{"id":9979,"date":"2017-05-24T17:10:20","date_gmt":"2017-05-25T00:10:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/magoosh.com\/hs\/?p=9979"},"modified":"2022-06-14T17:10:53","modified_gmt":"2022-06-15T00:10:53","slug":"dbq-essay-apush","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/magoosh.com\/hs\/ap\/dbq-essay-apush\/","title":{"rendered":"How to Write a DBQ Essay for APUSH"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"DBQ<\/p>\n

The Document Based Question (DBQ) essay is a key feature of the APUSH exam. And at 25% of your total score, it\u2019s an important feature! Keep reading and you will get some great tips on how to write a DBQ for the APUSH exam.<\/p>\n

What is a DBQ essay?<\/h2>\n

As I stated in a previous post on what the APUSH exam is all about<\/a>, the goal of the exam is to test your historical thinking skills. Historians write arguments based on documents, and for this exam, you will, too.<\/p>\n

For a DBQ essay, you will receive several documents of varying length. You will be asked to respond to some historical prompt that will require you to use the documents as evidence in your response. The great thing about a DBQ is that a lot of information you need to answer the question is in the documents themselves \u2013 score! However, you do need to have some background knowledge to make sense of the documents (we will practice this later in the post). The documents could be tables, charts, personal letters, or any other source that the exam creators believe would help you answer the question. Generally speaking, the documents will represent multiple perspectives on one topic.<\/p>\n

It will be your job to synthesize those various perspectives into a coherent response.<\/em><\/p>\n

Let\u2019s walk through a sample DBQ topic for the APUSH exam.<\/h3>\n

Before we get too far into this, it\u2019s important that you note that College Board, the organization that writes the APUSH exam, has made some major changes starting in 2015. I will be taking you through the 2015 sample<\/a> the College Board provided for students to practice, but, as you will see in a second, it\u2019s important that you practice as much as possible in order to read the documents quickly. Just make a note that the format may be slightly different if you review an exam prior to 2015.<\/em><\/p>\n

Let\u2019s say that you come across this prompt for a DBQ question:<\/p>\n

Compare and contrast views of United States overseas expansion in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Evaluate how understandings of national identity, at the time, shaped these views.<\/em><\/p>\n

Before you Read<\/h2>\n

You have 7 documents to read in the suggested time of 15 minutes. How is that even possible?!<\/p>\n

Well, no one ever said it was going to be easy. But it is<\/em> possible. When you get that prompt, or any other DBQ prompt like it, what you do before you read the documents will be just as important as what you end up writing. Before you even read the content of the documents, you should:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Recall what you know about the time period.<\/li>\n
  2. Read the source information for each document.<\/li>\n
  3. Recognize the possible opinions that could be compared and contrasted.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    Let\u2019s dig into each of those steps. <\/strong><\/p>\n

    1. Recall what you know<\/strong><\/p>\n

    This DBQ is interested in U.S. overseas expansion in the late 19th and early 20th century. What do you know about U.S. overseas expansion during that time period? Perhaps you remember something about the Spanish-American War of 1898, which falls into our time period. Perhaps you remember that the U.S. got some territory as a result of that war. Even if you can\u2019t remember exactly what territory, this puts you in a much better position to get started.<\/p>\n

    2. Read the source information<\/strong><\/p>\n

    Take these two documents below as an example.<\/p>\n

    \"Jane
    \nFrom     APUSH Sample Exam<\/a><\/p>\n

    Before I read the document, I see that Jane Addams titled her speech \u201cDemocracy or Militarism.\u201d Based on the title alone, I can begin to make some inferences that this document is not likely to be positive about any overseas expansion that would most certainly require military force.<\/p>\n

    \"William
    \nFrom     APUSH Sample Exam<\/a><\/p>\n

    Before I even read this document, I can see that William Jennings Bryan is campaigning for the presidency. However, I cannot recall there ever being a President Bryan, meaning that he was unsuccessful in his campaign. Perhaps what he was saying was not popular enough to get enough votes.<\/p>\n

    These inferences help me make sense of the document later on.<\/p>\n

    3. Recognize possible opinions <\/strong><\/p>\n

    Again, before I read the documents closely, I recognize that this is a compare\/contrast question. Before I even read this document, I\u2019m going to make the following table so that I can group documents later on.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n
    Documents FOR expansion<\/strong><\/th>\nDocuments AGAINST expansion<\/strong><\/th>\nDocuments with a complicated view<\/strong><\/th>\n<\/tr>\n<\/thead>\n
    1,2,3,etc<\/td>\n1,2,3,etc<\/td>\n1,2,3,etc<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

    <\/p>\n

    This table will help me more easily write my essay.<\/p>\n

    I know that your instinct will be to see the clock and think, OH MY GOSH, I DON\u2019T HAVE ENOUGH TIME TO BE DOING ALL THIS PREP WORK, MS. BERRY!!!!<\/p>\n

    Fight that instinct, because these steps will help you write a more coherent essay.<\/p>\n

    While you read<\/h2>\n

    This part is tough. You have quite a few documents to make sense of in a short amount of time. But, as you are reading as fast as you can, you should be actively annotating the document for the following:<\/p>\n