COMPUTER SCIENCE

LEVEL 3: A LEVEL
EXAMINING BOARD: AQA

New technologies are being introduced at an ever-increasing rate, from mobile devices and developments in PC and console specifications to self-driving cars. It is therefore more imperative than ever that young people gain a sound understanding of the nature of computing and software design.

This course will provide you with the fundamentals of why computers work in the way that they do.

You will also develop problem-solving skills and learn new programming languages, from procedural through to object-oriented and functional programming techniques.

This course is for those who wish to be at the forefront of innovation and technological developments in their future careers. Successful Computer Science students are mathematically minded, creative, resilient and able to work independently.

You will be expected to develop your coding skills outside of the lessons, as well as in class, using the Visual Studio development environment.

In previous years, students have been involved in enrichment including Mobile app design, Games development and Coding club.

In recent years we have run annual trips to the National Museum of Computing and Bletchley Park (home of the WWII code breakers) where students have gained an appreciation of the development of technology, particularly during and since the second world war..

 

You will study the following topics:

  • Binary representation of data including two’s complement floating point numbers
  • Basic programming such as iteration, selection, subroutines, local variables and global variables
  • Computer systems, including the classification of types of hardware, software and programming languages
  • Computer architecture
  • How technological innovation leads to moral, ethical, legal and cultural issues
  • Networks and communication
  • Algorithms for traversing graphs and trees
  • Normalisation of relational databases, SQL and client-server databases
  • Data structures such as queues, stacks, graphs, trees, hash tables, dictionaries and vectors
  • Big data – what it is and how is it processed
  • Functional programming
  • Computational thinking.

As a minimum, you will need (or equivalent to);

  • GCSE Mathematics grade 5
  • GCSE English Language grade 4
  • GCSE Computer Science grade 5 if studied at GCSE
  • plus two* more GCSEs at grade 4

*If you have not studied Computer Science you will require 3 additional GCSEs at grade 4 alongside your Maths and English grades.

It is recommended:

  • you have GCSE Mathematics grade 6 or above
  • you consider studying A Level Mathematics – this will support future applications for Computer Science degree courses and help develop the logical and analytic thinking that is helpful in Computer Science.

Your assessments will consist of:

  • an on-screen paper assessing understanding of programming concepts, including writing code and adapting a program provided by the exam board (worth 40% of your grade)
  • a written paper assessing theory topics (worth 40% of your grade)
  • a non-exam assessment (NEA) project; this is open-ended and you can choose (within reason) what your computing project is based on (worth 20% of your grade). 

Previous students have gone on to study at University, whilst other students have undertaken Apprenticeships in Software Engineering or Cyber Security.

Some students have gone straight into the workplace, typically in Software Development or Technical Support.

Many students will ultimately find themselves working in careers that do not yet exist.

Do I need access to a PC or laptop at home?

It will be challenging to undertake this course without considerable access to a PC or laptop but it is possible to use PCs in College if access at home is limited.

The PC or laptop you use outside of class should be able to run Visual Studio as well as office software.

Can this course be studied alongside Computer Science or the Digital IT and Computing courses?

Yes.

You must study this qualification alongside an A Level and a third vocational/A Level subject. You can select any course but if you are passionate about a career in IT you may wish to combine these 3 subjects.

What preparation can I do to support myself before starting the course?

Learn a new programming language.

We recommend starting with Visual Basic (VB.NET) as it uses fairly English-like syntax which makes it easier to learn, whilst also providing access to many complex programming techniques. We use Visual Basic (which runs in Visual Studio) to demonstrate programming techniques.

Visual Studio (community edition) can be downloaded for free. Many online tutorials are available, such as MooICT and VBTutor (as well as YouTube, of course). If you are already familiar with Visual Basic then pick up C# or Java.