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Chinese A-level

I want to do Mandarin Chinese for A level however I want to know if anyone else is doing/has done Chinese a levels and if they found it difficult or not. I'm not a native and I a currently doing my Mandarin GCSE's. Is there a big difference between A level and GCSE mandarin. If so, how? Do you recommend it ?
谢谢 :smile:
Original post by polyglot23
I want to do Mandarin Chinese for A level however I want to know if anyone else is doing/has done Chinese a levels and if they found it difficult or not. I'm not a native and I a currently doing my Mandarin GCSE's. Is there a big difference between A level and GCSE mandarin. If so, how? Do you recommend it ?
谢谢 :smile:

Hey there,
I'm not doing a-level mandarin but I was actually in a weirdly similar situation.
I do mandarin gcse as a non native speaker (I learn at school) and I spoke to the head of languages/mandarin teacher about the a-level and apparently it would be ridiculously hard to get a decent grade in it. I was recommended to do the mandarin pre-u, it's like the a-level but it's made for non native speakers. It looks interesting as it covers the culture as well as the language.
How are you finding mandarin gcse? I absolutely love it:tongue:
Good luck:wink:
Original post by Toastiekid
Hey there,
I'm not doing a-level mandarin but I was actually in a weirdly similar situation.
I do mandarin gcse as a non native speaker (I learn at school) and I spoke to the head of languages/mandarin teacher about the a-level and apparently it would be ridiculously hard to get a decent grade in it. I was recommended to do the mandarin pre-u, it's like the a-level but it's made for non native speakers. It looks interesting as it covers the culture as well as the language.
How are you finding mandarin gcse? I absolutely love it:tongue:
Good luck:wink:


Heyyyyyyyy. OMG really!!! Yes I've heard at pre-u. The next closest school to mine that does teach mandarin is Finham park school (which is Coventry I believe)which is still too far for me !!! And my school doesn't offer mandarin A level so ill have to study it privately with my teacher during my free lessons which scares me cause I don't know if I'll have enough time or if the teacher will still teach there next year. Oh no. Is it really that hard ? Maybe I should reconsider. But mandarin goes really well with my other A level/gcse options so I'm not sure what else I'd pick. And also I want to study it at uni. I find mandarin great!! I can correctly pronounce and remember the tones of every word I have learnt (almost) and I practice with natives to help me improve. Although I have to say it is a lot harder then other languages I am learning haha. What about you? how do you find Chinese? What else have you picked for A-level? How many people are carrying on mandarin for the Pre-U at your school ? Cause at my school out of the 10 students in the class, I'm the only one who wants to study it further.
Original post by Toastiekid
Hey there,
I'm not doing a-level mandarin but I was actually in a weirdly similar situation.
I do mandarin gcse as a non native speaker (I learn at school) and I spoke to the head of languages/mandarin teacher about the a-level and apparently it would be ridiculously hard to get a decent grade in it. I was recommended to do the mandarin pre-u, it's like the a-level but it's made for non native speakers. It looks interesting as it covers the culture as well as the language.
How are you finding mandarin gcse? I absolutely love it:tongue:
Good luck:wink:


Also I think we spoke before. You told me you do Mandarin and French edexcel right? And that you had your speaking exam a while ago? How was it ?
Original post by polyglot23
Also I think we spoke before. You told me you do Mandarin and French edexcel right? And that you had your speaking exam a while ago? How was it ?

Yep that’s me:tongue:
My mandarin speaking went well the second time (the first time I accidentally answered one of the questions backwards lol), funnily enough I have another one in the next few weeks.
Also hang around, I’ll repsond to your other post in a moment :h:
Original post by polyglot23
Heyyyyyyyy. OMG really!!! Yes I've heard at pre-u. The next closest school to mine that does teach mandarin is Finham park school (which is Coventry I believe)which is still too far for me !!! And my school doesn't offer mandarin A level so ill have to study it privately with my teacher during my free lessons which scares me cause I don't know if I'll have enough time or if the teacher will still teach there next year. Oh no. Is it really that hard ? Maybe I should reconsider. But mandarin goes really well with my other A level/gcse options so I'm not sure what else I'd pick. And also I want to study it at uni. I find mandarin great!! I can correctly pronounce and remember the tones of every word I have learnt (almost) and I practice with natives to help me improve. Although I have to say it is a lot harder then other languages I am learning haha. What about you? how do you find Chinese? What else have you picked for A-level? How many people are carrying on mandarin for the Pre-U at your school ? Cause at my school out of the 10 students in the class, I'm the only one who wants to study it further.


Me, I love Chinese; the language is so interesting, my current teacher is lovely and my lessons are really fun:^_^:
ooh studying it at uni would be cool, I think I'll pick it up at uni alongside my course (god knows what that will be!) or live in China for a bit:ahee:
I really want to continue (and my school are now offering the pre-u) but I've decided for other reasons to go for a different sixth form. I won't be able to do the pre-u there but I could potentially continue learning Mandarin throughout sixth form.
At my school, we had a class of 20 but we've gone down to 13 after people dropped it in the past few weeks.
Out of my class I think 4/5 want to do the pre-u, my teacher said they'd need three to run it although a student in the year above is taking it as one of her A-levels:curious:
I think if you want to get the highest grades possible in this language, you'll probably do better with the pre-u than the a-level though funnily enough I was told by my ex-mandarin teacher to not bother taking either at all:dontknow:
In the end, it's your decision...if you check on ucas progress my school did recently put up the fact that they're offering the pre-u but I have no idea whether it'd be closer or further for you:fluffy:
good luck with all your GCSEs:gigg:
Original post by Toastiekid
Yep that’s me:tongue:
My mandarin speaking went well the second time (the first time I accidentally answered one of the questions backwards lol), funnily enough I have another one in the next few weeks.
Also hang around, I’ll repsond to your other post in a moment :h:


haha. I'm glad to hear it went well overall. Ive got mine after the half term:s-smilie:
Original post by Toastiekid
Me, I love Chinese; the language is so interesting, my current teacher is lovely and my lessons are really fun:^_^:
ooh studying it at uni would be cool, I think I'll pick it up at uni alongside my course (god knows what that will be!) or live in China for a bit:ahee:
I really want to continue (and my school are now offering the pre-u) but I've decided for other reasons to go for a different sixth form. I won't be able to do the pre-u there but I could potentially continue learning Mandarin throughout sixth form.
At my school, we had a class of 20 but we've gone down to 13 after people dropped it in the past few weeks.
Out of my class I think 4/5 want to do the pre-u, my teacher said they'd need three to run it although a student in the year above is taking it as one of her A-levels:curious:
I think if you want to get the highest grades possible in this language, you'll probably do better with the pre-u than the a-level though funnily enough I was told by my ex-mandarin teacher to not bother taking either at all:dontknow:
In the end, it's your decision...if you check on ucas progress my school did recently put up the fact that they're offering the pre-u but I have no idea whether it'd be closer or further for you:fluffy:
good luck with all your GCSEs:gigg:

Oooh I'd possibly like to love in china too. I've heard that teaching languages have a few advantages there.Oh so what qualification will you take for mandarin during sixth form? Are you picking French too?Why did they drop out? was it too hard for them? Maybe the student in the year above you is chines so its going to be a lot easier for her possibly.
Really? thats a shame, I feel that more people should be encouraged to pick it. Don't let it dishearten you though.If you enjoy it, pick it:smile:.
Omg really? thanks a lot ill have a look. But I hope they offer French and Spanish too because I'm looking to study mfl's for A level.

Good luck with all of your GCSE's too :wink:
Original post by polyglot23
Oooh I'd possibly like to love in china too. I've heard that teaching languages have a few advantages there.Oh so what qualification will you take for mandarin during sixth form? Are you picking French too?Why did they drop out? was it too hard for them? Maybe the student in the year above you is chines so its going to be a lot easier for her possibly.
Really? thats a shame, I feel that more people should be encouraged to pick it. Don't let it dishearten you though.If you enjoy it, pick it:smile:.
Omg really? thanks a lot ill have a look. But I hope they offer French and Spanish too because I'm looking to study mfl's for A level.

Good luck with all of your GCSE's too :wink:


I don’t think I’ll take a qualification in mandarin, I’ll just keep doing Duolingo etc and talking to my Chinese exchange:tongue: I’m actually not planning to do any languages at a-level but I visit France every year and I’ll stay with my French exchange over the summer.
People dropped out of my class because they were consistently getting U grades (this was because they weren’t trying not the teaching!)
Nah the student in the year above isn’t chinese (I know her quite well) but I think she puts in a lot of work with the pre-u (and her lessons are 1-2-1!) I’ll ask her how it’s going when I next see her:h:
Five is actually quite a lot; I know that this year in a-level french they have five so it’s a normal amount for language a-levels in my school:wink:
Yeah my school offer French, Spanish and (now) Mandarin, a-levels for French and Spanish with the pre-u for mandarin.
Just check on UCAS progress, you’ll find it quite easily (I think...if not p.m)
I won’t be doing Mandarin though as I think I’m going to a different school for sixth form (though my school’s sixth form is great!)
wooo good luck:smile: (bon courage!)
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John6174
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Original post by polyglot23
I want to do Mandarin Chinese for A level however I want to know if anyone else is doing/has done Chinese a levels and if they found it difficult or not. I'm not a native and I a currently doing my Mandarin GCSE's. Is there a big difference between A level and GCSE mandarin. If so, how? Do you recommend it ?
谢谢 :smile:


Original post by Toastiekid
Hey there,
I'm not doing a-level mandarin but I was actually in a weirdly similar situation.
I do mandarin gcse as a non native speaker (I learn at school) and I spoke to the head of languages/mandarin teacher about the a-level and apparently it would be ridiculously hard to get a decent grade in it. I was recommended to do the mandarin pre-u, it's like the a-level but it's made for non native speakers. It looks interesting as it covers the culture as well as the language.
How are you finding mandarin gcse? I absolutely love it:tongue:
Good luck:wink:

Me too. Very interesting to hear yiur discussions. Have exactly the same issues.

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