French A Level to go with 3 Sciencey ones?

On my application forms for sixth forms, I've put down Maths, Further Maths, Physics, and, after thinking hard for a while, French.
I'm fairly confident about the 3 mathsy/sciencey ones, in that that is what I want to go on and do, but the question is whether doing French would detract from an application to do, for example, physics or computing at university.
Computing would have been the other choice for my fourth A Level, but I decided overall that French would be more generally useful if I didn't want to do computing and probably a bit of a break from doing three sciencey A Levels. Additionally, from what I have seen on many university websites, computing A Level is not needed for computing at university, and many people (including both my French teacher and my computing teacher) have said that universities really like language A Levels.

All I'd really like is some thoughts/reassurance, please!!

Reply 1

ThenameisGrey

Hi, TIF141!

I'm applying to BSc Biomedical Sciences with a year in industry right now and am taking A2 Biology, Chemistry and French. I took AS Maths last year and found it incredibly difficult, winding up with a D overall (B's in the rest of my AS levels). I thought I was done for when I mucked up Maths so badly but I realised I didn't need it terribly, plus the fact that French is still a very strong subject to have when applying to something scientific (as opposed to, say, having History). If you're doing the other three and do well then French will only add to your application, but it can also act as a decent safeguard if you do badly in, say, Further Maths and apply to Physics or Computing. French is definitely an interesting subject and I highly recommend you give it a shot; even if you don't do well you've got the other three subjects upon which universities can base their decisions.

Hope this helps!

Yours,
Grey

Reply 2

username1560589

Yes, you only need three relevant A-levels, so if you want to do French as well, you can.

Reply 3

Tarte Tatin

It doubt it will detract from anything, and I know someone who does all of these subjects. Go for it :smile:

Reply 4

Compost

Original post by TIF141

On my application forms for sixth forms, I've put down Maths, Further Maths, Physics, and, after thinking hard for a while, French.

They are all strong academic A levels and a good choice. I've known a couple of people do those A levels oddly they both went on to read Law but i think they'd be fine for Computing.

Reply 5

Actaeon

I'm doing these four A levels (plus Music) and I really like the combination. French requires different skills and is a good contrast - after half a day of maths lessons it's really good to go to something completely different, it makes my day more interesting :smile:

And a language is a great skill to have and will complement anything! I'd go for it.

Reply 6

neverstop

I did Maths, Biology, Chemistry and French. Enjoyable , but a fair amount of work. Work hard, stay on top and it'll be great !

Reply 7

TIF141

Ok, thanks for the replies!
It's just that it's quite possible that I'll do computing at university, because I do enjoy it at GCSE, and although it's not a "facilitating subject" and not listed as essential by most universities, universities want to know that you really love your subject, which might be a bit hard if I've clearly not done as much of it as I could have done :L
But I appreciate the responses! :biggrin:

Reply 8

Muttley79

A language is useful for computing because programing is essentially 'learning a language' so you are showing you have the right skills.

Reply 9

rich1334

As someone doing Maths, Further Maths, Physics and Computing AS Level, I would say go ahead and do French! I really enjoyed French at GCSE (and was surprisingly good at it) and I do sometimes regret not taking it at A Level. It will be a lot of work though, definitely in comparison to Computing, which I find is the easiest A Level I do.