URGENT: Should I switch from English Literature to Physics?

I've just started year 12, doing A-Levels in French, History and English Literature, however after doing a few lessons and seeing
the critical anthologies, past papers and model responses for English Literature, I'm feeling quite unsure. I got an 8 at gcse and I only really took it because I am good at it and have always found it relatively easy, however, after being in the classes and looking at the homework I am extremely skeptical, I know at a level you need to be properly invested in a subject so I am really requisitioning everything after doing it for about a week and I'm not feeling too interested. A part of me is saying that I'm just getting a sudden flash of insecurity and I should persist for a bit longer, see if it gets better.

Before in year 11, I felt that I would like to take a science a level, and the one that looked most appealing to me was physics, because I find it the most interesting and I always had a natural talent for understanding concepts and remembering facts, however I thought this was just a pipe dream is I would always get low marks, but afterwards, I found out that in order to make us revise harder, they would on purpose give us very difficult questions and mark us down. This demotivated me so much, and accompanied with bad mental health at the time, so I did no work throughout year 10 and 11, I couldn't reason as to why I was in set 1 and was allowed to do triple, I just couldn't figure out why.

In all the mock exams I had gotten a 5 in higher physics and I had taken it as I given as I had done no work and had never gotten marks that I thought were "good", so I had never properly considered taking it for a level as a serious idea, even though I liked it. However it came to results day and I got a 7! ( paper 1 71/100, paper 2 53/100) I was extremely happy with this as I thought I would get a 5 or worse! Finally it all made sense why I was in set 1 and why my teacher and my tutor were telling me that I was capable of taking science a level, I had never believed them because my mock marks were so "bad".

I have been thinking therefore that I should potentially do an a level in physics instead of English literature.
I do have one possible dilemma though, my maths grade was a 6 (but 5 marks off a 7), but at my school you need a 7 to take physics.

my questions are:
- is it still possible to do well in A level physics with a 6 in maths and a 7 in physics?
- is switching out of English literature a good idea?
- if I end up taking a level physics, as someone who could defo improve maths skills, what resources are there?
- if I am not taking A level maths, will it be a problem? (my school do not require this)
- what physics non fiction books, tv shows/films and podcasts are recommended (just for gaining a greater interest in the subject)

Reply 1

Faathi

1) A Level physics is incredibly difficult but if you have the passion for it, I'm sure you can make it work. I don't know what grades you are expecting so it might be worth thinking about that in relation to your abilities before picking it.

2) English Lit seemed to be a good combination with your other subjects (The Arts) but switching depends on the career you wish to pursue. You don't seem to like it so it might be a good idea to switch to something else, physics or not.

3) Unfortunately, this is not my area of expertise but Physics and Maths Tutor, Cognito, past papers and just YT vids in general?

4) Hmm... Most schools require you do maths alongside physics. I'm not sure of the reasoning behind your school's decisions but don't let this stop you. Just keep working on your maths skills if necessary.

5) Not sure but search online

Final thoughts : Whatever you do, make sure you love the subject and if you're going to make a switch, do it as early as possible and you got this! Best of luck to you.

Reply 2

artful_lounger

Universities Forum Helper

If you aren't really especially interested in/enjoy doing literary criticism/critical analysis I'd probably not suggest doing A-level English lit. I think a lot of people take it because they did well in the GCSE and "enjoy reading" generally or similar, but find it quite a slog to get through when they realise they have little interest in the much more detailed literary analysis you need to do in it (as the much more surface level character and theme analysis you can get a good grade in at GCSE is not sufficient and you really do need to do close reading and analyse things down to the syntax and such).

That said, I'm not sure your background really screams out that physics is a good option. I would generally not recommend taking a science A-level just for the sake of it, as it doesn't really add anything as a single subject (essentially every degree that requires A-level Physics also requires A-level Maths, even though the A-level material doesn't depend on it). You also have a sort of average grade in GCSE Maths which again, doesn't really strongly suggest physics would be "your thing".

My thought would be to suggest swapping English lit out, but swap it for another subject (i.e. not physics). If you have a general interest in science there are plenty of ways you can get some awareness of whats going on in the science world (reading magazines like new scientist, looking at the science and technology sections of major print media newspapers, etc), and even potentially doing a bit of "sciencey" stuff in your free time as a hobby (e.g. amateur electronics/ham radio).