GCSE History and Geography. A bad idea?

[MayBlossom]

DD is in the process of picking her options. She is contemplating taking both GCSE History and Geography, both subjects she enjoys and is doing well in. At her options chat with a member of the SLT she was warned that this combination would be "very content heavy" and it was almost portrayed as not the done thing. I am concerned she may also end up inadvertently limiting her future A Level choices if she does not do both as she is not going to do anything science or maths based and is highly unlikely to do either Drama or PE at A Level (these are the other two GCSE subjects in the mix). Is doing both HIstory and Geography really such a bad idea? Years ago I did both and also did both at A Level but it was a long time ago and I suspect things have changed considerably since then. Any advice, positive or negative, would be appreciated.

My ds is in year 11 and doing both. He’s not one of life’s natural workers but is finding it fine and is on the way to 8/9 in both. There is a lot of content but if you enjoy it then that’s the main thing.

Another one whose dc did both and did very well, (8s in both). If you are positive about it, your dc will feel confident to do it. Ignore the teacher.

My ds is in yr 10 and doing both. He swapped last minute from computer science to art. There should be in the first term a little room for change. But doing history and geography he was always sure on. They’re his favourite subjects so yes like others have said why give one up? He’s also at a church school and they were fine with it.

Though the problem now is what a levels to choose!

My DD really wants to do both, but sadly they clash in the options table, along with German which she also wants to do. It has put her in a real tizzy! The school does offer a 'Plus' programme where they study an extra GCSE in extracurricular time - she can take German this way, but Astronomy is also on offer and she also wants to do that! It's all teenage angst in this house.

When I did GCSE I did triple science, history and geography and 2 languages (All As) - but we are talking about the dark ages, so the content may well be different.

At my son's grammar there are very little GCSE options compared to other schools and lots of them do both history and geography. In some ways there is overlap because of learning the ability to for good essay writing is needed in both. My son does history, pe and drama - pe is quite a committment because you need to do 3 sports at a competitive level out of school. He was deciding between geography and drama - we encouraged him to do drama because he is shy and we thought it would be good for his confidence and he was keen to do less academic subjects. But if he enjoyed geography as you say your son does - we would have hands down encouraged him to do both history and geography - geography gives you a good perception of the world which is useful in this day and age of international working.

Another here who has children who chose both History & Geography GCSEs (one with dyslexia). They’re content heavy but I’m not sure if there are any subjects that aren’t either content heavy or time consuming. Or both!

My daughter chose to do both and they are her favourite subjects. We asked at parents eve and whilst both teachers said they were content heavy they still encouraged her to go for it. Our thinking was if she loves the subjects she’ll be happier putting the work in to get the grades.

My youngest is doing this, plus 3 sciences. It's been fine, not problems fitting in the work at all. He enjoys them and both support good study skills for university. His school raised the same issue but that didn't put him off, he's fairly studious though.