Are these humanities subjects a good pick?

2

I'm currently in Year 9 and choosing my options, I've had a good week into thought about it and it seems stressing. I consider myself a History and English based person who is more creative, however, I'm worried I may pick some of my GCSES wrong or poorly.

My options are History, Citizensip and Sociology, Religious studies is compulsory, however, these humanities subjects overlap and are all essay based, there isn't a lot of variety so, perhaps I was thinking if somebody could help recommend me better options?
( definitely not drama, music, Computer science or Art lol)

(edited 1 year ago)

Reply 1

PinkMobilePhone

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What do you want to take for A-Levels?

Reply 2

DerDracologe

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Original post

by midnight_pilgrim

I'm currently in Year 9 and choosing my options, I've had a good week into thought about it and it seems stressing. I consider myself a History and English based person who is more creative, however, I'm worried I may pick some of my GCSES wrong or poorly.
My options are History, Citizensip and Sociology, Religious studies is compulsory, however, these humanities subjects overlap and are all essay based, there isn't a lot of variety so, perhaps I was thinking if somebody could help recommend me better options?
( definitely not drama, music, Computer science or Art lol)

Choosing subjects you enjoy is the best idea 🙂 But obviously make sure not to take subjects you think you might not be good at.
If you want to take any particular courses for a level (if you know a career or uni degree you can figure out what a levels you need for that) then make sure you’re taking the right courses to be able to do that. For example if you wanted to do a geography degree then you should take geography gcse so you can do the a level ofc.
I did both history and citizenship btw so would be happy to answer any questions about either!

Reply 3

midnight_pilgrim

OP

2

Original post

by DerDracologe

Choosing subjects you enjoy is the best idea 🙂 But obviously make sure not to take subjects you think you might not be good at.
If you want to take any particular courses for a level (if you know a career or uni degree you can figure out what a levels you need for that) then make sure you’re taking the right courses to be able to do that. For example if you wanted to do a geography degree then you should take geography gcse so you can do the a level ofc.
I did both history and citizenship btw so would be happy to answer any questions about either!

Thank you for replying!
Additionally, I've heard loads of stories about citizenship being an easy gsce and people simply needing 'common sense' to pass. Is it true and have you enjoyed your experiences?

Reply 4

DerDracologe

Study Forum Helper

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Original post

by midnight_pilgrim

Thank you for replying!
Additionally, I've heard loads of stories about citizenship being an easy gsce and people simply needing 'common sense' to pass. Is it true and have you enjoyed your experiences?

I personally didnt enjoy the subject (it was compulsory at my secondary) however im assuming you have more interest in politics (given your option choices atm) than i do so you might enjoy it. Although its called ‘citizenship’ it’s basically gcse politics and we always referred to it as such.
Some of the topics were interesting for me such as crime however the subject requires you to have quite a broad knowledge of politics (a lot of multiple choice questions which are quite specific).
The grade boundaries are relatively low and theres quite little content to memorise for the spec which is why it’s seen as an easy subject. We had 100 minutes of lesson every 2 weeks so if you’re giving it more time then you’d have a lot more time to focus on exam style questions and reading around the subject which is the two things I struggled on when it came to preparing for the exams- i always had to write crazy fast because of the amount of points you have to make for one question lol. If you’re interested in following the news and current affairs then its a great subject to do i would say- loads of people enjoyed it (especially when we did debates) but as a ‘STEM kid’ it wasn’t my kind of thing.
I scraped a 9 which was unexpected (very little revision and didnt finish 2 of the papers) so in that sense its easy but limiting factor to how well you do will be how much time your willing to put in to learn about politics broadly- having examples of things from recent events will be needed for good marks and due to my limited knowledge of uk and global politics i struggled to have these at hand.
Sorry if that’s a confusing perspective- it’s relatively easy compared to a subject like history in my experience, the exams are a little irritating for exam tech, you’ll do well if you’ve got a broad interest in the subject and are willing to read around it.
Hope that helps, remember that everyone has different experiences with subjects 🙂

Are these humanities subjects a good pick?

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