Politics

Our Politics curriculum is focused on the AQA A Level specification. The intent is for our students to develop their analytical and evaluative skills that are essential for examination success at this level. There are three examination papers that students need to be prepared for. Given that there is one teacher delivering all three papers there is a suggested model of delivery that is provided by the AQA board.

The Politics curriculum is logically organised by the exam board in terms of the units to be delivered. Paper 1 titled ‘UK Politics’ is taught first, Paper 2 titled ‘US and Comparative Politics’ next and finally Paper 3 titled ‘Political Ideas’. Paper 1 begins in September of Year 12 and concludes at the Easter break of Year 12; Paper 2 begins when students return from the Easter break and runs until shortly before the Christmas break of Year 13. The final paper can run up to the start of the final examinations but is generally completed earlier allowing some revision time.

Lesson delivery is structured in such a way that there is constant recap of ground covered throughout the duration of the course. There is some flexibility with the order of delivery of the topics though the current model has been in pace since the introduction of the new specification in 2019; there has been considerable examination success with the current model. Paper 3 allows an ideology option to be chosen from 6 or so available ideologies. We deliver ‘Nationalism’ as our optional ideology – it is the most popular (along with ‘Feminism’) delivered by all centres. I gathered this information from a new specification delivery course offered by AQA back in 2019. Again, this model has secured consistent strong examination results.