Subjects - What A-Levels do I choose?

SUBJECTS - WHAT DID I CHOOSE AND WHY?

So I began at my secondary school's sixth form where I decided to study Psychology, Maths, Biology and Chemistry. The standard university offer for Medicine is Chemistry and usually two other sciences that includes Maths – they essentially won’t accept Critical Thinking or General Studies. Check any universities you may be interested in and mould your options around them.

It is also important that at GCSE you have aimed to get mostly A*s or As (now 7-9 in the new GCSE Grading System from 2017). It is vital you get the minimum GCSEs to study the A-Levels listed above. For example, you may require to get a B (or equivalent) in Biology GCSE to study Biology A-Level.

I chose Psychology because you study memory and case studies into dementia and have a beginning “foot-in-the-door” to understanding mental health issues. You also learn biological processes like synapses and neurones which you met at GCSE but will need to understand a little bit more (…which definitely goes hand-inhand with Biology A-Level). I chose Maths because I enjoyed it and Biology because I found it more interesting than Physics.

My word of advice: do not choose Biology A-Level if you are going to regard it as an "easier" subject compared to the other sciences. Don't learn this the hard way...


WHY HAVE I GOT TO DO A-LEVEL CHEMISTRY TO BE A DOCTOR?

You might be reacting how I first did reading uni prospectuses. Why Chemistry? Surely body anatomy and physiology outweighs the effects of temperature on the decomposition of hydrogen peroxide in a lab? Surely Biology is more important than Chemistry for a doctor? Well yeah I guess it is, but I have asked a doctor about this question.

She told me that it’s all about the skills you learn whilst studying Chemistry A-Level. I will dwell on this in the science subject section, but you learn a lot about logical working, critical thinking and investigations. The doctor said this is a perfect representation of Medicine. Someone comes in with a problem showing symptom A, B and C – you will diagnose their condition based on visual symptoms and results from tests. This is similar to Chemistry. If you have four beakers on a workbench containing clear liquids that all look and smell the same, you can work out which one is an iodide by adding silver nitrate and observing a yellow precipitate forming – you ‘diagnose’ it as an iodide.


SCIENCE A-LEVELS - WHAT'S INVOLVED EXACTLY?

So that explains choosing A-Levels… but I didn’t go into too much detail about the sciences, just that word of warning about Biology. You will hear it in the science department as banter that "Biology consists of respiration, photosynthesis and more on plants." Biology is the WHAT, Chemistry is the HOW and Physics is the WHY. They are all as hard as each other.

I can’t speak on behalf of Physics as I didn’t do it. But from what I hear from my physicist friends, Physics sounds similar to Chemistry in the way there is complicated theory endorsed by mathematical elements. This is very similar to Chemistry. If you like Maths, I would definitely recommend Chemistry and Physics. You will be taught things in both subjects that cross-link, eg. you’ll be taught logarithms in Maths and made to use logarithms in Arrhenius’ Equation questions in Chemistry.

Biology is not easy. You could say most of the content is easy as you may be familiar with parts. For example, closed keeping of chickens to conserve energy so they produce more meat. Or that all your genetic code is kept in a double strand of DNA. But the difference is quantity. There is sooo much to learn for Biology which makes it more challenging. My Year 2 Biology A-Level textbook was the same size as Year 1, whereas Year 2 Chemistry ALevel textbook was half the size of Year 1!