[wolf-pack]

I have currently selected:
History
English
Psychology
Sociology

I have been told that these subjects go well together, but I am aware that it is going to involve lots of essay writing!

I do not know whether to swap sociology for biology to give my choices variation, the only thing putting me off is how difficult biology would be in year 12 and 13, I do get As in most of my exams but during the actual lessons i feel like I am taking nothing in and not understanding anything. I am also worried that I would be the only person who couldn't do the work.

My sister took biology in year 12 and went from an A at GCSE to an E at A-Level, she also said that it was really difficult and boring and that the rest of her class got similar results or worse. Consequently some of my family members are strongly against the idea of me doing biology for these reasons, I am worried that I will get a poor grade in biology and end up regretting not sticking with sociology, a subject which I could probably get an easy A or B in.

Any advice as to what A-Level biology is like and as to which subjects I should choose? I do not know what I want to do at university yet but I am quite interested in journalism and law.

I am not interested in taking chemistry or physics because I find those lessons even more difficult and boring!

[theandyguthrie]

I've just finished A-Level biology and it's not as hard as everyone says. Just make sure you pay attention all year since there is a lot of material.

Have you considered another science? Like maths or physics? They have less content than biology - but the concepts themselves are a bit harder.


I would highly reccomend doing a stronger subject - since Psychology and sociology are both softer subjects they're more appropriate as 4th.
I'm sure i'm going to get negged for that last comment but it's true.

No subject is too hard, you just have to work in different ways for them all.

[Kim-x]

I wouldn't take a subject you feel you don't take anything in in the lessons for at GCSE level. You have two traditional subjects there and if you are concerned with pursuing a respected subject combination, drop either Psychology or Sociology after AS.


This was posted from The Student Room's iPhone/iPad App

[wolf-pack]

(Original post by theandyguthrie)
I've just finished A-Level biology and it's not as hard as everyone says. Just make sure you pay attention all year since there is a lot of material.

Have you considered another science? Like maths or physics? They have less content than biology - but the concepts themselves are a bit harder.


I would highly reccomend doing a stronger subject - since Psychology and sociology are both softer subjects they're more appropriate as 4th.
I'm sure i'm going to get negged for that last comment but it's true.

No subject is too hard, you just have to work in different ways for them all.

(Original post by Kim-x)
I wouldn't take a subject you feel you don't take anything in in the lessons for at GCSE level. You have two traditional subjects there and if you are concerned with pursuing a respected subject combination, drop either Psychology or Sociology after AS.


This was posted from The Student Room's iPhone/iPad App

Would it be a good idea to start off doing biology to give it a try, and then change over to sociology if I find it too difficult? or would I struggle to catch up if I missed 3 weeks of sociology? I don't want to take biology then get a poor grade and have my family saying "i told you so".

[Nav_Mallhi]

Arrrrrhhhhh English!!! I hate the subject. I'm picking bioogy, chemistry, physics and german because I enjoy them all. HAave you ever thought of a science related career- if you dont like biology you could pick chemistry or physics- very useful

[feelinginfinite]

Out of those, I take Biology and English Literature (and Law).
For Literature, it's very essay based and reading but I love that so it works perfectly. I got an A* at gcse in it so this was an easy decision.
For Biology, I changed my mind on results day and took biology instead of geography last minute (baring in mind I only did a science dual award- my gcse grades were B, A* - the A* was achieved because I realllllly knuckled down in my last year of comp). If you want to know about my individual grades within science, I got A*'s in chemistry and physics, but an A in biology at gcse. Even still, I found Biology most interesting. Like you, I was worried I would fall behind since the majority of people I knew taking a science had taken separate sciences at gcse.

I'm in year 12 and AS level Biology was super hard for me at first- our teachers tested us on each module every few weeks and up until November I was getting D's. Once it got to November, I ended up spending the majority of my spare time doing biology revision, and by the time I was doing full mock papers in December, I was getting A's (proving that it's the amount of work you put into it). I found that I just had to re-read the biology textbook plenty of times to understand it. It also helped me a lot to briefly read a section before being taught it in class the next lesson, so I had a brief understanding. In my January exam, I missed out on a B by 1 ums mark, but managed to pull it up to a B grade with my ISA (practical). Since November, (when I started revising in my spare time- realising a levels are much harder than gcse's), biology has became my favourite lesson. In some ways I even regret not taking up chemistry as level too since it means I can't do anything biology related at university.

As for your combination, History and English are "traditional" subjects, but psychology and sociology are both classed as "softer" subjects (despite how I tried taking psychology up until January and dropped it due to how much work there was- I'm weak haha ). For this reason, after AS level I would recommend dropping either psychology or sociology.

Feel free to PM me if you have any other questions

[theandyguthrie]

(Original post by wolf-pack)
Would it be a good idea to start off doing biology to give it a try, and then change over to sociology if I find it too difficult? or would I struggle to catch up if I missed 3 weeks of sociology? I don't want to take biology then get a poor grade and have my family saying "i told you so".

That sounds like the right thing to do, it wont be too hard to change after just a few weeks (it would be hard to do it the other way around. )

Don't give up on biology based on anecdotal evidence. Remember that 20% of people still get As and A*s just like every other subject. There is just lots of material.

[samaaf]

(Original post by wolf-pack)
I have currently selected:
History
English
Psychology
Sociology

I have been told that these subjects go well together, but I am aware that it is going to involve lots of essay writing!

I do not know whether to swap sociology for biology to give my choices variation, the only thing putting me off is how difficult biology would be in year 12 and 13, I do get As in most of my exams but during the actual lessons i feel like I am taking nothing in and not understanding anything. I am also worried that I would be the only person who couldn't do the work.

My sister took biology in year 12 and went from an A at GCSE to an E at A-Level, she also said that it was really difficult and boring and that the rest of her class got similar results or worse. Consequently some of my family members are strongly against the idea of me doing biology for these reasons, I am worried that I will get a poor grade in biology and end up regretting not sticking with sociology, a subject which I could probably get an easy A or B in.

Any advice as to what A-Level biology is like and as to which subjects I should choose? I do not know what I want to do at university yet but I am quite interested in journalism and law.

I am not interested in taking chemistry or physics because I find those lessons even more difficult and boring!

Well i take history and biology out of the ones you've mentioned. I don't regret taking either of them. History is such an interesting subject and biology, even though it's challenging, is also quite interesting. I think you should just choose subjects that won't bore you all year because you'll probably learn the most in a subject that doesn't. Like for example i did chemistry, BIG mistake. I couldn't even keep my eyes open long enough to listen. I know that you can drop a subject after the first 2 weeks of school if you realise you don't want to do it. I did that with maths, saved my life. And i didn't end up missing much of the subejct i decided to take up. Your sister probably just didn't realise how much harder Alevel was to GCSE and that's probably why she did badly in biology. I think you should do the subjects you like, because you're gonna change your mind countless times about what career you want to go in to. The only thing i would worry about is how universities think psychology is an extremely soft subject and some even blacklist it (could all be rumours though). You don't need psychology at alevel to do it at uni either btw, a science is preferred most times. I don't know much about sociology though, but it does sound interesting!
Good luck and I hope you end up with subjects you really enjoy