This paper describes and evaluates benefits of advanced placement programs and identifies materials which can help high school history classroom teachers develop effective advanced placement programs. An advanced placement program is defined as a program which requires a student to do extensive research and writing throughout the school year. Objectives of an advanced placement program in history are to help students develop basic reading, writing, interpretive, and research skills, and to help students understand the discipline and processes involved in becoming historians. To facilitate this research, schools must make library materials and an extensive resource area available to students. Suggestions for helping schools acquire these resources include asking college students to donate their history books after they are finished with them, soliciting samples from book salesmen, and using school funds to buy single copies of various materials. Textbooks which have been particularly useful in advanced placement programs include "The National Experience" by Blum et al. and "Sources of the American Republic," by Meyers, Kern, and Cawalti. Useful supplementary books include "The Jungle," by Upton Sinclair, "42nd Parallel," by John Dos Passos, and "The Grapes of Wrath," by John Steinbeck. Students involved in advanced placement programs are involved in a variety of activities including listening to lectures, developing theses, gathering and interpreting data, discussing issues in class, and writing research reports. (DB)