Year 9 Options - help with choice! Which GCSE subjects have more 'points' for Uni selection

My daughter is currently doing options (she is year 8 but they start the GCSE course a year early at her school).

At the science presentation we went to the teacher said that it was perfectly possible to go on and do Science A levels with either double or triple science. However, he reckoned that with triple they had a slightly better start and this sometimes influenced AS results. Apparently unis do look at AS levels.

She opted for triple science in the end as she enjoys the subject anyway.

If she's very bright and a good self-learner then I'd hazzard she will get her A*'s in science whichever group she is in. If a little less so, then being in a more able group might help her in my opinion. Watch out for if other subjects are set according to the science option too - in dc's school some unrelated subjects are set according to the science option for timetabling reasons.

If it's any help, my own daughter was G&T and did Double Science, Art, and Drama for GCSE, amongst other things, and also AS level Dance whilst she was doing her A Levels, all of which she enjoyed enormously. She's now at Cambridge doing Politics. So in this household we have practised what we preach, and it seemed to work!

janeite - delighted to hear your take on Drama. We encouraged DD1 to take Drama as she loves it and we felt it will help her confidence. It is nice to see it isn't too 'fluffy'!

DD1 sound similar to yours and has also given up Spanish, which was a little diappointing but as she still has French and Latin I guess she is keeping a balance. She also decided on single sciences as we were persuaded by her school that they encourage their most academic students to do that and that she is capable of good grades in each subject. Also, I discovered that many highly academic independant schools don't offer double award.

It is lovely now the decisions have been made

Unfortunately nowadays so many students get(or are predicted) the 3 As at A level required for the most academic courses at universities, that I think they DO look at GCSEs to a certain extent. It is very different now to when people of my age were applying to university.

As long as she will have the required GCSEs to do the A-Levels she wants, let her do what she wants from the rest of her options. Unis really only care that you've got a reasonable number of GCSEs at reasonable grades. I know many people on my course (Warwick University for an undergrad Master of Mathematics) who's GCSEs went a bit wrong but managed to get 5A's at A-Level.

The subjects start to matter at A-Level. If you want to get a place on a serious course at a serious university you need to have take A-Levels in traditional subjects. General Studies for instance is not accepted as an A-Level by many of the older universities.

Sorry, remove the word core from the above post, I meant all the subjects. I have one eye on CBBC as I type this!

At GCSE I don't think we'd mind a fluffy subject being there in the spread, because we really do like people to have a broad education at that stage. But you still usually need mostly meaty academic GCSEs and A Levels if you want to do a meaty academic degree course. So it's generally a mistake to substitute highly academic courses for vocational-type ones at school, unless the degree course you're applying for has a similar vocational bent, for example studying fashion design or something like that

We see Drama as non-fluffy, by the way! In fact any core subject from the National Curriculum would be seen as non-fluffy.

As an English and Drama teacher, I agree that Drama is not seen as a 'fluffy' subject at GCSE because it proves that pupils can communicate, cooperate, team-plan, meet deadlines, analyse texts etc): it looks good especially for those who plan to do English or Lit A level.

Think she's going to stick with the triple Science and French and give up Spanish.

Boffin - is it ok to have one fluffy subject in amongst the serious subjects? I just think its good for students to have exposure to different subjects, and if they love a subject, they should take it to try it.

I should clarify that we like to see 5 As at GCSE on applications where possible, but the subjects are less important at this stage.

We don't really pay a great deal of attention to GCSEs when selecting students. We're more interested in the predicted AL results, and we like those to be in fairly traditional subjects that show they will be able to tackle similar work to the degree course they will be applying to.

We particularly like Maths, English, Science, Music, Drama, Modern and Classical foreign languages, Psychology, History, Geography and things like that.

Students who have studied the half course in IT, Media Studies, Travel and Tourism vocational equivalents, Business Studies, Textiles, DT etc tend to struggle at degree level in our experience. This may be because less able students are pushed towards these courses by their schools.

We recently turned a student down because although she had an enormous number of UCAS points, these were mainly for low level dance courses and it wasn't a dance degree. Similarly someone with three A Levels and Grade 8 on an instrument will look on paper as though they have four A Levels to us.

At my DD's school they are banded when it comes to Science so only the top band gets to do the triple sciences. From what I can gather the top band has 6 lessons a week and the other bands 5 lessons for Science.

At my DCs school they can do triple science and two languages, I think.

Agh - now I'm confused again! My initial assumption was that she should do the triple science as I know that's what the 'brightest' pupils at the school I teach in do. It would mean she wouldn't be able to do a second language but, although she's good at them, it's not something she seems to want to push. Soooooooooo complicated!

Thanks Science Teacher. I was unaware of the triple science option.

NO one at DS' school either has ever done double science - only three separate GCSEs. They have now moved onto iGCSE science as the teachers don't think the GCSE is sufficient preparation for A2 leading on to degrees (lots of natural science and medical students).

Science teacher: At my DCs grammar school they all do triple science, no-one is allowed to do double science! Why is that?

I did three sciences at '0' level (showing my age) and so did DH (who then did Nat Science at Cambridge).

So when did it change to double science being the best to do?

Science Teacher - that is v helpful re: the triple Science option, thanks.

Dd1's school is a very trad academic grammar school, and they only offer double science rather than triple or separate. I think some schools see the triple/separate option as a selling point for ambitious parents?

At dd1's school they HAVE to do: English x 2, RE, maths, double science, one MFL (dd1 doing French), one of History or Geography (chosen History), and then seem to end up with three extra options.

For her extra options she's chosen German, Latin and Geography.

She is quite academic, so she's playing to her strengths. I'd be fine with her choosing a non-academic option instead of one of those options, but would encourage her to steer clear of the really fluffy 'fashionable' subjects like media studies (anything with 'studies' in the title really).

My weekly post on triple Science...

Science - Biology, Chemistry, Physics - is made up of various modules, including practical work.

In Year 10, everyone takes Core Science - which is made up of 4 modules each of Biology, Chemistry, Physics, and the related practical tasks. This leads to a single GCSE in Science, if they decide to cash in the qualification then.

In Year 11, they all take Additional Science, which is a further four modules in each strand plus the practical works. If they cash in this qualification, they get a GCSE in Additional Science.

If the do a further module in each strand, ie Biology 3, Chemistry 3, Physics 3, the can put together their Bio 1 (from Y10) and Bio 2 (from Y11) and Bio 3, to give them a Biology GCSE - and the same for Chemistry and Physics, giving them a total of 3 GCSEs for Science.

The big decision if they take three Science subjects is what they are missing out on elsewhere in the curriculum. The curriculum should be broad and balanced, and they soon narrow down when they get into sixth form. Is it really wise to narrow their subjects before they've even finished Year 9? The choice is personal, according to the timetabling (option blocks) in your school.

Traditionally, bright kids only ever did two Sciences (I did Physics and Chemistry). When the National Curriculum came in, it was still standard to get two qualifications in Science, but broadened to cover the whole spectrum (can't argue with that). It is only in relatively recent times that Triple Science has been put on a pedestal.

I love my subject, but would not promote it if it meant dropping a foreign language, for example.

Core/Additional is sufficient for A-level - the A-level courses start from where Additional Science leaves off.

DD is doing hers at the moment too. Currently she seems to be favouring opting for the third Science (as I think colleges see this and think "academic child" and in dd's school they have to be at least a level 6b I believe before they are allowed to do it) plus Geography, Art and French.

Her biggest area of frustration was having to choose between Art and Textiles but I think it's right that sheonly does one of the two, as she is academically very able. She can always do textiles in an evening class later.