The Student Room Group

Essay based AS subjects

Hi!:tsr2:

ok, so i currently do Biology, Chemistry, economics, business and chinese. As many people say that "business " is a blacklist subject, ive decided to drop it after my first year. However, i wish to do law at uni and i want to do an extra AS (essay like subject) to prepare for law.

does anyone know which will be a good choice? i want an "easy" subject,(because im gonna carry on doing chemistry, biology, economics and chinese A2)i want one that doesnt need much coursework but i dont want a so called blacklist subject. I know its based on opinions but please help!:smile:

thnx :smile:

Scroll to see replies

Reply 1
Who'd teach it? Would you teach yourself, or would you be able to take lessons? I would caution against teaching yourself an essay-based subject, because it's not like maths or a science where what you need to know is precisely prescribed and it's easy to see how to answer the questions.

But if you can get access to an expert, then I'd recommend politics, which seems quite interesting, and relevant to the law, tangentially. If you have good background knowledge you might find that that compensates for your lack of time. Personally, I think it's pointless to worry about the 'reputations' of different subjects: they're all ASes after all. With that in mind, I hear Sociology's pretty fulfilling. I would caution you off History, though, because, my course at least, is a lot of work. You should be able to find courses with no coursework in any subject.
Reply 2
Mr Dactyl
Who'd teach it? Would you teach yourself, or would you be able to take lessons? I would caution against teaching yourself an essay-based subject, because it's not like maths or a science where what you need to know is precisely prescribed and it's easy to see how to answer the questions.

But if you can get access to an expert, then I'd recommend politics, which seems quite interesting, and relevant to the law, tangentially. If you have good background knowledge you might find that that compensates for your lack of time. Personally, I think it's pointless to worry about the 'reputations' of different subjects: they're all ASes after all. With that in mind, I hear Sociology's pretty fulfilling. I would caution you off History, though, because, my course at least, is a lot of work. You should be able to find courses with no coursework in any subject.


im probably gonna do it at college with my other A2s, i didnt want to worry about reputations but i heard that doing economics and business is not really good because they are soooo similar.
Reply 3
Yeah, in our Sixth they warn you off doing both together due to the overlap, but I guess it's a matter of taste. Bear in mind you'll have five ASes already, which is more than most people.
tokyorose888
im probably gonna do it at college with my other A2s, i didnt want to worry about reputations but i heard that doing economics and business is not really good because they are soooo similar.



Psychology is very essayish..lots of structure, evaluating arguments and theories etc

You do things like the importance of eye witness testimonies etc, i've had a few friends, one of which got into UCL to do law who said psychology was really helpful. It can come hand in hand with biology aswell, eg the biological arguments for mental illnesses etc

It's not easy..i mean theres no such thing as an easy subject really as its all subjective, but like i said..theres elements too it that can come in handy, plus its interesting!
There's no such thing as an 'easy' respected essay subject. Respected essay-based subjects include History and English Literature - and these are, by no means, easy.
Reply 6
then what should i do? my teacher warned me about that just yesterday and said as i am chinese already, some unis may not accept my chinese a level even though i learnt it all through schooling
Reply 7
Business is the 'dumber' version of Economics.
Oversimplification for sure, I know :p:,
but it's the largely similar content, in a much less academically rigorous format.
:
tokyorose888
then what should i do? my teacher warned me about that just yesterday and said as i am chinese already, some unis may not accept my chinese a level even though i learnt it all through schooling



do psychology :rolleyes:
Go for English Lit: traditional, respected and challenging. And you'll be able to avoid learning boring, turgid, pre-set information and rigid markschemes - you'll be able to make of your texts what you will (within reason :p:)
Reply 10
Politics, I reckon: interesting, respected, relevant and perhaps slightly lower workload.
Reply 11
What about English LANGUAGE A/S? I am doing it and it is very easy and all of them are essay based.

In OCR, in my college, you have one piece of coursework where you write two creative pieces and then compare them in another piece (commentary) in terms of lexis and syntax. Then the two exams, one is on levels of formality and register, lexis and syntax in Language. The other exam is on Frameworks (you read through a transcript and point out the different frameworks, for example, where colloquialisms are used). It is SO easy :smile:.
anyone know which essay based subject has the least exams?
tokyorose888
anyone know which essay based subject has the least exams?



Psychology, 3 exams no coursework..only 1hour each
h3artie
What about English LANGUAGE A/S? I am doing it and it is very easy and all of them are essay based.

In OCR, in my college, you have one piece of coursework where you write two creative pieces and then compare them in another piece (commentary) in terms of lexis and syntax. Then the two exams, one is on levels of formality and register, lexis and syntax in Language. The other exam is on Frameworks (you read through a transcript and point out the different frameworks, for example, where colloquialisms are used). It is SO easy :smile:.


i second this. it is essay based and once you get into the swing of things it becomes very easy. plus, the new vocab such as pragmatics will take a few minutes to learn, and the case studies maybe and hour tops. so it isn't too time consuming either. however, you might have to check this up, because i've heard this is a blacklisted subject also :s-smilie:
anna_spanner89
Psychology, 3 exams no coursework..only 1hour each


i thought there was coursework, because one of the exams is a coursework based exam :s-smilie:
try history
that is painless really
no coursework and you just need to know the subject alright to get a decent grade and uni's love it
tokyorose888
anyone know which essay based subject has the least exams?


They're all going to have the same..... *raises eyebrow*

They all have the same number of units, and it all depends on which ones you do coursework in and which ones you don't. But they're mostly the same.

Also, don't do English Language - it's sadly not respected anywhere. Even people doing the joint Lang/Lit A-Level struggle to get any good recognition for it, at good universities.
SpiritedAway
i thought there was coursework, because one of the exams is a coursework based exam :s-smilie:


in AQA AS psychology there is no coursework, the coursework module is done in A2. Not sure about other exam boards though
Reply 19
tokyorose888
then what should i do? my teacher warned me about that just yesterday and said as i am chinese already, some unis may not accept my chinese a level even though i learnt it all through schooling


i'm chinese, learnt my a-levels through school and my chinese a-level didn't get recognised any where :p: well, i did finish it a year early, but that's irrelevent XD

all the decent essay-based subjects do have coursework bits, from what i know of the ones taken at my school.. i would say history seems to be slightly easier but i wouldn't know :p:

depending on the university, you don't really need a lot of essay-based subjects to get in for law: my friend got an offer for law with bio/chem/maths :p:

Latest