Philosophy vs Physics?

Do you want to go to uni, and if so, which course are you interested in?
If it's only for AS, then it doesn't matter much which one you pick as they're both respected subjects. If you have no preference at all, I'd recommend philosophy and ethics since it's an essay subject so you'll have a bit more variety.
I did OCR Physics, it's pretty hard but if you're good at maths and did well in GCSE, you should be fine. I found it to be a big step up from GCSE at first, but you settle into it.
I haven't done philosophy and ethics but I do know quite a lot of people who take it alongside a very similar combination to you and they all enjoy it (but it's definitely not a doss, if that's what you were looking for).


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Thankyou. I am not too sure what course to study at uni as I can't make up my mind. I'm not too sure whether I would carry it on at A2 or not as I don't know how well I will do at AS. I'm not looking for a doss around, I'm there to work. I just don't want to get bored, I suppose. Also the physics course has a lot on circuit I believe and if its anything like GCSE it sounds boring.

I did OCR Physics A, which does involve circuitry as a fairly large part of the second exam but it's more interesting than GCSE. You also get to look at more advanced concepts like the photoelectric effect. Honestly, the AS can drag on a little but the A2 is super interesting (cosmology, medical physics etc.) If you found circuits really boring though (I wouldn't blame you!) and you don't need physics, you'd probably be better off doing philosophy and ethics, as it's hard to get a good grade in something you don't like.
I'd only recommend taking physics if you think there's a chance you'll go for an engineering-related course. Without physics, you'd still be taking 4 facilitating and well-liked subjects so you'd have a wide range of options open to you, which is ideal if you haven't made your mind up yet.

Thankyou again. I looked at what is involved in A2 and it looks extremely interesting. I don't think I would be going down the engineering path as it's not something I would be intersected in doing. How many months would you say that it took to cover the circuits part of the syllabus? As I find the rest of the course interesting but circuits not so much.

We spent about a month and a half on circuit-related stuff, but we only had those lessons every other day (one teacher taught us Mechanics and the other taught Electrons, Photons and Waves). One thing you should keep in mind is that the coursework will likely be at least partially a circuit-related task as well (but that's only about a day's worth of work).
Looking at the OCR syllabus and teacher's guide, they recommend about 22 hours to be spent on circuits, though of course that'll vary depending on the school.

Interesting, thank you. How well did you do in your physics GCSE compared to ASl? Also how much extra work did you have to put in after class? I know some people say 1 hour of physics is 1 hour of extra work at home.

I got an A* at GCSE, an A at AS then an A for the overall A-level (a miracle since I only scraped the A at AS).
I had to put in a lot of extra work at AS because I found it hard to grasp mechanics and I never really understood circuits at GCSE, so I had to basically relearn GCSE midway through the year at AS when I kept getting Es.
Starting from December, I probably did half an hour of extra physics every day, and during study leave it got three hours a day while my other subjects got one or two.
However, at A2 I got a lot more confident because of my AS grade and I had perfected exam technique, so it was a lot less work. I wish I'd started practising exam papers earlier in AS.



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