The Student Room Group

How hard is higher maths/biology?

Is the work managable?
I personally found the work for both higher biology and higher maths manageable alongside my other subjects
Reply 2
Original post by stereotypeasian
I personally found the work for both higher biology and higher maths manageable alongside my other subjects

what other subjects did you do as highers & how did you do in them?
Original post by skye4609
what other subjects did you do as highers & how did you do in them?

I actually sat 8 highers over S4-S6 and got As in all of them :colondollar:

In S5, I sat higher english, higher maths, higher physics, higher chemistry and higher geography
I found higher geography to be very content heavy; I actually struggled alot with the jump between national 5 chemistry to higher chemistry which I was surprised ; I also took a longer time to understand higher english compared to national 5 but I think it is fairly normal to struggle with higher english at the beginning

In S6, I decided to do two crash highers with 2 advanced highers; the crash highers were in higher biology and higher psychology
As I already sat highers the year before, the crash highers were fairly easier as I knew what I was getting myself into when compared to a college course that my school offered that I chose to do alongside the two crash highers + two advanced highers
Reply 4
hardness is completely subjective and different for every person- it depends on your ability..
I think it really depends on how you got on with N5. If you found N5 fairly easy then you'll probs get on fine with higher. If you struggled then you'll struggle with higher too. If it was okay, then with revision and concentration in class you'll likely find higher okay too.

I didn't find it too bad, some of the concepts I know gave others some difficulty but even the people in my class who were failing every test managed to pass the final exam.
Reply 6
Original post by stereotypeasian
I actually sat 8 highers over S4-S6 and got As in all of them :colondollar:

In S5, I sat higher english, higher maths, higher physics, higher chemistry and higher geography
I found higher geography to be very content heavy; I actually struggled alot with the jump between national 5 chemistry to higher chemistry which I was surprised ; I also took a longer time to understand higher english compared to national 5 but I think it is fairly normal to struggle with higher english at the beginning

In S6, I decided to do two crash highers with 2 advanced highers; the crash highers were in higher biology and higher psychology
As I already sat highers the year before, the crash highers were fairly easier as I knew what I was getting myself into when compared to a college course that my school offered that I chose to do alongside the two crash highers + two advanced highers

Wow that’s impressive, I’m going into s5 & have taken Higher English, Higher Geography, Higher Biology, Higher Maths & Higher Modern studies, in just worried I will struggle with higher maths & biology as I’ve heard it’s quite difficult! Thank you for replying!
Reply 7
Original post by snazzles
I think it really depends on how you got on with N5. If you found N5 fairly easy then you'll probs get on fine with higher. If you struggled then you'll struggle with higher too. If it was okay, then with revision and concentration in class you'll likely find higher okay too.

I didn't find it too bad, some of the concepts I know gave others some difficulty but even the people in my class who were failing every test managed to pass the final exam.

Ah okay thank you, I found Nat5 not too bad so hoping higher goes okay.
Original post by skye4609
Ah okay thank you, I found Nat5 not too bad so hoping higher goes okay.

Yeah the subject I heard most people complaing about the workload was Biology, History, and sometimes English (at least at our school).

I believe Biology has a lot of memorising and such but I never took it so can't help much there.
Maths had a few equations you had to memorise as they weren't given on the sheets, and a couple little bits of information you had to know, but it's not so much that it's difficult on that aspect. The hardest part is likely just problem solving and understanding the questions which may be something that comes intuatively or may be something you'll have to work at.
Original post by skye4609
Wow that’s impressive, I’m going into s5 & have taken Higher English, Higher Geography, Higher Biology, Higher Maths & Higher Modern studies, in just worried I will struggle with higher maths & biology as I’ve heard it’s quite difficult! Thank you for replying!

If you haven't already checked out BBC Bitesize for higher biology - that was pretty much what I fell back on outside of past papers, blame my school but they loved showing me the amoeba sisters on youtube; imo not that great for english/geography/modern studies as they are like only 2-5 paragraphs for one topic when the teacher gives you ten pages of analysis and notes

For geography, my school was fortunate enough to us taking higher to use exactly the same examples and the same physical geography topics and same two global issues so think of it know - you do kinda already know some higher knowledge; the difficult topic at my school, weather, did not have a higher version of it so we were like singing hallelujah lol. I will say the last map reading question was what most people did complain about/struggle with; just the volume will increase a bit from national 5 to higher as instead of doing 2 out of the 4 available physical geography land formations you have to do all four now; soil was the most fun and liked topic at my school :tongue:

What I heard about higher biology before I crashed it was it was a lot of memorization and that "oh no why are the SQA turning the higher biology papers into maths tests"
Reply 10
Original post by snazzles
Yeah the subject I heard most people complaing about the workload was Biology, History, and sometimes English (at least at our school).

I believe Biology has a lot of memorising and such but I never took it so can't help much there.
Maths had a few equations you had to memorise as they weren't given on the sheets, and a couple little bits of information you had to know, but it's not so much that it's difficult on that aspect. The hardest part is likely just problem solving and understanding the questions which may be something that comes intuatively or may be something you'll have to work at.

Is higher a massive jump up from n5 for all subjects (especially maths) or is the jump ok? I’ve heard maths is the biggest jump that’s why I was wondering about it on here. Thank you again for replying.
Original post by skye4609
Is higher a massive jump up from n5 for all subjects (especially maths) or is the jump ok? I’ve heard maths is the biggest jump that’s why I was wondering about it on here. Thank you again for replying.

I personally don't believe the jump is insane, but obviously you have to work a bit harder throughout the year.
Can I ask what grades you got at N5? That will likely give an indication as to how you'll get on at higher
Reply 12
Original post by snazzles
I personally don't believe the jump is insane, but obviously you have to work a bit harder throughout the year.
Can I ask what grades you got at N5? That will likely give an indication as to how you'll get on at higher

Right now I’m predicted an A in 6 of my N5’s which are Maths, English, Modern Studies, Biology, Geography, Hospitality & then a High B in Business & I have picked to do geography modern studies maths biology and English at higher for S5
Original post by skye4609
Right now I’m predicted an A in 6 of my N5’s which are Maths, English, Modern Studies, Biology, Geography, Hospitality & then a High B in Business & I have picked to do geography modern studies maths biology and English at higher for S5

If you're predicted an A in your N5s then I imagine you'll be fine with Higher. Depending on how hard you work you may drop a grade for higher but you should still be good
Reply 14
Original post by skye4609
Is the work managable?


I'm taking higher bio this year and although the set work is manageable, I find I need to do a lot of revision to get my head around things. But the jump isn't that big if you've already done national 5.
Reply 15
ayyy were doing the same subjects barr maths, if you wanna chat through anything then pm me :smile:
Reply 16
Original post by sask1
ayyy were doing the same subjects barr maths, if you wanna chat through anything then pm me :smile:

What subjects are you doing next year!
Reply 17
Original post by skye4609
What subjects are you doing next year!

well I've never really liked school so I've applied for uni, and deferred for 2022 so plan on taking a gap year, if I was going to stay in school I'd probably take advanced geography, advanced modern, advanced german and higher rmps, what about you?
Original post by skye4609
Wow that’s impressive, I’m going into s5 & have taken Higher English, Higher Geography, Higher Biology, Higher Maths & Higher Modern studies, in just worried I will struggle with higher maths & biology as I’ve heard it’s quite difficult! Thank you for replying!

Probs the easiest subjects. Though this may be subjective. But some subjects you can refer to them as hard but these 2 subjects are subjective but are generally though of as easy at higher level. Biology many would say it would be their easiest subject. All you need to is to keep up with the work and understand + memorise. For Maths, you have to understand everything. Everything should make sense after doing lots of practice papers. Maths is generally easy if you do enough practice, that’s it for maths. Maths I find is the easiest subject because all you need to do is practice a lot, easy to say but when you get good at maths you just learn to love the subject. After solving hard equations it is a satisfaction. Hope that helped 👍🏼.

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