Any Humanities teachers out there? - GCSE choices...

[KingscoteStaff]

DS's school has a lot of compulsory subjects, which has left him with only 2 spaces and 3 subjects which he loves - History, Geography and RS/Philosophy.

Unfortunately, these are the three subjects that (currently) he would like to take at A level.

Is is possible/advisable to take any of these subjects at A level without having studied the GCSE course?

KingscoteStaff (which one though? Crommie? Not Keith surely...) Yes, if she has to make a choice she will do music at school and drama with her drama group - we just would prefer her to do drama at school too because (a) she wouldn't have to do an extra unnecessary GCSE (in addition to the unnecessary science she will be lumbered with) (b) there will be scheduling difficulties and she may well end up having to drop an instrument (she has 4 sets of lessons including voice) which seems bonkers - but she won't dump dance, that would happen over her dead body (c) because of the new syllabus, the fact that drama with the drama group always gets better results than drama with the school was going to be less of A Thing, in fact we suspected that her year would be the first year where there would be an advantage to doing it with the school rather than the drama group.

She already gets way more than enough EC opportunities (right now she is sorting out her costume for tonights MT performance in a regional dance festival) to perform so that's not an issue.

The fact is she doesn't HAVE to do drama GCSE or A level really - one can do drama at a drama school, conservatoire or uni without. But she wants to. And she decidedly doesn't want to do any of the other subjects.

Shame your DS will have to dump Latin. I think it's still possible to do it externally with the Cambridge Latin people? There's like an online thing?

What careers means you must play numerous instruments, sing, dance and act? People I know ended up specialising! Even musical theatre does not require playing instruments - usually! If you play in an orchestra, do you dance or do drama? What is her career objective?

She wants to do musical theatre. She doesn't have to keep up her instruments for that (other than piano and voice) true - but on the other hand they are something she is extremely good at (very high standard for her age - higher standard than DD1 who will be going to RCM in the autumn was at that age). And more worth keeping up than doing a useless GCSE in geography. And keeping up her instruments will keep her options open should she decide that actually, music is the thing she wants to do. Also - being highly proficient at music can be a good way to earn money as a student. Playing gigs and in pit bands and also busking financed me throughout my uni years. It's a useful thing to be able to do. Most of the people I know in that sort of world are multi skilled. They have to be.

Sorry OP - I seem to have hijacked this thread a bit. I'll leave it now. Sorry, again.

I would say to drop the RS.
The school I am at has no 6th form provision but I have briefly taught A-level History and the one pupil without history GCSE struggled. I would imagine geography to be similar.

At our local sixth form college you can do all of those subjects without having done a GCSE as long as you have a decent English pass. They may also ask for a pass in one humanity but I am not sure of that.

I did RS A level having not done GCSE. Oh and I had an offer from Cambridge too. I ended up going to Cardiff but that's another story, but it doesn't close down options with decent universities.

3 sciences compulsory. Some rubbish about being rounded

How rubbish. One science is more than enough to be "rounded". Sigh. I'm fed up with the government pushing science down everyone's throats. We still need non-scientists.

RS is compulsory at KS4. My son's school gets everyone to do a GCSE in it so that time isn't wasted. Does your son's school do that too - I assume not or you wouldn't have the problem.

Out of interest, do you have time/funds for him to do the 3rd subject outside school eg via someone like Wolsey Hall?

Hijack away.

For what it's worth dd is only going to do GCSE music & not drama despite wanting to do MT so she can keep triple science (with an eye to dance physiotherapy) & her school have dropped dance as a GCSE on the basis that they all have higher dsnce qualifications than that anyway.

GCSE music covers a lot of stuff like composition that you don't necessarily cover in instrumental lessons & it's much harder to be accepted onto music a level without GCSE which isn't the case for drama.

I'm appalled that schools are forcing kids who are more arts orientated to do triple science & not giving them the option of double.

Balletgirlmum - it's what the government want, innit. An army of low grade technicians, who don't have security of employment, who are set to be replaced by AI anyway, who can't access decently paid jobs, who will never own property and therefore will be stuck in the rent trap, and who therefore won't rock the boat (and who, if they wish to rock the boat, won't have the skills to articulate their arguments in any prodctive way).

bored tell me about Wolsey Hall?

I'm interested in Wolsey Hall too, if anyone has any experiences! Particularly in Latin. DS1 is another one doing triple science and taking creative subjects. On the starting from scratch at A level, I would definitely agree that RS is the one you can pick up later - it's a bit like classical civilisation in the sense that you can transfer skills learned in other essay subjects and don't need really specific prior knowledge.