AQA A - AS to A2 jump

Peanut247

1

How big is the jump in AQA A Psychology from AS to A2?

Reply 1

studentwho

1

Research Methods sucks! I guess i'll just have to get used to it since I'm planning to do Psychology at Uni haha

Reply 2

studentwho

1

Research probably, what about you?
What uni's are you looking at? :smile:

xxx

Reply 3

studentwho

1

wow!
I'm looking at Stirling University (looks amazing), Sunderland University and Nottingham Trent xx

Reply 4

studentwho

1

i didnt really like any of the top ones :/ i wanted to stay reasonably close to home and i like smaller unis etc... they didn't really attract me that much, and I dont think that sunderland/stirling/NTU are too far down the league scale are they? :confused:

What did you get in your AS Levels? xx

Reply 5

jaydamber

8

I just finished A2 psychology, same exam board. There's a hell of a lot more content that you basically just have to memorise. Then there's the research methods as well which I found pretty tricky, but others were okay with.

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Reply 6

Unknown_user

2

The amount you need to rememeber at A2 increases. You basically have topics and you kind of know possible exam titles and have to memorise the content for each. At first it seems a lot but if you put the effort in let exams come it will be ok.

Reply 7

RosieEPQ

9

I got a C at AS but an A* at A2 as the exam structure played much more to my strengths. Although you're not technically marked on it, I'd say learning names/dates of specific researchers and studies is much more important at A2, as it makes you sound like you know what you're talking about! There's definitely more content in A2, so making clear notes all the way through and regularly practising timed essays is key :smile:

good luck!

Reply 8

Peanut247

OP

1

Original post by RosieEPQ

I got a C at AS but an A* at A2 as the exam structure played much more to my strengths. Although you're not technically marked on it, I'd say learning names/dates of specific researchers and studies is much more important at A2, as it makes you sound like you know what you're talking about! There's definitely more content in A2, so making clear notes all the way through and regularly practising timed essays is key :smile:

good luck!

What is the exam structure like? :colondollar:

Reply 9

Peanut247

OP

1

Original post by Unknown_user

The amount you need to rememeber at A2 increases. You basically have topics and you kind of know possible exam titles and have to memorise the content for each. At first it seems a lot but if you put the effort in let exams come it will be ok.

How much does it increase by exactly? With AS I basically had to read out my notes loud for 2 weeks before the exam. I ended up with overall 97.5% but I'm wary whether it will work with A2.

What is the best way of revision?

Reply 10

RosieEPQ

9

Original post by Peanut247

What is the exam structure like? :colondollar:

Essays!

Unit 3 is three 24-mark essays, unit 4 is one 24-mark essay, a series of shorter questions on a different topic and some short research methods questions :smile:

Reply 11

Peanut247

OP

1

Original post by RosieEPQ

Essays!

Unit 3 is three 24-mark essays, unit 4 is one 24-mark essay, a series of shorter questions on a different topic and some short research methods questions :smile:

Oh gosh...
So with the essays is there a particular writing technique you have to follow or can you basically regurgitate facts, dates, procedures etc.

Thanks :smile:

Reply 12

RosieEPQ

9

Original post by Peanut247

Oh gosh...
So with the essays is there a particular writing technique you have to follow or can you basically regurgitate facts, dates, procedures etc.

Thanks :smile:

Definitely start with an introduction, so if you're talking about, say, the behavioural approach, then briefly explain the main assumptions of the approach.

Then for first 8 marks, you're giving AO1 material - so you're explaining the concept asked for in the question. Make sure you explain this concisely - you don't get marks for waffling! (I made this mistake for ages at the beginning of year13)

The second part is AO2 - evaluation. Here, it's wise to know procedures, names, dates etc, BUT you can't just regurgitate stuff, you need to explain why it's relevant to your AO1 material. So you can't just quote a research study that seems to support the approach you discussed as AO1, you need to explain WHY it supports it and evaluate the piece of research - so even if it seems to support the initial hypothesis, is there a methodological flaw that means it can't really be used to support it? Or is the methodology pretty good? Criticism doesn't always have to be pointing out bad things about the research, you can praise it too!

Hopefully your teacher will help you with essay technique, but that's how I went about it and it seemed to be pretty successful! :wink:

Reply 13

tgwktm

19

Posted from TSR Mobile
I have just finished A2 i wouldn't say the jump isn't anything hard to adjust to. The exam becomes more about essays which are frequently 24 marks. These do however follow a similar structure so you can use the same structure for each essay usually. Research methods does get bigger but a lot of stuff is repeated from last year. Basically it is nothing that can't be adapted to with hard work.

Reply 14

Unknown_user

2

The jump is quite big for some people. But I suggest as you go the through the year and cover possible exam questions have a go at it. Sometimes the teacher will set it as homework sometimes they won't. But do them for each one as you go along and get it checked by your teacher that way you can have a near perfect model answers for wverything w

Reply 15

Unknown_user

2

Which will be really useful for when exams come

Reply 16

Unknown_user

2

I did that and found revision much easier as I had one source that I would just try to remember as opposed to other people who tried to revise near exams and didn't even know which book to revise from.

Reply 17

Unknown_user

2

But for 2 of the topics you can't do that this is research methods and the other topic which is something like psychology in action or psychology in the media I can't remember these are the parted questions I did addiction. For these I did notes and one final tip for these topics do past papers and for all the topics look at the examiners report it may be useful