Alex K.

Portia L.

Alex Z.

Karen L.

Mark B.

Ayesha W.

Nick W.

Teresa F.

This year, if you’re taking the AP English Literature exam, you’ll be responsible for responding to three questions, which the College Board calls “free response prompts.”

, you’ll write a literary analysis of a poem. 

 you’ll write a literary analysis of a piece of fiction, which could be an excerpt from a play. 

, you’ll analyze a major literary aspect—a theme or a literary device, for example—of a literary work of your choosing.

The last of these prompts attracts perhaps the most attention and, by extension, produces the most anxiety among students. Anyone would admit that such a capacious (‘open, roomy’) question is challenging, especially when a year of AP Lit has taught you to focus on the details of the book you’re reading. And it certainly doesn’t help that this question comes at the very end of the essay, and you and your fingers are about as tired as they could possibly be!

But if you approach the prompt with enthusiasm, it can be the cherry on top of your exam, not the straw that breaks the camel’s back (getting creative with metaphors is always important in AP Lit!).

Here are five tips to help you write a great essay response to the third prompt on the AP Lit exam.

Wait a minute—you can write about anything under the sun, as long as the College Board defines it as “a work of literary merit?” How is that even possible? In truth, your evaluators are using this prompt as a way to gauge your analytical abilities no matter the text. You’re not going to be judged for the work you select, as long as it’s substantial enough to ensure your analysis can be rich and meaningful. A good rule to live by: if a work pops into your head and you don’t immediately have at least a few different ideas for how to answer the prompt with it, toss it out of your brainstorming process. You want to find a work that is challenging and complex in order to show that you’re capable of effectively analyzing such works.


You have two main options for selecting the perfect work, both equally effective. The first is probably the most common: choose a book, play, or other literary work you read in AP Lit. Because you read it in class, you will almost surely be familiar with its themes and literary devices. Your second option is to pick a work you’ve read on your own, which could be anything from a novel you adored over summer break or the Shakespeare play you starred in at school. 

We recommend creating a short list of works you’d like to write about before you take your AP Lit exam, just to have your options at hand.

 As you’ve learned to do in class, consider each work’s rhetorical situation. This way, if you’re on the fence about whether a work is really “of literary merit,” you can ask your teacher or someone else in the know for an expert second opinion!



You don’t know what the third free-response prompt will be, but you know that it will be! The College Board’s 

 is only one of a gazillion easily accessible resources online that compile prompts from past years and devise hypothetical ones, too. These are great places to look. In the weeks leading up to the exam, we recommend selecting three to seven prompts—the more diverse in content, the better—and practicing with your list of works of literary merit. We recommend practicing with a work no more than two or three times—it’s great to know a text inside and out, but you don’t want to be a one-trick pony in case the prompt on the exam doesn’t lend itself to an essay about that text.

Whether for AP exams, the SAT, or the ACT, you’ve heard the dictum a million times—outlines make better essays, even when your time feels extremely limited! When it’s time for the test, this can feel a little bit trite, but we challenge you to find one soul in the grand history of the AP English Literature exam who hasn’t benefited from creating even a rough outline. This is the place where your reasoning and organization come alive. We recommend devoting 5-7 minutes to your outline—the lower end if you’re confident you know the text inside and out and just need to nail down your claims and evidence, and the higher end if you need to jog your memory and give your thesis a bit more time to gestate.

What should your outline include? Keep it clear and concise. You definitely want to write your thesis; plan the topics of your body paragraphs, including potential topic sentences; and—a helpful, oft-forgotten third part—remind yourself why the work you’ve chosen is the best for the prompt. This last part won’t be formally integrated into your essay, but it’s extremely helpful as you try to stay focused and pointed while writing what can feel like an impossible broad essay.

4. Each paragraph is a new opportunity to be creative

The third free-response prompt, and the AP Lit exam in general, is extremely structured. It can feel downright constricting. The little-known truth about the last essay is that it’s the most creative part of the whole exam. You not only get to choose the prompt, but within the roughly five-paragraph structure of the essay you’re penning, you get to be quite creative with what you say in each paragraph. There are so many ways to explain to your readers how, say, a symbol illuminates an important theme in a text. We find this knowledge incredibly liberating; paired wisely with the organization that the outline and the essay require, this creative approach can lead to a top-notch essay.

5. Proofread, but not just for the sake of proofreading.


We’ve all been there—time is nearly up, you’ve put the period at the end of your conclusion, and now it’s time to make sure you haven’t written an incoherent jumble of nothingness. This is the last, crucial step before handing in your AP Lit exam and never reading again (just kidding!)

Because you’re so exhausted from hours of test-taking, proofreading your third free-response essay can feel like a chore—a hurdle you have to jump to reach the finish line. But it can also be an opportunity to make sure 

your argument, your analysis, and your claims and evidence are coherent

. We don’t mean that you should restructure your thesis—there isn’t time for that, and we’re sure it’s great, anyway!—but we encourage you to make sure that every sentence is as clear, concise, and (reasonably) creative as possible. Proofreading is the time to read every sentence with a fundamental question in the back of your head: What is this sentence doing, and what are the words that form it doing? If something feels like it’s not pulling its weight, don’t hesitate—change or delete it. Now that you’ve nailed the bigger picture, you must demand only the best from the details.

5 Tips for Writing a Great AP Lit Essay

Pivot is one of the themes of 2020. But how has the College Admissions process pivoted this year, now that SAT and ACT exams are optional, SAT subject tests don’t exist, and other changes are on the horizon?

 submitted in 2021, meaning students overall were applying to more schools than in the past. Elite colleges, in particular, saw more applications than ever. Top colleges and universities in the US reported an increase of 30% to 100% in early decision and early action applications, typically due around November 1. One reason for this increase in the application rate has to do with the new test optional policies. Many students felt that if they did not have to show their SAT or ACT scores, they would have a better chance of getting into an Ivy League or top tier university based on just good grades and a strong application otherwise. But this strategy back-fired. With such a large increase in the number of applications, acceptance rates are at an all-time low and many students are wait-listed or deferred. In these changing times, it’s worth looking at some smaller colleges (some terrific schools also!) that reported a drop in applications.

For better or for worse, your high school transcript is now the most important part of your college application. As many schools have gone test-optional, college admissions officers are using a student’s coursework and grades as the initial indicator to gauge if that student can handle the school’s academics. Beyond good grades, colleges are looking to see that you have taken some rigorous courses and challenged yourself academically. This means taking the initiative to seek out college level classes (in person or online) as well as taking advantage of the most advanced and AP courses at your school. Colleges are looking for students who took the most advanced courses offered (especially in their interest of study) and did very well on them.

Now that SAT Subject tests are canceled, AP exams are the only way to show colleges and universities which subjects you’re able to handle on a high level. Getting a very high score on the SAT or ACT only shows your reading, grammar, and math skills. If you’re interested in medicine, you’ll also want to show that you can handle science courses at a high level. If you’re thinking about applying to business or economics programs, try to take the AP Microeconomics or AP Macroeconomics exams, even if your school doesn’t offer the course. If you’re proficient in Spanish, Chinese, German, Japanese, French, Italian, or Latin, you can highlight this by taking the exam. How you’ve fared in AP courses and exams is a signal of your ability to handle that college’s course load.

The more AP courses (or equivalent) you have, the stronger your application looks. If you’re a 9th or 10th grader (even 11th grade isn’t too late!), look at your high school’s course catalog and plan out which classes you’d like to get into next year and the year after. Find out what the requirements are to get into AP and other advanced classes and work hard to meet those requirements, even if it means doing some summer or after school prep.

While SAT and ACT scores have diminished in importance, they aren’t at all irrelevant. Studying for and taking one of these standardized exams gives you more options. SAT and ACT scores tell colleges what you’re capable of in math, reading, and grammar. While standardized tests aren’t a show of your intelligence, they can indicate how you handle time-management and a time-crunch. And an increase in your score from the 1st time you took the test to the 2nd time shows admissions committees that you are motivated and aren’t afraid of giving a hard task your all!

‘Test optional’ is a bit of a hazy concept. While it would seem that test-optional means that standardized exams are no longer the main gate-keepers of admittance, we have seen that submitting good test scores increases your chances of being accepted, particularly at elite colleges. Additionally, if your extracurriculars or GPA are not as competitive as they could be, SAT and ACT scores continue to help boost applicants to the top of the list. The bottom line is: SAT and ACT scores play an important, strategic role if you can show that you’ve scored well.

Elite schools used the SAT in 2020 and will continue to do so for two things: a sign that the student overcame something academically very difficult. Since top schools are not a walk in the park once you get in - they are a big jump in difficulty for almost everyone - they need evidence that the student has what it takes to survive and triumph over academic challenges and that the student won’t need “remediation” like you might expect at flagship state schools (unless they’re an athlete). So the rigor of the courses you take in high school added to a top notch SAT or ACT score serve as proof that you can handle academic rigor. The other, though lesser, reason that colleges  and frankly harder to admit, is proof of means. Schools are businesses and need enough students who will pay full -- or close to full -- tuition. Strong SAT or ACT scores are often a sign that the student had great tutoring, which signals affluence. The mega endowed schools care less about this second point, but it’s a factor for a lot of admissions offices since applications are need-blind and cannot see who will need financial aid before writing up that acceptance letter. A strong SAT or ACT score helps them take a good educated guess.

If you’re applying to schools as an athlete, it’s important to note that your SAT or ACT score is still very important. This is because schools still have parameters around what score ranges they can consider for their teams. Likewise, test scores are important qualifiers for merit aid. Students who have submitted higher SAT or ACT test scores often get more financial aid than others.

Another significant pivot has been college touring; with most campuses partially or fully closed, most schools have all-together cancelled tours on their premises. Yet, the pandemic has pushed colleges to ramp up (or create!) great virtual tours on their websites, giving prospective students near and far a better idea of the facilities and student life.

Beyond virtual tours provided by the schools themselves, a number of outside sites have sprung up to mimic the in-person tour experience. College Planner Pro (available to all Ivy Tutors Network students for free) and Campus Reel are two sites where current students will give you a ‘real’ tour of the school from their point of view.

More than ever, direct communication with current students can help in college applications, particularly in narrowing down your school list. Many successful students have used Instagram, TikTok and other social media apps to get a sense of these schools from afar. Whether through a school’s social media channels, plowing through hashtags, or DM-ing students outright, seeing and talking to real students gives you a sense of what going to that school is really like. College counselors can also facilitate meetings with current students at the school.

If you’re craving the road trip and want to get a sense of the surrounding area, many campuses will allow you to walk around even if they aren’t offering tours. For New York City kids especially, this can be crucial: do you want a city? Do you mind a secluded campus? Those are good questions to ask yourself, and another really important reason why you should try to visit.


5 Ways College Admissions Has Changed Since 2020 

At Ivy Tutors Network, parents often come to us with these complaints about their children's study habits:

Not staying focused when disinterested or when a subject is hard

Procrastination: working on a paper or studying for a test at the last minute

On March 9th, Ivy Tutors Network founder, Lisa Speransky, moderated a panel discussion with Sue Groner (

, to unpack these problems and offer some solutions for parents and their children.


The panel explained in detail that it is a process (sometimes one that spans years) to teach kids to be driven by internal motivation and have pride in their work, to really “care” about doing well in school. Parents can be a huge help in this process by noticing the strengths and weaknesses of the child within their ‘executive functioning,’ and helping to create systems around the strengths to complement the organizational weaknesses. It’s important to model the behavior of asking questions and a trial-and-error approach to empower children to ask questions and problem-solve issues.

 Being ‘the homework warden’ or any ‘warden’--screen time, free time-- boils down to being the punitive-based ‘bad cop,’ which we hope will make our children behave a certain way to get to a certain place. However, instead of being the ‘warden,’ parents should be pivoting their parenting style to teaching their children to be self-reliant, problem-solving and self-motivated. It’s important to note that what works for you, may not work for your child because people strategize differently. Taking the punitive approach will never work because it means they aren’t developing the skills to advocate for themselves and learn to create a system that works for them.

 Brainstorming tools around organization should be a collaborative effort between kids, their parents, and their teachers. In the classroom setting, it’s impossible to teach to every person’s learning style. When trying to find the right organizational method for a child, collaboration gives kids more options. It’s also important not to assume that one organizational method will work all the time and to remember that a method that once worked, may not work now and so there needs to be room for changing the way things are done.

When I work on organization with students, in order to help them find the right method, I’ll often move from one method to another very different method. For example, if I start with a visual tactic around writing notes or using a calendar one week and that doesn’t work, then we’ll try something more list-based the next week. For many students, it’s important to have a physical place to put homework that is done. I’ve found that asking kids themselves for feedback on what they like and don’t like about the method makes kids really excited. I think kids enjoy learning new skills and like being asked to collaborate to find the right method of organization for them; when adults give kids the space to try something out, the kids are more willing to participate in trial and error.

 has been a great tool for some students. I am thinking of an example in which one student had a very messy backpack and could never remember when things were due. We recommended to the parent that they use Trello to help with organization issues and realized it was an incredible tool for any student, but also great for attention issues such as ADHD. In that app, students make quick lists of what they need to accomplish and then physically drag those items into other columns like, “Work in Progress” and “Done.” It’s satisfying to watch items go from “Need to do” and end up in “Done.”

 Executive functioning is the buzzword for a skillset to help us organize ourselves relating to impulse time management, impulse control, planning, memory, and task initiation. Generally, they’re the tools needed to help get someone to a place where they can get work done. An ‘executive functioning issue’ generally relates to a problem with two or more of these areas. The best advice I can give from afar is to pay close attention to your child’s strengths and weaknesses, and creatively think together with teachers on how you can use their strengths to cover their weaknesses.

For example, one condition where there can be impairments in executive functioning is ADHD. For some with ADHD, their working memory can be excellent, but switching between tasks or staying focused when disinterested can be difficult. Creating lists and keeping a calendar may not be the right tool for them. But for kids who like starting a task, but may not be great at finishing them, then the tool could be to take a long task, like homework, and break it down into say, four chunks. Breaking homework into chunks means kids can start a task four times and that can help them get things done. As mentioned before, it can take ‘creative thinking’ to find the right tools for optimal executive functioning.

 I think the best way we can help kids is to really understand and agree as adults that the process of learning is more important than performance. Your child may not be successful at everything they do in school, but they need to have that negative experience, be reflective, learn to pivot, and get themselves out of the rut on their own. Talk to your child and do that often. Tell them that you are on their team and ask what’s working and what’s not. Kids can have great insight when they are really heard. We all remember being kids to some extent: some lessons in school don’t make sense and homework can feel like nonsense after that. I can’t stress more how important it is though in the long-term for your child to feel like you’re a partner in their schooling success rather than a punitive figure. Fear of punishment or losing a privilege leaves kids with a negative feeling around school and around the parent-child relationship. As a parent, one of your jobs is to help your child learn how to help themselves.



 This is tough for everyone. I was an educator at Mansfield Hall, a school for children with learning differences. I can think of a few students who I would sit with to make sure they completed their homework, only to then find out they had not turned it in the next day. It was tough because no matter how perfect the work was, they could never get the full points if they didn’t turn it in on time. We also used to talk about the importance of a physical space where homework existed, like a homework box that you would put it in. Another suggestion would be upon completion, creating a clear marker beyond finishing the homework to signal that work has come to an end. One marker I’ve used was a quick chat and ask, for example: ‘What was the point of that? Why did my teacher have me do that?’ It’s one more step after turning in the work but it can trigger them to remember the next day to turn in the work.

As mentioned earlier, Trello is a great project management system and it’s really fantastic also when it comes to learning online. Beyond that, you should watch students turn in and have dedicated ‘homework time’, say 4pm, when all homework has to be finished and submitted.

 I would add that there is no need to shame kids when they didn’t do something on time. If they depend on you to keep them on track all the time, they will never develop the skills to track themselves.

 At Ivy, we would first try to find out why: is it disinterest? Did they fail to learn a subject well so now it’s hard to stay focused? Is it someone in class? Do they need more movement in their day? Is it ADHD? It’s very hard to suggest a tool without knowing the why! Finding out why is also important because it helps kids develop accountability, and to be self-reflective, which are important for self-monitoring, an executive functioning skill. It should also be said that in today’s world, it is truly hard to focus. There are many distractions online, especially. Empathize with your child and tell them stories of when it’s hard for you to focus and how you solve that issue… or maybe how you’re still trying to solve the issue too! What kinds of things have you tried to help you focus?

 I love the Pomodoro technique -- and use it myself! Work for 25 minutes, take a break, work for 25 minutes, and so on. I’m a big fan of the kitchen timer for this so that there are no phones around. It helps kids conceive of time better, and track their progress so they don’t take forever to finish an assignment. It’s a great time management technique.

 We also have used timers. Visible timers not only help kids manage their time, but also teach them how to work on a schedule. I would also recommend resetting timers during breaks too, so that kids can register it as a break in the workflow rather than an ‘end of working.’ Oftentimes, if the break isn’t timed it can go on for too long and it’ll be hard to get the student back to focusing.

 Again, it’s important to stress to a child that learning is a process not a performance. It shouldn’t matter if they do everything perfectly. Performance anxieties, like testing anxiety can come from parents and teachers who kids are afraid to disappoint. If a child knows she’ll get in trouble for a poor grade or a missed assignment, this can be the beginning of some very serious anxiety around academics in general. Make sure your child feels that you are on their team!

 Testing anxiety and other performance anxieties, more often than not, stem from how a child sees their general worth. Schoolwork generally isn’t the source of the anxiety, but the focus of it. It’s important when it comes to performance anxiety to see it as part of a student’s struggling, but not rush to fix it as if it’s the only problem. If you’re seeing anxieties in your child, I would have a conversation with them around this idea of worth, maybe even with their teachers, to tackle the issue head on.

 First, validate that homework isn’t fun. Next, I would say that for adults and children, when the only feedback we’re willing to accept is praise, it’s hard to accommodate anything less. It’s important for children to develop resilience to displeasure, and again, to learn how to problem-solve rather than dwell on a problem or issue, like homework. Rushing through work can be a sign that your child hasn’t quite grasped that good work is an effort, and conversations around effort can hopefully motivate them in many areas of their lives.

At Ivy, we really stress the idea of ‘growth mindset,’ which is the idea that your basic qualities are things mainly cultivated through effort. It’s an important topic to bring up with your kids so that they know that in order to grow and learn better, they need to put in the effort. Kids should understand that physiologically, studying actually changes the brain by creating new neural pathways and then strengthening them through practice. Every time you study, you strengthen that pathway and become better at something. No one is born knowing the times tables! Think of it like a muscle. For a child who’s worried about what others think, it’s important to remind them that they look smart when they ask questions. Teachers love when kids ask questions. This is helping the teacher and makes you look like a star student. It doesn’t show weakness.

 I second modeling for your child how important, and easy, it should be to ask questions and how common trial and error is in all stages of life. Talk about something that didn’t work out, and what you’re going to do about it so they see you taking initiative and taking on challenges--with or without success! 


 What a great way to teach ‘growth mindset’. Shakir, Sue -- it was so wonderful talking to you. Thank you so much!

Interested in attending more webinars hosted by Ivy Tutors Network? Check out our 

Join us at our expert-led webinars that cover a wide range of education-related material to help your child grow and succeed!

Webinars | Organization and Homework Issues | Ivy Tutors Network

How to Teach Kids to Care: Webinar Recap on Executive Functioning, Focus, Motivation, and Organization Skills for Kids

Henry is thoroughly enjoying working with Jordan. Up until now, Henry has not gotten any one-on-one teaching of coding so he's thrilled to work this way with Jordan. Henry has said it's super interesting, fun and he loves it.

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My son did great in Geometry, ending the semester with a 95 for the course.  He and George did really well together, as my son's main issue was not really knowing how to study/prepare for exams on his own in math, and personality-wise as well as skill-wise, George was a great match.

We’ve had such a positive experience with Ivy Tutors.  My son started working with Shakir two years ago, at a time when he was really struggling in school.  The one on one support has been invaluable, and has truly helped to turn things around. I honestly don’t think we could have made it this far without them - would highly recommend!

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Thanks to you and to our tutor who had committed 200% of yours and his efforts to help our daughter to get to the score of 1520 in such a short time!  Great, great jobs for both of you! She is now truly ready for the upcoming college application processes.

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