Earn the LEQ Contextualization Point! (AP World Edition)

01.24.25 04:55 PM - By Claire Baumgartner
Does the contextualization point have you confused?

I'm a professional tutor who has helped dozens of students improve their scores on Long Essay Questions in AP World History.  I'm going to outline how I understand the contextualization point.  That way you can get a perfect six on your next essay.

The Basics of Contextualization

Let's tackle what contextualization is.  The root word here is "context."  Context refers to an event's surroundings or circumstances.  Humans care about context because it gives us information about a specific thing.  This information helps us determine the meaning or importance of a particular event.  We can understand an event in a new way when we understand its context.


Let's look at an example.


Event: A baseball pitcher winds up and throws a pitch.


This is pretty mundane, right?  Because this event lacks context, it's hard to judge why this event matters.  Let's look at this event with some context.


Context 1: It's the seventh game of the World Series.  Ninth inning.  Bases loaded.  The score is tied.  Three balls and two strikes.  A baseball pitcher winds up and throws a pitch.


Now, this event has some drama.  The extra context tells us that this pitch matters.  It's high-stakes and high-pressure.


Let's change the context and see what happens.


Context 2: Last season, the pitcher blew out his elbow.  Nobody expected him to ever pitch again.  After three surgeries and endless setbacks, he winds up and throws a pitch.


This time we have a comeback story.  Everyone love an underdog.  This account is much more dramatic than the original account that didn't have context. But it's also dramatic in different way than the World Series pitch.  That's because the context has changed how we interpret what meaning of the pitch is.


Let's look at one more example.


Context 3: A baseball pitcher winds up and throws a pitch.  He is fourteen, and his mother snaps a picture from the stands.  A decade later, he gets his chance to play in the major leagues.  His mother pulls that picture out of the drawer and smiles.  Nobody knew what doors would open up because of that first pitch.


This context lacks all the glamour and drama of the other options.  Once again, the context has given us information about why the event matters.  It reveals an important truth about context.  Sometimes, the significance only reveals itself as a part of a series of events.  Circumstances can include processes that exist during and continue after a specific event.


In each case, the event stayed the same.  It was the circumstances around the even that changed.  I can influence how you perceive an event by giving you more information. I can tell you what happened before (Context 2) or during (Context 1) an event. I can also talk about a process that is starting and will continue (Context 3).


This principle applies in many parts of our lives.  If my friends snaps at me, I get frustrated.  But if I know that she has three tests later that day, there's a pretty good chance I'll forgive her.  If she snaps at me and blames it on a test from two weeks ago, that's pretty sus. 


On a more serious note, murder is a crime, but killing in self-defense isn't.  Context matters in even the most serious of events.


When we contextualize historical events, we use these same principles.  We can help our audience understand it's significance by giving them more information. If we tell them about how it happened, they can understand why it matters.

How to Earn the Contextualization Point

Understanding Contextualization

You must provide information about the circumstances of the topic to earn this point. That information should help the audience understand the significance of the event.


Let's break that down.


Every prompt will have a main topic.  It could be a specific event, like the American Revolution.  It could be a pattern over time.  For example, your topic could be beliefs about the federal government.  This topic may be more specific than a theme, event, or period.  One example of this is "gender roles during the Industrial Revolution."  In this case, gender roles and the Industrial Revolution narrow that topic down.  It's important to understand the topic before you start writing. If the contextualization is irrelevant to the topic, you won't earn the point. The information won't help the audience understand the event.


You have several options when it comes to what circumstances to discuss.  You can discuss events or people who influenced the event.  People could mean individuals, but it can also mean groups of people.  You can also talk about developments and processes.  This is a fancy way of saying a series of steps or changes that occur over a longer period of time. It can also cover new ideas or practices.


Finally, contextualization requires description.  It is good to include specific vocabulary or proper nouns when possible. But a single phrase or word will not earn the point.  A phrase does not give the audience enough information to understand the event in a new way.  If we return to our baseball analogy, if I said "underdog" that doesn't give a lot of information about the context.  Who is the underdog?  The team, the pitcher, or the batter? There's that old English standby that we should show, not tell.  It's true here too.  Don't drop a word and then move on.  Use the specific vocabulary and explain your ideas.


The prompt will outline a specific period. The circumstances can be from before, during, or "continue after" this period.  You get more flexibility with time when compared with any other part of your paper.  Consider our baseball examples above.  The first contextualization was during the event and the second one was before. The last one discussed things that continued after the initial event.

Strategies

There isn't one single way to contextualize a document. That can make it difficult to know if you're on the right track.  When I am unsure about my direction, I return to the goal. If the information helps my reader understand the circumstances that shaped these events.  As long as my answer is yes, then I am on the right track. I take time to ask myself that before I start writing.


Contextualization is one area where it pays to think big picture. This is different from the rest of my essay.  You improve the thesis, evidence, and argumentation by providing specifics.  Contextualization is about going broad.  I don't have to stick to the specific period. So being open to ideas a little further away is helpful. I can generate many ideas that way, and then chose the best one.


Consider our baseball pitcher earlier.  The pitcher's record, childhood, or career helped you understand the pitch's significance.  That's true even though you didn't get any information about the actual pitch itself.


I recommend contextualizing your paper using events that happened before the current period. Many students find it easier to consider the timeline before the period they have to write about. This also allows you to save information that can work as evidence. This is particularly important in the Long Essay Question. This style of question requires you to remember all the information you need for your paper. On the exam, it is common to forget things you wouldn't otherwise. That means you should use the information you do remember where it does the most good.


It's also a good idea to focus on things that occurred close to the period covered by the prompt.  It's easier to describe a strong connection between things close in time. The further apart they are, the weaker those connections become.

Where To Put the Contextualization

Most students contextualize in the first 2-3 sentences of the essay.  Most people will put the thesis statement immediately after they finish the contextualization.

There are several reasons for this.  First, the goal of an introduction is to hook the reader and gain their attention.  One way to do that is to give the reader information about why an issue is important.  Another way to do that is to explain information that helps the reader understand your topic.  In other words, contextualizing a topic is a common way to start an essay in many fields.

The contextualization is one of what I call the Top Three points on a Long Essay Question.  They are the three points that don't take a lot of time to complete.  If you earn these three points, you'll have an above average score on the Long Essay Question.  You will also be in contention for a 4 or 5 on the exam.  I advocate completing these three point first.  That way, you won't forget about them and you'll write them when you have the most focus and attention.

Contextualizing in the first paragraph is not required.  If you chose to put it elsewhere, make sure it is clear to the grader that your contextualizing.

Putting It All Together

Examples

Let's us this prompt for this example: 


Evaluate the extent to which the American Revolution changed American society in the period between 1776 and 1800.


In this case, my topic is the American Revolution AND it's impact on society.  The majority of my essay will be about changes during or after the American Revolution.


I could choose to focus on the events that helped shape or start the American Revolution.  This is relevant to my topic because without causes, there would be no revolution.  It's also likely that the causes of any major event would impact society.  These events can give information about the circumstances of this societal change.


I could talk about any of the major events that led up to the American Revolution.  I could focus on the French and Indian War, the Stamp Act, or the Declaration of Independence.


I could also focus on developments and processes.  There were long-term changes that also helped cause the American Revolution.  These changes influenced how people viewed the American Revolution.  They also affected the ideals that people tried to embody during and after the war.


I could discuss the spread of Enlightenment ideas. These ideas caused the American Revolution AND shaped the new US government.  This route gives insight into the event and the changes.  It's perfect for contextualization.


The American Revolution isn't the only topic mentioned in the prompt.  I can contextualize this essay by discussing American society. For example, I could discuss the colonial tradition of self-rule. This helps describe life before the war, and helps set the stage for discussing changes. You can't know what's different if you don't know what it's like before.

Myths and Misconceptions

Myth 1: Contextualization must be at the beginning of the paper.

The contextualization does NOT need to be at the beginning of the paper.  You can put it anywhere in the paper as long as the grader can determine that it is contextualization.


This follows a general principle of AP history exams.  There are no points awarded for format, organization, or mechanics.  Those things don't measure your understanding of history. That means you don't earn or lose points for organization. Of course, errors can't make it impossible to understand what you meant.


Remember: A happy grader is a happy grade. Your teacher gets to grade your paper.  If your they say it should be in the first paragraph, then you must put it in the first paragraph. This is a good writing practice generally, so it's not worth sparing over.

Myth 2: The contextualization must come from x years before the time period.

X can stand for any arbitrary period of time.  For AP World History, I've heard everything from two hundred to five hundred years. People also recommend using something from the period immediately before the prompt's period.


The rubric does not state that the contextualization to come a narrow period of time.  It says your contextualization can occur during or "continue after" the prompt's period.  There is no reason to limit yourself to a range of times that's more narrow than it needs to be.


In fairness, there is a glimmer of good advice in this misconception.  It's always easier to contextualize something close to the topic in question.  It's better to choose events close together in time over one that's more distant.  It's easy to forgive your friend for being rude if they have five tests on the same day they were curt.  The connection is intuitive.  It's harder to see the connection if she's rude two week's later. It may be there, but you need to show it.


If you want to contextualize World War II, then World War I is a better choice than the Civil War.  Could I make a connection between the US Civil War and World War II?  Without a doubt.  Am I choosing to play on hard mode if I do?  Yes.  I don't like doing that when I'm already stressed and more likely to make errors.  It's already hard.  Again, this is a guideline and not an absolute statement.  If you know twice as many things about the Civil War and you see a clear connection, that may be the right choice.


This misconception is a problem if you have a prompt from one of the earlier time periods.  In AP US History, one of the Long Essay prompts will come from one of the first three time periods.  You may not have studied the previous period.  Remembering all your options can help you tackle this kind of question.


Like before, a happy grader is a happy grade.  If you teacher puts time restrictions on contextualization, that's okay.  Do it their way when they're grading.

Myth 3: Contextualization, historical context, and historical situation are wildly different things.

Contextualization, historical context, and historical situation have specific meanings in AP classes.  Elsewhere, they are interchangeable.


In AP history classes, historical context and contextualization go together.  They describe the relevant circumstances for the main topic of your essay.  This helps people understand the meaning or significance of a specific topic. Historical situation is part of the sourcing point.  Sourcing is about describing the relevant circumstances for a specific historical document.  It helps people understand the meaning or significance of a specific document.  We do that by making connections to historical events or developments. This is the document's historical situation.


It's the same type of thinking applied to different scopes. Contextualization and historical context refer to the whole period. Historical situation applies to a single document created in that period.

I help ambitious students improve their skills and master the AP exam.  Learn more here! 


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