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OCR Computer Science A-level

If anyone here does OCR Computer Science A-level, both y12 and y13, could you please tell me how it is and how do you find it. For y13 students, does the coding project negatively impact your other subjects? (because of the time it takes)
I’ve just finished year 13 at college. I took CS and OCR was the exam board. The coding project didn’t hinder my other subjects. I didn’t do anything for it over the summer either. Our tutor set a deadline a couple of weeks before the actual deadline, I think I had like a month before my exams actually started from the deadline.

I however did the project and ensured I got in the top band of marks for each section before we handed it in for peer marking at each stage. So this meant I didn’t have to go over a load of parts each stage which may have pushed me back a little. I did have a few all nighters to finish it off, but that’s because of my mental health.

I actually found it fairly easy to do the project, I enjoyed it and found the coding part quite easy. They don’t ask for your whole code, they just want some screenshots of it. So even if it doesn’t work you can manipulate it into looking like it does. I had to do that at one point as an arrow to show direction wasn’t in the right position, but it would have involved me to redo the whole thing so I blabbed it. My tutor actually told us to do this if we were struggling and not concentrate so much on the actual coding. The documentation is so much more important than the program you’re producing. So pseudocode, flow charts and top down designs. Always justify why you’ve done something that way, even if it just seems pointless and repetitive to you, always ask you’re self “why”.

Just DM me if needs be, I’m happy to help. I genuinely loved doing the project. I’m predicted nearly full marks in it. However some of my class mates did struggle with this, mainly with the documentation and pseudocode. Although this one guy didn’t bother at all, tried to “smash it out” in one night and got predicted an U, he’s not bothered as he is pretty confident he can get fully marks in the exam which will bring his grades right up. The project is only 20% of the final grade.

I would just say make sure you stay on track with your deadlines, that every section you do check it with the mark scheme and try and get into the top band before handing it in for feedback (if your tutor will give you feedback during it, they can’t actually mark it).

Oh and I really didn’t want to do the project at first and I was dreading it. What are you thinking of doing?
(edited 4 years ago)
It went alright considering I never did it in GCSE, and I was making progress in each mock (unlike my other alevels). The coding project didn't really impact my other subjects, and it shouldn't unless you leave to last minute (like what my friends did and I had to help them out). They flopped hard in their mocks for other subjects as a result. Funny thing is that they ended up getting a higher mark (for the project) even though they couldn't even get theirs to work properly.
(edited 4 years ago)
Reply 3
Original post by Paypurr
I’ve just finished year 13 at college. I took CS and OCR was the exam board. The coding project didn’t hinder my other subjects. I didn’t do anything for it over the summer either. Our tutor set a deadline a couple of weeks before the actual deadline, I think I had like a month before my exams actually started from the deadline.

I however did the project and ensured I got in the top band of marks for each section before we handed it in for peer marking at each stage. So this meant I didn’t have to go over a load of parts each stage which may have pushed me back a little. I did have a few all nighters to finish it off, but that’s because of my mental health.

I actually found it fairly easy to do the project, I enjoyed it and found the coding part quite easy. They don’t ask for your whole code, they just want some screenshots of it. So even if it doesn’t work you can manipulate it into looking like it does. I had to do that at one point as an arrow to show direction wasn’t in the right position, but it would have involved me to redo the whole thing so I blabbed it. My tutor actually told us to do this if we were struggling and not concentrate so much on the actual coding. The documentation is so much more important than the program you’re producing. So pseudocode, flow charts and top down designs. Always justify why you’ve done something that way, even if it just seems pointless and repetitive to you, always ask you’re self “why”.

Just DM me if needs be, I’m happy to help. I genuinely loved doing the project. I’m predicted nearly full marks in it. However some of my class mates did struggle with this, mainly with the documentation and pseudocode. Although this one guy didn’t bother at all, tried to “smash it out” in one night and got predicted an U, he’s not bothered as he is pretty confident he can get fully marks in the exam which will bring his grades right up. The project is only 20% of the final grade.

I would just say make sure you stay on track with your deadlines, that every section you do check it with the mark scheme and try and get into the top band before handing it in for feedback (if your tutor will give you feedback during it, they can’t actually mark it).

Oh and I really didn’t want to do the project at first and I was dreading it. What are you thinking of doing?

Thank you so much for your response!! I really appreciate it. And that's good to hear because the way it was described to me was that you'd have to spend over 200 hours on it, and it was made to seem like a really long process.
I haven't started thinking of ideas as i'm only in year 11 (going into yr 12 in September), but that's another part I was worried about. How did you choose your project because it can be anything which is so different to GCSE. How did you narrow it down?
Once again, I really appreciate your response! Is it alright if I just DM you whenever i think of any questions or if I need help?
Thanks a lot
Reply 4
Original post by JoelBigSmokeTea
It went alright considering I never did it in GCSE, and I was making progress in each mock (unlike my other alevels). The coding project didn't really impact my other subjects, and it shouldn't unless you leave to last minute (like what my friends did and I had to help them out). They flopped hard in their mocks for other subjects as a result. Funny thing is that they ended up getting a higher mark (for the project) even though they couldn't even get theirs to work properly.

Oh okay and ahaha actually imagine!! Thank you so much for your response! What other subjects do you do?
Reply 5
Original post by Paypurr
I’ve just finished year 13 at college. I took CS and OCR was the exam board. The coding project didn’t hinder my other subjects. I didn’t do anything for it over the summer either. Our tutor set a deadline a couple of weeks before the actual deadline, I think I had like a month before my exams actually started from the deadline.

I however did the project and ensured I got in the top band of marks for each section before we handed it in for peer marking at each stage. So this meant I didn’t have to go over a load of parts each stage which may have pushed me back a little. I did have a few all nighters to finish it off, but that’s because of my mental health.

I actually found it fairly easy to do the project, I enjoyed it and found the coding part quite easy. They don’t ask for your whole code, they just want some screenshots of it. So even if it doesn’t work you can manipulate it into looking like it does. I had to do that at one point as an arrow to show direction wasn’t in the right position, but it would have involved me to redo the whole thing so I blabbed it. My tutor actually told us to do this if we were struggling and not concentrate so much on the actual coding. The documentation is so much more important than the program you’re producing. So pseudocode, flow charts and top down designs. Always justify why you’ve done something that way, even if it just seems pointless and repetitive to you, always ask you’re self “why”.

Just DM me if needs be, I’m happy to help. I genuinely loved doing the project. I’m predicted nearly full marks in it. However some of my class mates did struggle with this, mainly with the documentation and pseudocode. Although this one guy didn’t bother at all, tried to “smash it out” in one night and got predicted an U, he’s not bothered as he is pretty confident he can get fully marks in the exam which will bring his grades right up. The project is only 20% of the final grade.

I would just say make sure you stay on track with your deadlines, that every section you do check it with the mark scheme and try and get into the top band before handing it in for feedback (if your tutor will give you feedback during it, they can’t actually mark it).

Oh and I really didn’t want to do the project at first and I was dreading it. What are you thinking of doing?

Also what other subjects did you do alongside CS?
Original post by wizkid44
Oh okay and ahaha actually imagine!! Thank you so much for your response! What other subjects do you do?

Maths and physics.
Original post by wizkid44
Also what other subjects did you do alongside CS?


Maths and physics :smile:
Reply 8
Original post by JoelBigSmokeTea
Maths and physics.


Original post by Paypurr
Maths and physics :smile:


That's what I'm planning to do!
I think i'm going to start with maths, physics, computer science and further maths.
How do you both find physics and maths if you don't mind me asking?
Original post by wizkid44
Thank you so much for your response!! I really appreciate it. And that's good to hear because the way it was described to me was that you'd have to spend over 200 hours on it, and it was made to seem like a really long process.
I haven't started thinking of ideas as i'm only in year 11 (going into yr 12 in September), but that's another part I was worried about. How did you choose your project because it can be anything which is so different to GCSE. How did you narrow it down?
Once again, I really appreciate your response! Is it alright if I just DM you whenever i think of any questions or if I need help?
Thanks a lot


I didn’t take notice of how much time I spent on it but it wasn’t anywhere near 200 hours!

I chose mine because of my physics course, we were learning about circular motion and the simulations on the internet are lame, so I thought I would make a better one. Which also gave me lots of existing solutions to include in my documentation and gave me a lot to write about what I liked about them, what they were missing and stuff like that.

You’ve got lots of time until then, something may just come up that you’ll be genuinely interested in doing, it makes it easier. Some of my classmates did games, one did a mental puzzle of an invisible maze, encryption software, theory driving test simulator, sorting algorithms. You just need an idea that is just complicated enough to get high marks, not super complicated. In previous years, this guy did absolutely amazing programming, the programming even was beyond our tutors, but they only came out with a C as their documentation was poor.

Really don’t worry about it, if you keep within the time frames you’re given and make sure you do your best for each section you can’t go wrong!

And yes, just drop me a message whenever you want. Even if it’s in a years time when you’re actually doing the project.

When I was doing my project, I didn’t get any responses to my forums about it, hence didn’t get much advice or anything. I just looked at past exemplar work to go off. I also didn’t get anyone to test my project, so I didn’t meet the requirement of a test subject. So if I can I would be happy to help in that way too.
Original post by wizkid44
That's what I'm planning to do!
I think i'm going to start with maths, physics, computer science and further maths.
How do you both find physics and maths if you don't mind me asking?


For me in maths I found it easy to grasp the concepts, it, it’s just the exam questions that can be a bit tricky to work out and pick out the key information you need. So I recommend just keep doing maths, you don’t have to go wild and spend hours on it each day, but try and regularly do maths, and don’t avoid topics you find more difficult. I also loved maths, my favourite was the integration and differentiation topics which in 2nd year you get so much more and most of our syllabus was of it. My exam board for maths was OCR MEI.

Physics, exam board AQA. I really enjoyed physics, found it very interesting. Our optional topic was Turning Points, which I didn’t like. I really wanted to do astrophysics or engineering physics but nope. Turning points is supposed to be the easiest optional topic due to that you learn most of it as you go through the course anyway. So there as nothing “new” to learn.

A levels are hard, but I miss it now it’s over.
Do you have any idea of what career you want to do in the future?
(edited 4 years ago)
Original post by wizkid44
That's what I'm planning to do!
I think i'm going to start with maths, physics, computer science and further maths.
How do you both find physics and maths if you don't mind me asking?

Maths is a bit of an inconsistant bag for me, but at least it was a very very smooth transition from GCSE. The only real difficulty you will find is reading the questions, you must understand what they're asking very well if you want to succeed in the exams. Stats is probably the most boring and least mathy part of alevel maths which is probably why I hated it the most. Last paper in the real exams was the only one where I had any real issues, where I suddenly forgot everything I revised for the stats section, aced the mechanics though.

Physics was a ****ing mistake, never in my life have I fell asleep in a class (at least in the past 6 years prior) until now. I practically fell asleep in nearly every physics lesson because it was that boring I couldn't keep my self awake. Its miles harder than GCSE (which was my best GCSE) to digest content for me, at least in GCSE i could relate or use logic to easily understand many of the concepts quite easily. Here, not so much. All that in combination with the sheer boringness, and my ever hatred for the subject didn't go so well during revising. Flopped the 3rd paper and at best did okayish in the others.

I highly suggest you don't bother doing further maths, unless the university specifies that for the course you want to do. Doing all 3 subjects that us two did is already an excellent combo. Last thing you want is stress and having that fill your mind instead of **** you're currently trying to revise.
(edited 4 years ago)
I've just finished Y12, course has been a mixed bag. Sometimes it's brilliant, usually it's pretty good, but sometimes it's very dull. Overall I'd say it's been good so far this year.

My teacher wants us to do the coding part of the project over the Summer, so he's been getting us to do the planning stages at the moment. I don't think it's that brutal on your other subjects (we had to juggle it with June mocks and most of us came out fine) if you work at it regularly.
Reply 13
Original post by Paypurr
For me in maths I found it easy to grasp the concepts, it, it’s just the exam questions that can be a bit tricky to work out and pick out the key information you need. So I recommend just keep doing maths, you don’t have to go wild and spend hours on it each day, but try and regularly do maths, and don’t avoid topics you find more difficult. I also loved maths, my favourite was the integration and differentiation topics which in 2nd year you get so much more and most of our syllabus was of it. My exam board for maths was OCR MEI.

Physics, exam board AQA. I really enjoyed physics, found it very interesting. Our optional topic was Turning Points, which I didn’t like. I really wanted to do astrophysics or engineering physics but nope. Turning points is supposed to be the easiest optional topic due to that you learn most of it as you go through the course anyway. So there as nothing “new” to learn.

A levels are hard, but I miss it now it’s over.
Do you have any idea of what career you want to do in the future?

Oh okay thank you! And same, I usually get the concepts quite easily but have to continually do past papers/questions to be able to apply it.
I didn't even know there was an optional topic! Does your school choose that for you?
And defo something STEM related, but I'm not sure yet. Maybe engineering, finance or computer science? But not sure yet. Are you in uni at the moment?
Original post by wizkid44
Oh okay thank you! And same, I usually get the concepts quite easily but have to continually do past papers/questions to be able to apply it.
I didn't even know there was an optional topic! Does your school choose that for you?
And defo something STEM related, but I'm not sure yet. Maybe engineering, finance or computer science? But not sure yet. Are you in uni at the moment?


That’s exactly what you have to keep doing, the past papers etc :smile:

Schools choose it, there’s a quite a few different optional topics, such as medical physics and electronics.

I’ve applied for mechatronics and robotics engineering, hopefully starting this September (fingers crossed). You’ve got plenty of time to decide, I didn’t know what I wanted to do until we had to apply for UCAS and do personal statements. I wasn’t even considering uni, but thought might as well look. And found a course I’m really interested in. You’ll be fine with the a level options you’re considering doing :smile:
Ngl I did OCR Computer Science A level (just finish year 13) and the project was too much for me. I found it hard because of many reasons like there being no real sense of direction. You come up with your own problem and how to solve it. I also kept getting sick so that got in my way. Ultimately if you enjoy programming and are good at writing things up you should be fine.
Reply 16
Original post by username2676349
I’ve just finished year 13 at college. I took CS and OCR was the exam board. The coding project didn’t hinder my other subjects. I didn’t do anything for it over the summer either. Our tutor set a deadline a couple of weeks before the actual deadline, I think I had like a month before my exams actually started from the deadline.

I however did the project and ensured I got in the top band of marks for each section before we handed it in for peer marking at each stage. So this meant I didn’t have to go over a load of parts each stage which may have pushed me back a little. I did have a few all nighters to finish it off, but that’s because of my mental health.

I actually found it fairly easy to do the project, I enjoyed it and found the coding part quite easy. They don’t ask for your whole code, they just want some screenshots of it. So even if it doesn’t work you can manipulate it into looking like it does. I had to do that at one point as an arrow to show direction wasn’t in the right position, but it would have involved me to redo the whole thing so I blabbed it. My tutor actually told us to do this if we were struggling and not concentrate so much on the actual coding. The documentation is so much more important than the program you’re producing. So pseudocode, flow charts and top down designs. Always justify why you’ve done something that way, even if it just seems pointless and repetitive to you, always ask you’re self “why”.

Just DM me if needs be, I’m happy to help. I genuinely loved doing the project. I’m predicted nearly full marks in it. However some of my class mates did struggle with this, mainly with the documentation and pseudocode. Although this one guy didn’t bother at all, tried to “smash it out” in one night and got predicted an U, he’s not bothered as he is pretty confident he can get fully marks in the exam which will bring his grades right up. The project is only 20% of the final grade.

I would just say make sure you stay on track with your deadlines, that every section you do check it with the mark scheme and try and get into the top band before handing it in for feedback (if your tutor will give you feedback during it, they can’t actually mark it).

Oh and I really didn’t want to do the project at first and I was dreading it. What are you thinking of doing?


Hi there I’m doing alevel computer science now with the ocr exam board and I know it’s getting close to the deadline but I’m stuck on some programming issues to do with my project and would really appreciate if you could help me. I don’t go much on this but if you msg me on my Instagram @thoiba_akhter I’d really help as I need the help asap thanks :smile:

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