healthy breakfast! Good Luck!