79 replies to this topic

[Leanne]

Hi! i would really like to have studied the terrorist attacks for gcse. i find it all really interesting, espeshially why they actually went through with all the bombings. and why they chose to destroy the twin towers. my friends think its weird that i actually find all of that quite interesting, and am not a swot or anything either! .
i hope you reply, thanx!
from leanne

[del1802]

For my GCSE History I studied Nazi Germany, America in the 1920's and the Peace Treaties following WW1. I found this interesting but too modern for my liking.

Im currently studying A-Level History and again, Im doing modern units (Russia, germany etc....). Although I did find these areas intersting, I would have much preffered to have done topics maybe covering Ancienct History; eg. Greece, Egypt, Mesopotamia. Talking to other History students in my class, this seems to be the general view of many.

As far as I understand, the most common exam boards (OCR, AQA, Edexcel) don't actually include these units as an option. I think that the more 'Ancient' areas of History may attract more students to the GCSE.

[Xeitan]

I'm about to take A-level history and I'm still debating with myself whether Government and politics would be better?

[Mrs Faithorn]

Which is "better" is such an individual thing that it's not really possible for someone who doesn't know you to advise.

However, ask yourself the following questions (not necessarily in order of prority)
* Have I found out exactly what's involved in both courses?
* Which subject is the better taught at my school/college?
* Is one of the subjects vastly oversubscribed at my school/college?
* Which subject is the better resourced?
* What other subjects am I also taking?

Above all TALK to the teachers concerned.

If you think you might want to read History at Uni then stay with History, but if you think you might want to read Politics it doesn't matter as much if you don't do Government and Politics now.

Decisions, decisions .... it's difficult I know.

[Xeitan]

Which is "better" is such an individual thing that it's not really possible for someone who doesn't know you to advise.

However, ask yourself the following questions (not necessarily in order of prority)
*  Have I found out exactly what's involved in both courses?
*  Which subject is the better taught at my school/college?
*  Is one of the subjects vastly oversubscribed at my school/college?
*  Which subject is the better resourced?
*  What other subjects am I also taking?

Above all TALK to the teachers concerned.

If you think you might want to read History at Uni then stay with History, but if you think you might want to read Politics it doesn't matter as much if you don't do Government and Politics now.

Decisions, decisions .... it's difficult I know.

* Have I found out exactly what's involved in both courses?


• I have for G & P but not for history which in turn is how I stumbled on the site in search of help.
  
  * Which subject is the better taught at my school/college?
  
  
• Seeing as both of them are humanities, I'm pretty sure they are treated the same. If anything I beleive that G & P seems ever so slightly more organized.
  
  * Is one of the subjects vastly oversubscribed at my school/college?
  
  
• Not vastly over subscribed but...how shall we put it? Popular?
  
  * Which subject is the better resourced?
  
  
• Like I said before G & P seems to be a touch more organized.
  
  * What other subjects am I also taking?
  
  
• I'm not sure how this affects it but, Biology, Chemistry and Maths. I'm taking the Humanity so I can qualify for Imperial College.

[Mrs Faithorn]

I asked about your other subjects in order to try to assess the workload aspect. Given your answer, there isn't really a 'better' choice between G&P and History. Either one is a perfectly respectable choice given your ambitions - though History may have a bit of an edge as a 'rigorous' academic subject.

Have you tried talking to students now starting A2 courses about what they thought of AS G&P or History? They are the ones who know more about the courses/teachers/resources etc at your school. Try to ask a range of people though.

Obviously I think that History is better than G&P in general terms, but if I were in your shoes I'd go with whatever you think you will be most interested in - once you have found out about the History course offered at your place. (there are so many History options on offer that I can't make a general observation).

[As a semi-jokey aside ..... I am not aware that there is anything like this Forum for G&P ]

[Smile]

There is always something in history class that you want to study... but it never seems to be in the ciriculum. Personaly I would prefere to study some earlier history- we don't seem to go much further back that WW1 and also other countries history. We could spend a little less time per topic and therefore cover a wider varity in less depth. Every topic seems to last forever- and with some teachers seems to repete itself, which I hate. Or we could just study it our own time, but if theres something you don't understand then you never understand it because you have nobody to explane it. I also sometimes history is taught as if it didn't happen to real people. The fact that it didn't just affect a large group of people but that it affected singular people. I feel we should also be shown how much can be learned through history (if you just think about it )

[historygenius]

i am choosing my GCSE's (year 9)
many of my friends do not want to take it as there is lots of coursework involved and there are so many options it is hard to chose. Sometimes history can be really depressing.

[FooTy MaD]

At the moment there are lots of people discussing what students should and shouldn't study for GCSE History. It is part of plans to improve what is offered to Year 10 and Year 11 students in the future.

However, I'm really interested to know what students of today feel.

If you are currently doing your GCSEs - what do you think? What would you like to study? What would improve GCSE History?

If you are planning to take GCSE, or even didn't opt to take it - what do you think - what do you think would encourage more people to take history?

Any sensible, well explained suggestions are welcome. In fact, I don't even know why I said that - all good history students make sensible, explained suggestions don't they!

i wud take romanz and greekz coz i no da most about them Why don u do a survey?

[short-n-stumpy]

I live in Scotland so ive just completed my Standard Grades (pretty much equivalent to GCSE). For Standard Grade History we studied WW1, American Civil War and a big topic of Scottish History...all about the Farming and everything in Scotland....I am actually English and moved up to Scotland 2 years ago...unfortunately I never studied scottish history down in the south of england and so i was very behind in the scottish topic, somehow i managed to scrape a Standard Grade level 1 (same as A* ).

This year im taking my Higher's (A-Levels) and we are studing Appeasement and the Road to War, Spanish Civil War and A Big British Topic which involves alot of English topics...(so the scots study english history, why cant the english study some Scottish history?)

I think for GCSE there should be some sort of history of scotland, especially if anyone is planning on moving to scotland, because i had a really hard time last year catching up on 3 years worth of scottish history!

[Sarum]

Another thing in what would you like to study is a report that has come out recently or something...again saying too much attention paid to European and Second World War history and not enough to more local blah blah blah but also - black! They're saying not enough attention is being paid to black history (save slave and post-war immigration) - they're saying we should also be studying the achievements of black people. All very well but in an area like mine there are hardly any pupils from ethnic minorities and then I thought that perhaps there should be options - perhaps a school with more black students could study more black history than a school like the ones round here that generally have less than a percent of minority pupils in it. I'm not being racist or anything but shouldn't students who have to study history study something they can relate to? ie something recent or something from their own country or things like that.

[Mr Moorhouse]

I'm not being racist or anything but shouldn't students who have to study history study something they can relate to? ie something recent or something from their own country or things like that.

In order to gain a REAL understanding of the world, don't you have to study and understand the way in which OTHER cultures have developed, been treated, reacted to things and the way in which they relate to our own culture? Ignorance of the history of black / asian history leads only to more racism.

I can uderstand your point that there are few people from ethnic minorities in the region BUT surely that increases the need to teach their involvement in our British history? Otherwise you'd have no chance at all of understanding how it all fits to together - which would simply bolster racism and racist views.

[Sarum]

I can see your point there Mr Moorhouse. I wouldn't actually have minded briefly covering something like the Civil Rights movement I suppose.

[dan]

took History for GCSE and studied Northern Ireland, Nazi Germany and Superpower rivalry

i would really recomend the NI course as it is really interesting (but maybe thats just me)

now in AS history with the irish famine and daniel o'connel, nazis (again) and Russa (Lenin)

Russia was very hard to start with but now its easy,
Nazis were easy cos we did it for GCSE (definatly a help)
Only started Ireland

[dandale]

Im doing Edxcel Paper B. Were doing topics on things like canals and Railways and Medican for paper 1 and Women and Poverty for paper 2. Paper 1 is so boring it really is. We just want to do somthing intresting. Howcver, I must say paper 2 work is so much better. I never knew women acted like that. I made us giggle watching the Derby when the kings horse got taken down.

Our course work was like that again. We did mines which was boring but we got to do Jack the Ripper which was good.

If we had a choose I would have like to do the Romans and Acient History, which is so cool.