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What's A-Level Geography like?

Jordan1104

I was thinking about taking geography at a-level and was just wondering what its like? I never took it at GCSE but I was told that doesn't matter, just a few things:

What units do you study?
How many exams?
Do we have coursework?
Is it hard?

Thanks

crap

I've just finished Geog' at AS and it was easily the most enjoyable subject I did (out of Geog', Biology, Maths and Music). It's such a broad subject so there's something for everyone really.

The units depend on what exam board you do and what options your school chooses to take. I did AQA and our core (compulsory) modules were Rivers and Population. On top of that our optional modules were Cold Environments and Health. I know other optional modules were Coasts, Deserts, Energy and Food Issues. I think the modules are pretty much the same over the different boards - especially for the compulsory core modules.

We did 2 exams - Geog' Skills and the Physical and Human exam (this tests your knowledge of the modules). The Skills paper is half graphs, data analysis etc and the other half is questions on fieldwork that you will undertake as part of the course. It basically just asks what your results were, what you did, how to improve it etc. I didn't have any coursework but I'm not sure if this is the same for other exam boards.

I personally did not find Geography hard but then again it is my best subject and I want to go on to read it at university. The only thing that I would say wasn't particularly easy for me was remembering figures from case studies. A few people in my year didn't do GCSE Geography and they found it okay - you just need the basics of your core modules.

Good luck - hope I've been able to help!

Daisy :smile:

Reply 3

tgwktm

I have just finished my AS geography and I have loved every second of it. The following depends on what exam board you are under, but for OCR: 1. there are 4 units 2 in AS 2 in A2. my topics in AS consisted of for unit 1(physical) hot environments, cold environments, and then either rivers or coasts (my class did coasts) for unit 2 (human) energy, tourism and then either urban or rural (my class did urban). For A2 unit 3 is geographical skills which is basically the practical side of geography, you learn the skills needed to conduct an investigation and analyse and present the results, this is done by doing a fieldwork investigation (it is not coursework, this unit is assessed in an exam based on your fieldwork, it replaced the old spec where this used to be a coursework unit) then unit 4 is global issues which is split into environmental and economic issues and under several mini topics such as natural hazards, development, population, globalisation, rivers etc. (i'm really looking forward to studying this unit) 2. the exams I found were okay, I can't tell you about the A2 exams cause I haven't done any yet but for AS there were 2 papers unit 1 (physical) and unit 2 (human) both had 2 sections one short answer and one essay question (25 marks) the short questions range from 4 mark to 9 mark and are similar to gcse, the 25 mark isn't that hard once you get some practice and a clear structure in place the key with that is to remember your introduction, conclusion and to gives examples/ case studies and explain them 3. for OCR there is no coursework 4. I really enjoy geography so I don't find it that hard, I think the content is mostly common sense you need to be prepared to dedicate time to revision cause there a lot to revise but if you enjoy it then this won't be a chore.

What's A-Level Geography like?

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