S6 Subject Choices

Hey. By this point you might have seen me be indecisive about my subject choices about a million times, but I know what subjects I want to take now.

So, you may be asking, why are you creating a thread titled 'S6 Subject Choices'? Good question! Because I now need to convince my school that they should in fact let me take these subjects.

I want to take four advanced highers in S6: English, history, classical studies, and modern studies.

I love social subjects, they're kind of my thing, but my guidance teacher is hesitant about the amount of them I want to take. She was also hesitant about this for higher and I just got straight A's in my Higher prelims (English, history, modern studies, classical studies, and business).

Is my guidance teacher right or should I stick with my gut? I just want to have fun in S6, and my version of fun is taking an insane amount of social subjects and subsequently writing a million essays.

Thank you in advance!

Reply 1

University of Strathclyde Student Ambassador

Official Rep

Original post

by jasmineva3128

Hey. By this point you might have seen me be indecisive about my subject choices about a million times, but I know what subjects I want to take now.
So, you may be asking, why are you creating a thread titled 'S6 Subject Choices'? Good question! Because I now need to convince my school that they should in fact let me take these subjects.
I want to take four advanced highers in S6: English, history, classical studies, and modern studies.
I love social subjects, they're kind of my thing, but my guidance teacher is hesitant about the amount of them I want to take. She was also hesitant about this for higher and I just got straight A's in my Higher prelims (English, history, modern studies, classical studies, and business).
Is my guidance teacher right or should I stick with my gut? I just want to have fun in S6, and my version of fun is taking an insane amount of social subjects and subsequently writing a million essays.
Thank you in advance!

Hi there! (:

Generally, very dependent on you and whether you can manage that workload! - As you were mentioning, it definitely will be a lot of work to balence! - also worth thinking of whether you really need to take that amount of subjects, the majority of scottish courses dont require highers unless you were looking at 2nd year entry - also if they ask i would expect max 2-3, worth just considering if it might be more work that is really worth 😊

Also worth considering anything extra you'll be doing in S6, although i was taking less highers I found S6 to be pretty busy with part-time work, uni applications, and just generally having some fun with friends before school ends (: - really worth considering all of this when deiciding

neither of you are right or wrong lol - just a personal decision for whats best for you!! - maybe worth writing a wee pros/cons list to help you make a decision and lay out all the opttions (:

hope this helps,

Emily
Year 3, Chemistry
Official University Of Strathclyde Rep

Reply 2

MaryamMajick

Original post

by jasmineva3128

Hey. By this point you might have seen me be indecisive about my subject choices about a million times, but I know what subjects I want to take now.
So, you may be asking, why are you creating a thread titled 'S6 Subject Choices'? Good question! Because I now need to convince my school that they should in fact let me take these subjects.
I want to take four advanced highers in S6: English, history, classical studies, and modern studies.
I love social subjects, they're kind of my thing, but my guidance teacher is hesitant about the amount of them I want to take. She was also hesitant about this for higher and I just got straight A's in my Higher prelims (English, history, modern studies, classical studies, and business).
Is my guidance teacher right or should I stick with my gut? I just want to have fun in S6, and my version of fun is taking an insane amount of social subjects and subsequently writing a million essays.
Thank you in advance!

Hey Jasmin! Congrats on deciding your subject choices for S6 (I changed my mind two weeks in or something from 3 AHs and a Higher to 4 AHs and then I had to go through the whole rigamarole of convincing everyone once teaching had already begun so you're already doing better than me lol)

I took 4 AHs - and they were all STEM subjects so quite different, but I just thought I'd yap a bit in case it helped at all.

You've probably heard me say this before but my opinion on the matter is that it is not as much work as people make it out to be. I had 5 or so extracurricular things I was doing and I was applying for Medicine which is one of the most intensive courses to apply to - I'm not going to lie this time period I basically had no life, but once that passed I found the rest of S6 very enjoyable and had a lot of free time.

A good thing to consider is what work you will actually be doing. Talk to people at your school doing those subjects and actually get the run down of what it looks like week in week out, what the dissertation is like (will you have 4 dissertations!) etc. That is what is most important. I can't really advise on this as the only knowledge I could possibly have is second hand interest in the AH English course because everyone knew how much I loved English so was always telling me about it and commiserating with me that I can't live two lives to take all the subjects I wanted lol.

What I can say for me is that I had 3 projects and imo they were all very intensive, I mean I had to do lab work every day during my prelims. However, my secret weapon was maths. Sometimes, I almost feel like it is misleading to say I took 4 AHs because AH maths did not take a lot of work for me - no project, basically no practice/homework/studying except during exam time. I just went to class basically and did the bare minimum. If you have a subject like this - I don't know how naturally English comes to you, but if you wouldn't struggle with the exam papers then the dissertation and folio might not be too much work (as for humanities you wouldn't have to do lab work obviously you would just have to do reading and write up which you can kind of do whenever and however you want so it gives you a bit more flexibility and time). I would say the reason doing 4 AHs (along with everything else) was so doable is because a lot of the things I was doing came very naturally to me, particularly maths, so it meant I didn't have to do as much work.

Best of luck convincing your school, hope you succeed. I will just say that sometimes it might literally not be possible - as in the timetables are stacked on top of each other, so they might put the AH history and modies class at the same time so you literally cannot take both courses unless you are in two places at once. This was an issue when I tried to take mechanics and Latin or something, it literally wasn't possible. Maybe it won't be an issue, but just something to be aware of and maybe negotiate with whoever is making the timetable.

Getting straight As in your prelims is probably a very good sign, and schools are usually more convinced with evidence so I wouldn't be surprised if it's even your final grades that convince them you'd be alright (because, like I said, a lot of people do end up shuffling their choices around after results day so they might be a bit hesitant about it for that reason as well).

Hope that all makes sense let me know if you have any more questions x

Quick Reply

Latest

Trending

Articles for you

Personal Statement:Physics And Aeronautical Engineering

Personal Statement - History and Politics 5

Personal Statement - History and Politics

Criminology, computing and computing with economics degree personal statement example (1a)

How The Student Room is moderated

To keep The Student Room safe for everyone, we moderate posts that are added to the site.

Try out the app

Continue on web

S6 Subject Choices

Quick Reply

Related discussions

Articles for you

How The Student Room is moderated