Topic “A Levels”

The first year focuses on rivers, floods and the management of flooding, and population change. A field trip will be undertaken to investigate these issues first-hand.

The second year covers plate tectonics and associated hazards, weather and climatic hazards, development and gloabilsation, and contemporary conflicts. There is further opportunity to undertake a fieldwork investigation of your choice.

The first year looks at understanding dance, choreography and performance.

By year two, you will ready to explore dance appreciation, content and context, and will get involved in both group and solo choreography. You will also get to choose a specialism: ballet, jazz or modern dance. There's plenty of opportunity to particpate in workshops with professional dance companies and attend performances in local theatres.

An enrichment trip to London is also available, where you will take dance classes at Pineapple Dance Studios and watch the professionals at one of London's major dance houses.

Studying French A level gives you the opportunity to develop your fluency, accuracy and language knowledge. You will improve your knowledge of speaking, listening, reading and writing the language and develop an awareness and understadning of a contemporary society and its cultural background.

There are three main strands to the A level in music; performing, composing and developing musical understanding.

Each year consists of one unit for each of these areas, so whatever your musical strengths, you will get an all-round experience right from day one!

You will be assessed in a variety of ways too, with a mix of exams, coursework and performances. You will look at creating and interpreting ideas, and there's an opportunity to choose which genres you study in detail - from baroque to Brit pop.

Both the first and second years look at how performers, designers and directors communicate meaning to an audience, and theatre practice through your own engagement as a participant and as an informed audience member.

You will look at practitioners such as Stanislavsky, Brecht and Artaud, and take part in workshops and local theatre trips. You will also have the opportunity to take part in a trip to London where you will tour the National Theatre and Shakespeare's Globe theatre and see a West End play.

In year one you will explore writing and speech, and how context affects language function. This could include language in relation to sport, technology, power, gender and the workplace. You will cover a huge range of media from sources such as print, e-mail and social networking sites.

At A2 you will move on to explore how advertising and television have affected the development of language, and how change may be analysed and evaluated creatively. One unit also covers child language acquisition, which could prove useful for students entering professions involving working with young people, such as psychology, teaching and social work.

The course involves the study of the following units:

• developing your critical understanding of organisations, the markets they serve and the process of adding value. This will involve consideration of the internal workings and management of organisations and the process of decision making in a dynamic external environment
• creating your awareness that business behaviour can be studied from the perspective of a range of stakeholders including customer, manager, creditor, owner / shareholder and employee. In addition, you should be aware of the economic, environmental, ethical, governmental, legal, social and technological issues associated with business activity. You should understand that business studies draws on a variety of disciplines and that these perspectives and disciplines are interrelated.
• enabling you to acquire a range of skills including decision making and problem solving in the light of evaluation and, where appropriate, the quantification and management of information.

The AS year comprises two units ...

Unit 1 (Families and households)

We will study the important changes in the family in the UK ranging from marriage to cohabitation, divorce to changes in child rearing as well as how expectations have changed and continue to change.

Unit 2 (Education)

We will study which groups of people benefit from the education system in the UK today. We look at a history of education and the different type of schools that have been tried out as well as their relative merits. We look at the experience of school to see if it is positive or negative or both.

The A2 year comprises two units

Unit 3 (Beliefs in Society)

We will look at the various different types of ideology that influence society including religious and non-religious belief systems. You will look at the influence of science and why it is seen to be an alternative to religion (by some) whereas others argue it is no better or worse than religion. We also look at the various forms religion takes and why particular belief systems appeal to some groups more than others.

Unit 4 (Crime and Methods)

We will look at the patterns of crime and criminality in the UK today. We examine the role of the police and imprisonment as well as crime statistics to see whether or not crime is spiralling out of control. We look at which groups of people are likely to get into trouble with the law and why.

This course introduces you to the main concepts and issues concerning the mass media.

• Unit 1: modern media forms - this module looks at how media products are constructed and how they create meaning.
• Unit 2: you will research and execute a media product of their own devising.

These units will be dealt with through detailed studies of several areas, including:
• the world of advertising
• newspapers and magazines
• television and film extracts
• internet pages
• production research using archives and the internet
• storyboarding and scriptwriting
• page layout and design • desk top publishing.

*Subject to conditions