English lit, biology and psychology??

Hello everyone!
Just wondering if any of you have done these a levels and could tell me what they are like and difficulty etc.
also what career/degree prospects are open to me?
Thanks!

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Reply 1

angelcake123

I done psychology - loved it
I heard biology is v long
I heard English lit is just a pain in the backside

These are all just opinions, not facts :smile:

you may disagree by the end of AS

But from what I heard, in terms of difficulty: (highest to lowest)
1) english lit
2) biology
3) psychology

This is obvs debatable. Always prioritise the subjects you find hardest. I'm not sure about jobs sorry

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Reply 2

yaknow

Thanks for your help.
As you did psychology what kinda of skills are involved and what do you find most difficult about the subject?
Also, what other subjects are you doing and how are you finding them?
Thanks again :smile:

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Reply 3

preetg97

Biology is one of those subjects where people either find it difficult, or find it easy. I can tell you from experience though that it's extremely time consuming and does require a lot of work and understanding. Although, saying that, it's an extremely interesting subject and everyone I know that did it (including myself) thoroughly enjoyed it. :smile:

Reply 4

emiloujess

Psychology is awesome, I've really enjoyed studying it and could not recommend a subject more! I'm not gonna lie, it's hard, but very rewarding :smile:

Reply 5

Dougieowner

Out of these subjects I only studied English Literature, and with that I'd say it's very enjoyable - personally I loved the lessons because there was lots of interaction and debate. But I'd only recommend taking it if you love reading, because even though I do, parts of it were still very stressful, particularly the exams. I can imagine that if you didn't enjoy literature, it would be even more tedious. There's so much uncertainty about exams and you never know how the examiner will interpret your answer - sometimes you'll get a generous marker and sometimes you'll get a harsh one, which you can't control. For example, last year at AS I got a low B in the exam despite being predicted a high A, and then I resat and ended up getting full UMS marks, which confused me because I don't think my answers were significantly better. And then with my A2 exam I was convinced I hadn't answered one of the questions properly and also got full UMS. So it's a bit of a weird subject!

From what I've heard, Psychology has a lot of case studies and people respond differently to the subject - those that are genuinely interested and work hard do well, and those that just took the subject because they felt like it tend to complain all of the time. It's similar with Biology - there are apparently lots of facts/definitions to remember, but if you're interested in the concepts it sounds fascinating.

My conclusion: take what you'll enjoy the most; the subject you're most passionate about. If you like a subject, there's a much better chance you'll do better at it :smile:

Reply 6

yaknow

Thanks everyone! Very helpful.
Is English hard to revise for? Is it more dependant on having a good teacher/ natural ability?
Also is biology quite straightforward to learn? Is it mainly memorising things?

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(edited 8 years ago)

Original post by yaknow

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I'd say there's quite a few skills
- learn how to make attractive notes
- learn how to write an essay with the basic structure. (Your teacher will give you a style)
- learn case studies and experiments: not really a skill, but something u need to pass. When you learn your first case study, learn all the details as if you had to write an essay describing and analysing (evaluating) it :smile:

so learn little details like how many participants were used in the study and so on!

I'd say the most difficult probably is the content? If I didn't start revising from the start of the year, there's no way I would have gotten the A. The content is a bit large

I also did
- economics, history, religious studies and an EPQ.
- Throughout the year I loved economics, was getting Bs and As, then I just found the exam extremely hard so I got a C (ohwell :smile:

). I love history even though I do think it's my hardest a level, it's quite fun learning about the past :tongue:

and I also did religious studies which acc wasn't a piece of cake, this was interesting too :smile:

I'd say least interesting is economics tho

Hope that helps!

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(edited 8 years ago)

Reply 9

Jooooshy

Original post by yaknow

Thanks everyone! Very helpful.
Is English hard to revise for?
Is it more dependant on having a good teacher/ natural ability?

Also is biology quite straightforward to learn? Is it mainly memorising things?

It can be quite time-consuming to revise for, depending on how long the book is that you're studying.
You can grind out a good result, but it obviously helps if you've already got a knack for writing essays!

Yeah and yeah.