You might have better luck here:

ARE Pre-Design Forum

Victor Horta on your pre-design exam ???

architecture is the last bastion of generalism, you’re not expected to be an expert on soils -that's what the phone is for. that said, as an architect you should understand, for example, the implications of building on bentonite vs sand.

save the graphics exams with the retarded generic cad, i didn't find the ARE a "waste of time/money." it is relevant. if your work experience is not there, then review material will not get you through.

I don't think you should worry too much- I just took the exam a few weeks ago, studied soils, etc like crazy , then found the questions were extremely general and loose, more about contracts and planning then architectural history. Thought I didnt do too well, but surprise, I passed! Good luck.

passing is all that matters. pre-design seemed like one that was easy to "wing it." I was surprised by the history questions. How are they relevant? Guess you need to know history to protect HSW. Oh well, good luck.

beyond HWS, the ARE tests for qualification based on education, training, blah, blah, blah. that's how history is relevant.

Hey-I am about to tke that one, too, in a few weeks. Glad it wasn't just me that some of the cards seemed odd.
Are you solely using the cards for this one?

IMO Pre-Design was the most comprehensive and thus challenging of the multiple choice tests. But a lot of it is common sense gained from work experience. Just take a deep breath....good luck!

I agree with L-bell it's all common sense and many think on the test you can study for you ither had had to deal with the issued and learned the concept from experience, the most comprehensive test it was my first exam and after taken then all i do thnik it cover every issue in a conceptual bases.
my sugestion:
Read All The ALB books. do the test at the end of every chapter, ARch flash, Ballast non structural topic a must, sutaimable design strategies, thumb throu your histoty books, be familiar with new urbanism concepts.
may the force be with you.

thanks for all the comments (and the link). part of me thinks that it should be pretty do-able, as I have been practicing for 5-1/2 years, and basically at some point I have had to deal with all of these items. Other times I think the PD section will reveal me as a total fraud who merely nods in mock agreement (although with absolultely no real understanding) when a Civil Engineer starts talking about "swales" or whatever in a meeting.

sothpole good advice but way too much reading material...look at the Kaplan books (they bought ALS) and they are pretty comprehensive, and look at the suggested reading in the ncarb handbook...these test are not as bad as they seem before you take them.....just relax and think of the most common sense answer it turned out to typically be the right one

I didn't find that this was one of the harder exams. Yes, the content is very broad, and the sources listed by NCARB in their "ARE Guidellines" can seem overwhelming. But because the subject matter is so broad it's unlikely you'll encounter more than a few questions on any one issue. For example I saw only 5 to 10 questions on history and urban theory combined, and all were general enough that skimming a survey text of architectural history (and looking at the pictures) was enough to refresh my memory ahead of time.

Many of the questions (about 20% at leastJ) were based on charts/graphs/matrixes and were basically freebies as long as you could read the charts (and sometimes filter out irrelevant info seemingly thrown in to obscure the right answers.) Other questions were based on bubble diagrams and other graphic info.

I actually thought this test was the one that was most closely related to my academic experience.
And I don't remember more than one question on soils, or any on Victor Horta.