The Student Room Group

A Level Choices

Torn between these A Level choices... need to pick 3 - hoping your experiences with these subjects will help me! Which ones should I pick???
* Geography
* Maths
* Economics
* Spanish
* Psychology
* Physics
Original post by Mouse2
Torn between these A Level choices... need to pick 3 - hoping your experiences with these subjects will help me! Which ones should I pick???
* Geography
* Maths
* Economics
* Spanish
* Psychology
* Physics


Good old A Level choices! Tell us if you know what you want to do at uni,or your interests, then we might be able to help more:smile:
like the guy above said, do you have any future career/uni ambitions? tell us about what you enjoy/what you're passionate about etc.
Original post by Mouse2
Torn between these A Level choices... need to pick 3 - hoping your experiences with these subjects will help me! Which ones should I pick???
* Geography
* Maths
* Economics
* Spanish
* Psychology
* Physics


That's such a wide range. It really depends on what you want to do when you're older, and only you know that. Look up what A-levels are required for the course/path you want to follow.

Maths and Physics work well together, but for some unis courses even that isn't enough - they'd often want a second science or Further Maths.
Reply 4
Original post by Mouse2
Torn between these A Level choices... need to pick 3 - hoping your experiences with these subjects will help me! Which ones should I pick???
* Geography
* Maths
* Economics
* Spanish
* Psychology
* Physics


Of those 6 which three do *you* prefer?

Posted from TSR Mobile
Original post by Mouse2
Torn between these A Level choices... need to pick 3 - hoping your experiences with these subjects will help me! Which ones should I pick???
* Geography
* Maths
* Economics
* Spanish
* Psychology
* Physics

First decide which are the subjects you are good at and most enjoy, also consider the career choices you are aiming for . :smile:
I'm doing a levels next year but I've heard lots of people say physics is a bit harder than expected
Reply 6
Original post by hakunaXmatata
Good old A Level choices! Tell us if you know what you want to do at uni,or your interests, then we might be able to help more:smile:


That's my issue! I'm not exactly sure what I would like to do at uni... I'm interested in all these subjects... but not sure which ones are best, in terms widening my choices in the future.
Reply 7
Original post by ParisOMg
First decide which are the subjects you are good at and most enjoy, also consider the career choices you are aiming for . :smile:
I'm doing a levels next year but I've heard lots of people say physics is a bit harder than expected


These are all my strongest subjects, although I'm not sure what I would to do in the future... so would like the best courses which enable me to widen my choices in the future
Reply 8
Original post by Doonesbury
Of those 6 which three do *you* prefer?

Posted from TSR Mobile


I like all of these... that's why I can't decde between them. I can only choose 3 because my sixth form which I'm going to won't let me do more
Original post by Mouse2
Torn between these A Level choices... need to pick 3 - hoping your experiences with these subjects will help me! Which ones should I pick???
* Geography
* Maths
* Economics
* Spanish
* Psychology
* Physics


Maths and Spanish are great as they open many, many doors, so I would stick with them two. Depending on if you want to go down a purely maths route, having Physics or Economics might be a good idea with them two. But if you prefer essay writing, Geography or Psychology. If you want a mix, drop Spanish and have one from the maths route and one from the essay route, for example, Maths, Physics and Geography, or Maths, Economics and Psychology.

But in my opinion doing Maths, Spanish, and one of the others would allow you to go down many different future routes, especially as Maths and Spanish are both considered facilitating subjects :smile:
Reply 10
Original post by Mouse2
I like all of these... that's why I can't decde between them. I can only choose 3 because my sixth form which I'm going to won't let me do more


Well it's perfectly correct and sensible to have to choose "only" three.

And only you can really decide what those 3 should be. They are all fine.

Do you have a rough idea want you might want to study at university? Obviously that's difficult and many people do change their mind but it would help to focus your choices now.

Do you prefer arts+humanities or sciences?

Which ones did you do best at for GCSE?

Posted from TSR Mobile
Original post by Mouse2
That's my issue! I'm not exactly sure what I would like to do at uni... I'm interested in all these subjects... but not sure which ones are best, in terms widening my choices in the future.


Don't worry if you don't know what you want to do just yet! In terms of subjects that'll give you a wider range of options you might want to choose maths/physics/economics. When i chose my A Levels I really had no clue what I wanted to do in uni, and now I wish i chose biology as a lot of uni courses I'm interested in require biology. Can you picture yourself working in science/technology in the future? How about languages?

I take psychology, some universities consider it as a science subject, but some don't. It's a really interesting subject and involves a lot of timed essays and also have to remember a lot of content.

I also take maths, some modules are easier than others (especially in the first year) but one thing you HAVE to do is practice past papers, you really have to understand the methods and go through all your mistakes you make if you want to get a good grade as it is quite a step up from GCSE maths.
(edited 6 years ago)
Reply 12
Thanks all for your comments - I think I have a more idea of what I may want to do! Maths seems like a recurring one which most of you have mentioned... also Spanish seems quite good. Thanks again
It really does depend on what you are good at and enjoy. What is the top three out of those for you are how well at them are you doing in GCSEs. Maths and Psychology are pretty hard but if you are good and enjoy learning about them then go ahead. Maths is a facilitating subject that if you smash is impressive. What do you want to study at uni? And have fun choosing!:smile:
You really need to think about what you may want to do after A-levels - this will help inform your A-level choices now.

In general, Maths is a good choice, but if you are considering taking Physics you more or less are necessarily required to take them together. Every course that requires A-level Physics will also require Maths, so taking the pair ensures you can actually apply to these courses. Maths is also very recommended if you think you may pursue economics at uni, even if you don't take A-level Economics.

Of the remaining A-levels, the only one which is a required prequisite to any course is Spanish, which is necessary for any Spanish language degrees (including joint honours courses with Spanish, usually). However according to TSR, language A-levels tend to be pretty challenging for even very able linguists - unless you have an exceptionally strong background and interest in language learning and linguistics, it's probably not the best option.

The others are generally good essay based A-levels, and are all more or less accepted equally. Taking the relevant subject at A-level may help you decide if you want to pursue it at degree level, so these could all be used to explore a subject area. However there is the caveat that some A-level subjects don't reflect the study of that subject at university as well as others.

A way to help you decide which you want to take is think about your GCSE studies and exams. Which aspects of the subjects that you've taken which are on the list you provided did you enjoy? Which didn't you enjoy? Are there are any general exam types/styles which you find more difficult or stressful, e.g. oral exams? In language A-levels you'll need to be pretty comfortable talking in class, both presenting and in roleplay discussions, as well as giving oral examinations. If these are things you tend to not prefer, I'd advise not to pursue that route. Similarly, for Physics there will be a signifcant lab component; if you didn't like doing circuits/electronics in GCSE Science, or writing lab reports on a regular basis, you may get fed up with that subject. Maths is fairly self-explanatory - you'll probably have problem sets very often (weekly potentially), and you need to keep on top of it or else you can fall behind pretty quickly as much of the material builds on the earlier content.

The other subjects are essay subjects - do you enjoy writing extended academic prose? You'll likely have pretty regular essay deadlines for these subjects, particularly if you take more than one. If the thought of having to write 2-3 essays or projects often fills you with dread, or if you find yourself panicking at the start of essay exams where you don't have all the material with you or a specific essay plan already set up for that particular title, you might struggle. On the latter note, while you'll generally prepare "generalist" essay plans ahead of exams, you can't necessarily know what questions will come up - so you need to be able to change tack pretty quickly. Also, while they generally aren't "long form" essays in exams, you need to be able to fit a lot of factual information into relatively short chunks of writing/time for those subjects.

So, basically - if you take physics, also take maths. If you take economics you should probably take maths as well, as many economics courses at university prefer or require maths. Make sure you know what you're getting in for if you pick spanish and be prepared to put in a lot of work for it. For the other essay subjects, be aware that they may not necessarily be representative of university study in those subjects, nor are the specifically required for it - make sure you choose the ones you're genuinely interested in, rather than ones that will "look better on paper" for a given course/university.

Quick Reply