OCR History GCSE June 5th 2017 thread

Im doing medicine through time/american west for my paper 1 and British public health paper 2. My predictions/advice:

Medicine through time: The ancients (Prehistoric, Egyptian, Greek and Roman) come up EVERY year without fail.
19th century surgery problems and how they overcame problems. E.g pain (1780 Humphrey davy laughing gas, 1800's ether then 1848 chloroform)

American west: Plains Indians (way of life, religious beliefs e.g wakantanka, happy hunting ground, circles etc.)
Conflict between the plains Indians and the whites (Little Crows War 1862, Red Clouds War 1866-68, Battle of the Little Big Horn 1876)
Why Custer was to blame for the loss of the Little Big Horn appears frequently in some shape or form; learn them (Refusal of gatlin gun, reinforcements etc.)
Homesteaders (way of life, how they overcame problems e.g wind mill etc)

Public health: Definitely Chadwicks report 1842, liberal social reforms (MUST)
I cannot stress enough that when you answer the long essay question that you should answer it by doing a complete timeline of the public health course starting with cholera in 31 and finishing with National Insurance in 1911. Add the sources somewhere into it and then always refer to the question with each date that is appropriate.

Im predicted an A. To get an A* you need about 94% of 200 marks. this is about 188/200. Considering I dropped 4 marks on my controlled assessment I'm going into the exam with only a possibility of 98%/100% Dream of the A* is moving closer away :P

Good luck everyone!

Is the final Question the same every year on the public health paper? (re 1831-1914?) Thankyou

Cheers, did you do Arab/israeli conflict for your CA? I did but only know I got an A no idea what mark

Sadly not. But you can answer it with the same answer every single time and get full marks. Simply adapt the complete timeline with relevant connections to the sources given on the paper and change it to suit the question

Early 1800's - Industrial revolution
1831 - Cholera in Sunderland
1832 - Cholera in London
1842 - Chadwicks report
1845 - Andover workhouse scandal (people were eating bone marrow to survive :c)
1848 - 1st public health act & 3rd cholera outbreak
1854 - John Snows water pump discovery
1853-56 - Crimean war
1875 - 2nd public health act/Artisans dwelling act
1877 - River pollutions act
1899-1902 - Boer war
1906 - Liberals come into power
1906- Free school meals act
1907 - Old age pension act
1908 - Childrens charter
1911 - National insurance

There are a few more dates but these are the key ones. Just talk about the effect they had and relate it to the question. Good luck! If you need any help with Medicine through time/American west or public health please pm me. History is my favourite subject and i'm always up for a discussion on it

Thankyou so much with that detailed answer!! i was also wondering whether every year is the medicine through time abc always a modern era or and ancient era choice such as Pick an ABC on Surgery in 1800s or an ABC on the Greeks? if so, shall i only revise for one era? thankyouu

No worries anything to get me out of doing english lit revision ey

I've done most past papers and each year questions A B and C are different with one exception. Every year one of the blocks of questions is based on the Ancients (Prehistory, Egypt, Greek and Rome) without fail. I would 100% recommend becoming an expert in all 4 of these because I guarantee they will come up! (prehistory not so much.
But considering prehistoric medicine has only come up about once for the last 6 years there is a very high chance that, considering its the last year this exact course will be examined, prehistory may be a huge chunk of the medicine side. It could even possibly be the sources question.

However. In the 2016 paper the sources questions were about the ancients so im 99% sure they will not come up again as the source questions. My money is this year the sources questions will be on the medieval or Renaissance era.

Make sure you're familiar with every important individual in medicine and be able to briefly describe their work. E.g Hippocrates, Galen, Pare, Versalius, Harvey, Florence nightingale, James Simpson etc

Lastly, be able to state factors that effected medicine through time and whether they helped or hindered medicine. (War, chance, luck, genius etc.)

I use youtube as the main source of my revision, I find it really helpful

https://www.youtube.com/user/revisegcsehistory (Kind of just highlights stuff and sounds like Paul O'Grady but he covers the whole course in depth)
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL_H6o_Epf3Q1YhjGdQYDqgyUuSqaR7I9E (Tries to be funny and fails, horrendously.)
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLwcRjBG2r8wbzENHvb2OyY5Bm9QUAhTEG (Same tedious music every single time... But really good.)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TtZNM5bnQGg&t=633s (cringe but good.)

If you need anything else lemme know

Thankyou! I will be sure to check out them youtube videos! Have you any tips on the timing i should spend on each of the questions! i tend to do well in mocks i got an A* in the Yr 11 mocks but i always seem to lose the marks on the latter questions due to rushing! Thankyou! What books are you studying for english lit!

Considering the exam is 120 minutes and is 64 marks I would recommend (roughly) 2 minutes a mark. But its the same for every exam - you could spend 5 minutes on an 8 mark question but 15 minutes on a 5 mark question. Just make sure you have enough time to answer each question.
I am also hoping for war to be in the poetry question or nature!

I'm doing An inspector calls (I actually like it) Romeo and Juliet (Awful) and A Christmas carol (eh, wish you got marks for context.) Oh and the conflict part of the anthology. I hope my questions on Wilfred Owens "Exposure" because I love that poem! wbu?

I'm doing OCR History B, with The Cold War and Germany (1919-45) - I've not dropped a mark on my CA so I'm hopeful this will take the pressure off a bit. My predicted grade is an A/A* so I'm hopeful I can get a good mark on both papers! (Paper 2 is a pain though!)

Good luck everyone.

No worries anything to get me out of doing english lit revision ey

I've done most past papers and each year questions A B and C are different with one exception. Every year one of the blocks of questions is based on the Ancients (Prehistory, Egypt, Greek and Rome) without fail. I would 100% recommend becoming an expert in all 4 of these because I guarantee they will come up! (prehistory not so much.
But considering prehistoric medicine has only come up about once for the last 6 years there is a very high chance that, considering its the last year this exact course will be examined, prehistory may be a huge chunk of the medicine side. It could even possibly be the sources question.

However. In the 2016 paper the sources questions were about the ancients so im 99% sure they will not come up again as the source questions. My money is this year the sources questions will be on the medieval or Renaissance era.

Make sure you're familiar with every important individual in medicine and be able to briefly describe their work. E.g Hippocrates, Galen, Pare, Versalius, Harvey, Florence nightingale, James Simpson etc

Lastly, be able to state factors that effected medicine through time and whether they helped or hindered medicine. (War, chance, luck, genius etc.)

I use youtube as the main source of my revision, I find it really helpful

https://www.youtube.com/user/revisegcsehistory (Kind of just highlights stuff and sounds like Paul O'Grady but he covers the whole course in depth)
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL_H6o_Epf3Q1YhjGdQYDqgyUuSqaR7I9E (Tries to be funny and fails, horrendously.)
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLwcRjBG2r8wbzENHvb2OyY5Bm9QUAhTEG (Same tedious music every single time... But really good.)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TtZNM5bnQGg&t=633s (cringe but good.)

If you need anything else lemme know

Im doing medicine through time/american west for my paper 1 and British public health paper 2. My predictions/advice:

Medicine through time: The ancients (Prehistoric, Egyptian, Greek and Roman) come up EVERY year without fail.
19th century surgery problems and how they overcame problems. E.g pain (1780 Humphrey davy laughing gas, 1800's ether then 1848 chloroform)

American west: Plains Indians (way of life, religious beliefs e.g wakantanka, happy hunting ground, circles etc.)
Conflict between the plains Indians and the whites (Little Crows War 1862, Red Clouds War 1866-68, Battle of the Little Big Horn 1876)
Why Custer was to blame for the loss of the Little Big Horn appears frequently in some shape or form; learn them (Refusal of gatlin gun, reinforcements etc.)
Homesteaders (way of life, how they overcame problems e.g wind mill etc)

Public health: Definitely Chadwicks report 1842, liberal social reforms (MUST)
I cannot stress enough that when you answer the long essay question that you should answer it by doing a complete timeline of the public health course starting with cholera in 31 and finishing with National Insurance in 1911. Add the sources somewhere into it and then always refer to the question with each date that is appropriate.

Im predicted an A. To get an A* you need about 94% of 200 marks. this is about 188/200. Considering I dropped 4 marks on my controlled assessment I'm going into the exam with only a possibility of 98%/100% Dream of the A* is moving closer away :P

Good luck everyone!

Hey, just saw some of your amazing answers and was wondering if you could help me out? I’m doing the same papers as you and just need to know what are the key topics/key people for the 19/20^th century medicine because I’m not sure what to focus on. thanks :-)

Thank you!

So 19th/20th century is around the 1750-1900 mark of the course. This is in chronological order btw

So 1750 starts off with Galen not being read. Few reasons why:

Microscope meant that Harveys ideas could be proved right, people realised the 'All-mighty' Galen is wrong
4 humors stopped being accepted as more 'innovative' ideas were being believed (Miasma etc)
Dissection was allowed to Galens books were futile.

Inoculation

Lady Montagu brought inoculation into the UK. Inoculation is basically cutting open a vein and putting pus from a sufferer of whatever disease (e.g smallpox.) This is essentially the botched version of vaccination (more on that in a bit) Basically people died as the vein is being butchered and sometimes the pus taken is actually a really strong strain or whatever scientific nonsense and people fully contracted the illness.

Vaccination

Edward Jenner, country doctor who recognised that milk-maids didnt get smallpox - instead they contracted cowpox. Using this analogy he committed child abuse (not really but whatever) and tried it on a boy called James Phipps. He stuffed James full of cow pox pus, he caught a mild infection, beat the illness and he was sweet. Then Jenner abused him some more and filled him up with pus from a smallpox victim. He survived and vaccination was invented. (nerdy fact: Vaccination comes from the Latin word for cow "Vacca" )

People opposed Jenner because:
Inoculators would lose money and everyone cared more about money than health xd
People thought if they injected pieces of animal into them THEY WOULD TURN INTO A COW?????? (you might have seen the cartoon called "the cow pock" - If you quote this in an answer about Jenner the examiner is likely to be rather impressed.
He was a country doctor who couldnt actually scientifically prove his ideas. Scientists laughed at his idea of vaccination. Jokes on them though, smallpox vaccination became compulsory in 1853!

Nursing

Florence nightingale - she made massive improvements to ward hygiene which, in turn, decreased the death rate.

Mary Seacole - Nursed soldiers to health and built the 'British hotel.' Nightingale is the most widely known nurse and is thought to be the 'Mother of modern nusing' but this easily could have been Mary Seacole. It was only due to ethnic prejudice that she didnt get as much recognition.

Germ theory

Pasteur - Many scientists thought microbes caused disease - Spontaneous generation. Others believed in miasmas. Pasteur was employed in 1857 to find an explanation for souring sugar beet in the alcohol industry. He blamed germs in the air. He did the famous swan-neck experiment which proved that germs in the air caused disease.

Kock - Linked diseases to the microbe that caused that specific disease. He identified anthrax spores and the bacteria that caused cholera, tb and septicemia.

Problems with surgery

Pain
Blood loss
Infection

Pain was overcome by anesthetics. First was Humphry Davy and laughing gas, then R. Liston with Ether and finally Chloroform by James Simpson.

Laughing gas didnt actually knock patients out = useless
Ether = Wasnt a very pleasant smelling chemical and was explosive. No electricity = open flame. Open flame + ether = boom
Chloroform = Effective but because of the taboo associated with anesthesia people held their breath while the chloroformed rag was up to their nose/mouths. Once they had to breathe they took a huge breath and inhaled hellaaaa chloroform. They overdosed and died. This was fixed by John Snows chloroform inhaler and dosage list.

Opposition to anesthesia

Uncomfortable, doctors liked the patients being in pain as they screamed. Screaming = Alive!

But queen victoria used chloroform for her 8th child. Her 8th child Prince Leopold carried on to passively kill millions. Thanks, chloroform.

Infection

Joseph lister recognised that raw sewage smelt like gangrene. This sewage was sprayed with carbolic spray. He did the same in the operating theatre and it essentially started antiseptic surgery. But it slowed down surgery, cracked the skin of doctors and germ theory wasnt widely accepted in 1857.

In 1890s aseptic surgery was introduced which was the removal of all germs in theatres. Then surgical instruments became steam sterilised, hospitals were cleaned and rubber gloves became of use!

Bleeding

After Harveys discovery of blood, transfusions where attempted. They ended in disaster because they didnt know how to stop clotting and blood groups hadnt been discovered. This changed in 1901 when landsteiner discovered blood groups (only 3/4 of them tho) and during the world wars sodium citrate was used to stop clotting, refrigeration was used to transport blood and plasma packs were invented to increase the volume of blood.

Public Health

Industrialism was a massive problem. Conditions of British towns became worse than ever. Houses were build as close together as possible. Disease was rampant and many died from diseases like cholera.

The easiest way to understand the public health side of things is to understand the full timeline:

1831: Cholera arrives in Sunderland.
1832: Cholera hits london
1842: Chadwicks report
1845: Andover workhouse scandal. Workhouse workers were discovered to be so hungry and malnourished they ATE bone marrow from bones.
1848: 1st public health act
1853: Crimean war
1854: John snows water pump discovery
1858: Great stink
1867: 2nd reform act - working class men could vote.
1875: Second public health act
1875: Artisans dwelling act
1876: River pollutions act
1899-1901: Boer war
1906: Social liberal reforms
1907: School meals act
1908: Old age pension act
1911: National insurance
1948: NHS established

I hope this helped! I was evidently bored and this took my mind off the looming exams. Good luck in your exams!

WOWW! Thank you so much! this is so helpful, I wish you luck in your exams also (not that you'll need any with the amount of knowledge you have). x

No worries

I do have some anxiety about the exams though! Im praying that the sources questions arent on the mormons :s