This humanities subject is an excellent choice if your chosen career will require good written and verbal communication.
An A Level in Classical Civilisation will help you to understand the legacy of the classical world, whilst equipping you to progress to higher education. It allows you to develop skills of critical analysis and evaluation further and apply these to the range of source materials studied in order to gain insight into aspects of the classical world.
If you are looking to apply to university, Classical Civilisation can be extremely useful. You not only acquire specific Classical knowledge, but also important transferable skills such as analysing sources and developing independent, critical and evaluative approaches. You learn to formulate and support an argument and develop a valuable understanding of cultures very different to your own.
The course also offers opportunities for trips to visit ancient sites in the UK.
The study of A Level Classical Civilisation can often lead to university-level study of Classics, Drama, English, History, History of Art, Philosophy and Politics. Information from UCAS shows that students who studied Classical Civilisation also went on to study in diverse disciplines, including Medicine, Veterinary Science and Chemistry!
What you'll learn
You will be following the OCR specification:
First Year AS Classical Civilisations:
Unit 1: The World of the Hero (Homer’s Odyssey)
Unit 2: Imperial Image
Second Year A-level Classical Civilisations:
Unit 1: The World of the Hero (Virgil’s Aeneid)
Unit 3: Love and Relationships
How you'll learn and be assessed
You will learn in a variety of ways:
- Discussion
- Group work
- Independent study
- Essays
- Reading
- Source analysis
- Research tasks
There will be a mock exam at the end of the first year.
At the end of the second year you will have 3 exams: one of 2 hours and 20 minutes and two of 1 hour and 45 minutes.
There will be regular assessments throughout your period of study and individual learning targets are set each term, with regular feedback on all assessments.
Entry requirements
Applicants should have five GCSEs at grade 5, including English and maths.
