GCSE 'Pathways'/Options HALP MEE!!

Well we got our 'Pathways and Opportunities' booklets today, and my initial preferences are:

Media studies
Modern History
French

I will *hopefully* have my Spanish GCSE, so I'd like to go on to do another language. And I know how the whole language thing goes now, so it's OK.

Also we have to do a Design and Technology, and they're letting some people do Graphic Products or Music Technology, and since I'm not very good at the practical side of D&T, I fancy doing Graphic Products.

Does anyone have any experiences in any of the courses and any recommendations? Do any of the courses attract idiots?

I have until Friday to make my final choice.

Edited by Alkaz (Forum Moderator): Thread closed due to being bumped.

:o This is for GCSE? You get so much choice lol! I didn't have half of that! D/T is BIG Mistake. I took it to be easy, but its the most work I have! History is a great subject, and I did Spanish, but French is quite good apparently. As for sciences, Biology is quite good and yeh, thats bout it. GL With whatever you choose Jack :)

Media Studies is a waste of a GCSE, its not very often people get into a Media type job.

Here is what I chose an my opinions:

First two where in a general category:

Geography
It's ok I guess, I think the reason I don't like it is because of the teacher. I think Geography is useful and interesting to know.

Art
Very interesting and enjoyable to do. One of my favourite lessons.

Then I had to pick a technology:

Graphics
Seemed to be put with a load of prats but hey I can still get a GCSE as long as I put my head down and ignore them. I think it's quite useful but can be quite boring.

Then I had to pick another option from the final group:

Performing Arts
Find it very fun and enjoyable to do (I do the music side, as there is a makeup side as well). The coursework is very hard though.

Overall I think you should choose lesson's which will help you with your job choice later on in life. If you don't know what you want to be, just pick the most general subjects that would be good for anything. I think languages are an extremely good GCSE to have but I never picked a language as It has nothing to do with what I want to be when I'm older and I find languages very hard to learn.

I also recommend you pick something you will enjoy and don't just pick a lesson because your friends are. Also I don't understand the way some students let their parent decide. It's not the parents doing the lesson and you're the one stuck with it for the next two years if you don't like it/find it hard. Yes, your parents can HELP you decide, but they shouldn't make the final decision in my opinion.

Hope you pick the right choices! :)

If your going to take Media Studies, i'd have a read of this thread first:
http://www.habboxforum.com/showthread.php?t=480247

Just dont do D/T!!

My GCSE choices were:

DT
Music
Geography
French

French sucked so bad I couldn't wait to drop it. Geography was a bit of a bore and never seemed to end. Music was easy and a doddle to pass. DT is even easier =)

I got A's in all of them

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Originally Posted by CHA!NGANG

:o This is for GCSE? You get so much choice lol! I didn't have half of that! D/T is BIG Mistake. I took it to be easy, but its the most work I have! History is a great subject, and I did Spanish, but French is quite good apparently. As for sciences, Biology is quite good and yeh, thats bout it. GL With whatever you choose Jack :)

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Hi!!
Since we're a technology school, we have to do D&T, and the Graphics one sounds better than doing the practicals. As for French, I think it'll be quite easy, as I know Spanish, and I'll have done the whole exam process before, so that should be good.

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Originally Posted by Tawm

Media Studies is a waste of a GCSE, its not very often people get into a Media type job.

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It isn't, but it appears to be more useful than most of the subjects on offer. I could learn something good from it too.

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Originally Posted by Toughened

Here is what I chose an my opinions:

First two where in a general category:

Geography
It's ok I guess, I think the reason I don't like it is because of the teacher. I think Geography is useful and interesting to know.

Art
Very interesting and enjoyable to do. One of my favourite lessons.

Then I had to pick a technology:

Graphics
Seemed to be put with a load of prats but hey I can still get a GCSE as long as I put my head down and ignore them. I think it's quite useful but can be quite boring.

Then I had to pick another option from the final group:

Performing Arts
Find it very fun and enjoyable to do (I do the music side, as there is a makeup side as well). The coursework is very hard though.

Overall I think you should choose lesson's which will help you with your job choice later on in life. If you don't know what you want to be, just pick the most general subjects that would be good for anything. I think languages are an extremely good GCSE to have but I never picked a language as It has nothing to do with what I want to be when I'm older and I find languages very hard to learn.

I also recommend you pick something you will enjoy and don't just pick a lesson because your friends are. Also I don't understand the way some students let their parent decide. It's not the parents doing the lesson and you're the one stuck with it for the next two years if you don't like it/find it hard. Yes, your parents can HELP you decide, but they shouldn't make the final decision in my opinion.

Hope you pick the right choices! :)

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Thanks for that. I think I'm quite lucky in the fact that I have parents who will let me make my own choices, but if they think I'm going in the completely wrong direction, they will say to me, but if I disagree (which normally I don't once I've considered it), they'll let me go on.

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Originally Posted by Olleh

If your going to take Media Studies, i'd have a read of this thread first:
http://www.habboxforum.com/showthread.php?t=480247

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That looks quite good. What sort of things do you have to do for coursework? Is it interesting to do in lessons?

i took

german
geography
business studies
&music.

all of them bar business was a big mistake really, a language is more work than it's worth, geography, meh, not toooo bad but boring as ****, and music - ONLY take it if you can play an instrument (semi-well) and have a basic theory knowledge.

but i wish i took a des tech lesson, they seem fun at my school.

With my circumstances and conditions, I was left with one option choice and went with the one I thought would help me the most.

Geography.

I did that. TBH I spent 1 year on coursework, and got 91% in it, and it was only 25% of the overall mark. That was a big let-down as, I would have thought it would be at least 40%.

We had to do English, Maths, Science, Short course RE (not paper), PE (not paper) and PSHE (not paper).

We then picked 4 subjects we wanted to, they gave us recommendations on the variety of subjects we should pick but they didn't actually say we had to pick one of this and one of that, any four we wanted except for Drama no one could do that this year.

I picked History, Business studies, Geography and French and for reserve subject it was long course religion. I think I picked good ones :)

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Originally Posted by PriceTags

That looks quite good. What sort of things do you have to do for coursework? Is it interesting to do in lessons?

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The GCSE/Coursework split is 50% each way, so it's pretty fun. The coursework is different every year, this year I had to:

• Shoot my own trailer
• Wrote an essay about representation of females on mainstream TV
• Explore and write an essay about Wallace and Gromit

And also I submitted all the work I had done on ClubHabbo for my Practical Production (otherwise you'd have to create a whole magazine and write about it).

Graphics is good, keep it. Media studies however... despite being fun, it isn't recognised as a 'good' GCSE to have and isn't respected by colleges and unis.

Media studies attracted the 'idiots' at my school, might not be the same as yours. Like others have said people don't even really see it as a GCSE. I picked French, Geography, History and Art.

Although I found french very easy in the lower years at secondary school it's not as good as a GCSE. Too much effort with the oral and coursework. If you're a really determined person and don't mind putting the work in then it can be fun. However, I find it very boring and wouldn't pick it if I was to pick again.

History is great, yeah there is a hell of a lot of coursework but it's relatively easy to do if you do the work in lessons and browse the net. I got an A in all the mocks and and A in all my coursework. I would certainly recommend this, great subject.

Geography, mhmmm. I enjoyed it this year but not in year 10. Some lessons are just so bloody boring learning about weather and what causes it. The good thing is there is only one bit of coursework but you need a good 50-60 pages in that one bit to achieve the higher grades. It's a well structured course. I have already got 50% of my final grade. I go into the final exam needing 52% out of the entire marks to get an A. Again it's good if you put the work in.

Art is crap in my opinion. Although I only picked it because I had to seeing as we're a media arts school. Some people say it's one of the easiest GCSE's to pass but I don't think it is. You need to do a lot of work to get a C grade. Hardly even worth the effort. Although saying that I believe the grade depends on how much work you do regardless of how good you are at art. Very independant GCSE, if you do a performing arts i'd do Drama or music if you can play an instrument relatively well.

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Originally Posted by Immenseman

Media studies attracted the 'idiots' at my school, might not be the same as yours. Like others have said people don't even really see it as a GCSE. I picked French, Geography, History and Art.

Although I found french very easy in the lower years at secondary school it's not as good as a GCSE. Too much effort with the oral and coursework. If you're a really determined person and don't mind putting the work in then it can be fun. However, I find it very boring and wouldn't pick it if I was to pick again.

History is great, yeah there is a hell of a lot of coursework but it's relatively easy to do if you do the work in lessons and browse the net. I got an A in all the mocks and and A in all my coursework. I would certainly recommend this, great subject.

Geography, mhmmm. I enjoyed it this year but not in year 10. Some lessons are just so bloody boring learning about weather and what causes it. The good thing is there is only one bit of coursework but you need a good 50-60 pages in that one bit to achieve the higher grades. It's a well structured course. I have already got 50% of my final grade. I go into the final exam needing 52% out of the entire marks to get an A. Again it's good if you put the work in.

Art is crap in my opinion. Although I only picked it because I had to seeing as we're a media arts school. Some people say it's one of the easiest GCSE's to pass but I don't think it is. You need to do a lot of work to get a C grade. Hardly even worth the effort. Although saying that I believe the grade depends on how much work you do regardless of how good you are at art. Very independant GCSE, if you do a performing arts i'd do Drama or music if you can play an instrument relatively well.

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I chose graphics, geography, french and double science (because we couldn't do that automatically -.-)
Despite it being hard, french is a good GCSE to have and is much more helpful than media studies when applying to colleges etc. I highly recommend you doing graphics and geography. (I enjoyed both of them)

I've decided to carry on with Spanish next year to improve my grade, because I've thought that a C in Spanish might not get me anywhere. Then in Year 11 I can do a short course in French or German.

Is Media not a good one to go for, then? I've been trying not to pick because my friends are/aren't doing it, but I do know that a couple of my friends are fancying it, and I really don't want to go any of it completely alone. Most of my friends are doing history, too, and we had it all explained to us that a humanity and a language are good to get into Uni and stuff.

The full list of what we can have is:

Geography
History
French
German
Spanish
Music
Business Studies
Media Studies
BTEC Sport
Art
Expressive Arts
Food Technology
NVQ Food
Leisure and Tourism

You can do media, but I wouldn't advise it. Even if you did choose the sam subjects as your friends it doesn't guarantee you will be in the same class. I was in classes alone, but I just spoke to new people and eventually became their friend. Just do what you want to do or you might regret it by the time you go to college.

i picked my recently and choooooose
BTEC ICT (we HAD to pick a btec, bare sucks.)
History
Textiles

When i leave school i wanna be like a PA in the fashion industry.... hence why i took textiles!

Good luck with whatever you pick and sorry I cant help you.. dont have much experience in them yet!

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Originally Posted by alicewoah

i picked my recently and choooooose
BTEC ICT (we HAD to pick a btec, bare sucks.)
History
Textiles

When i leave school i wanna be like a PA in the fashion industry.... hence why i took textiles!

Good luck with whatever you pick and sorry I cant help you.. dont have much experience in them yet!

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ah my sister is kinda doing that... at london college of fashion

How about Business? How's that seen?

I used to do GCSE Business but now doing BTEC Business. If it's BTEC business then there's no exams, but there's more assignments. Also instead of it being 2 GCSEs in the normal course then it's an equivalent of 4 GCSEs.

I do graphics and it's alright but there's a lot of work to do really but it's quite fun as well. Upto now I've done CD Covers, Point of Sale, and Easter Egg Boxes haha

Anyway what I'm going to say is choose what you want to do.

BTECs aren't good for uni though >_<

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Originally Posted by JackBuddy

ah my sister is kinda doing that... at london college of fashion

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lucky cow!

Quote:

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Originally Posted by JackBuddy

BTECs aren't good for uni though >_<

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yeeeahhh.. i know its abit crap though because we HAVE to take one! Apprently it offers a new style of learning ha........ losers.

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Originally Posted by PriceTags

Does anyone have any experiences in any of the courses and any recommendations? Do any of the courses attract idiots?

I have until Friday to make my final choice.

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I say go with Graphics, but it does attract idiots :( Because they think it's a doss.

Edited by Alkaz (Forum Moderator): Please do not bump old threads.

I did French and I think it's good. If you're good at learning languages (spanish gcse proves it), I'd say go for it. Can't say for the other two choices but I was never good at D+T either, especially the practical side. However, GCSE Food Tech was the best choice for me. The practicals only worth a small percentage of the grade and mostly writing (in fact, someone dropped out because they thought it'd be loads of practicals, small writing - idiot). :D

Just remember that you've got another two years with them so pick ones you'll enjoy as well as being good at them.

In the end I went with Spanish (so I can get it up to an A*, then do the Short Course French in Y11, then possibly learn some more languages later in life), Graphic Products (because I can design, but not make), and History, because it's more interesting to me than anything else on the list.

Wow, it doesn't look like you have many subjects to choose from, we have:

Business Communication & Technology
Legal Studies
Accounting
Economics
Information Technology Systems
ICT
Art
Graphics
Music
Technical Studies
Industrial Practises
Hospitality
Geography
Modern History
Ancient History
Biology
Chemistry
Physics
Japenese
German
Maths C
English Extension
Music Extension
Human Movement Studies

yeah there are probably more but they're the electives we can choose off the top of my head.

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Originally Posted by PriceTags

In the end I went with Spanish (so I can get it up to an A*, then do the Short Course French in Y11, then possibly learn some more languages later in life), Graphic Products (because I can design, but not make), and History, because it's more interesting to me than anything else on the list.

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You've got a good broad range of subjects there which will help you. History specifically is a very good choice because from personal experience it helps you with your written and essay skills which are essential for coursework, 6th Form and University if you're planning on further education.