GCSE's for a wannabe writer

[GEK1983]

My son is about to pick his GCSE's, he's always been an incredible, creative writer that spends time outside of school in creative writing clubs and spends lots of time at home writing. He's had this idea since he was 5 and has clung to this dream since. He would like to be an author or scriptwriter when he's older. Of course English is a big one but is compulsory anyway, so how about options? He's thinking definitely drama and history but what else? Are these good options for his future path? We also spoke about how becoming a writer js not easy with lots of set backs and needing a career on top of that. He isn't 100% sure on what that other career would be but he's leaning towards teaching. Any advice would be great.

History will teach valuable evidence handling skills, great for research.

Looking beyond to A levels - a language would be good as they study a boo and a film.

Film studies A Level also coukd work

Yh I would suggest an MFL as he will learn about the grammar of a language which I personally have found useful as a writer.

Otherwise yes to drama and agree history or RE. Does he plan to study creative writing at uni? Maybe look at some courses and work back - not to GCSEs obvs but A level choices may be suggested, which may then lead to GCSE choices if that makes sense.

History and languages, for sure. what other interests/strengths does he have?

BUT, as you suggest yourself, he needs to think of how he’s going to make a living, which will almost certainly not be from writing or anything writing-adjacent. I’m a novelist who teaches at a university, but I had a career as an academic long before I started teaching writing, and virtually all the writers I know have PT or FT university gigs. But we mostly got those after some success at writing. Your son needs to think of something he will find rewarding, that will pay his bills and leave him enough time to write, if he’s really serious about it, and think backwards from there.

I have known teachers who were also novelists and poets but they weren’t in the current UK system, which doesn’t sound as if it would give you much time to write outside of holidays.

Also if he is going to be a teacher he needs to do a degree that will facilitate that (unless he means primary). So he could do creative writing BA and the PGCE primary; but if secondary he might be better doing a degree in xxx subject (English, history, insert subject here that he is interested in and that is taught in secondary) plus an MA in creative writing and then a PGCE. Phew! A lot of study there.

Another job might give him more time to write, yes - something creative like marketing or project management?

(I do realise that all that is a long way off obvs - but no harm in having a rough plan).

The trouble with GCSE, if its anything like my DC's school, I don't think he'll get much more choice. My dc for example had the 2 Englishes, the Maths and then the single or combined sciences, which counts as another 2 (with an extra for the one that did separate science). RE was compulsory, as was a MFL and a practical (which drama might fall into). It juat depends on your school. The only choices mine had were which practical to choose, whether to choose History or Geography and which MFL to choose. Some schools get Psychology as a humanities option, which would be good for creative writing, but RE or History are better at GCSE level.
I would say History, RE and English are the best options. Probably Drama would be a better after school club, to do as an enrichment. Once he does A Levels he could choose from Film Studies, English Language, History, Psychology, Sociology.
Get him to think about careers around creative writing - media, journalism, teaching, historian and look at what the uni requirements are for these subjects.

What kind of books/shorts does he want to write.

I think psychology, criminology and sociology could useful if the school does them. If not, they can usually be taken in college.

I mean really anyone can become a writer with enough talent and perseverance. There's never any guarantees but it's brilliant to have a dream I think.

Media studies would be good for script writing perhaps.

Again, colleges often run short script writing courses so maybe he could take one of those and see if he enjoys it.

Geography, if the school does a decent broad course. It really helps you understand how the world fits togethers - why towns are located where they are, how landscapes impact the people who live there and how people impact the landscape etc etc - all of which contributes to world-building (even if just writing standard fiction and not fantasy/sci fi).

This is all very helpful everyone, thank you! I'm feeling unwell tonight and going to go to bed but will respond tomorrow as there's a few more things I want to add. Thanks again. Hope you all have a lovely rest of your evening.

And personally...I'm not sure I'd go the uni route for creative writing or script writing. I'd stick to shorter college courses. The joy can be sucked out of things like writing by long courses where they insist on things being a certain way.

And that's what creative writing should be - joy. Sure there will be days where he will have burnouts or not be feeling it, but it'll remain HIS. University will potentially just...pigeon hole him. Suck the fun right out of it.

Fair enough if he wants to be a journalist or something but otherwise I'd just encourage him to feel things out as as goes along. College classes, entering online writing competitions, 'for dummies' guide books, perhaps writing a little book of short stories and self publishing to start him off.