Computer Studies / Computing

Course summary

Computer Science is a practical subject where students can apply the academic principles learned in the classroom to real world systems. It’s an intensely creative subject that combines invention and excitement, that can look at the natural world through a digital prism. Our Computer Science qualifications will value computational thinking, helping students to develop the skills to solve problems, design systems and understand the power and limits of human and machine intelligence. These are the concepts that lie at the heart of our Computer Science qualifications. This will be the best preparation for students who want to go on to study Computer Science at a higher level and will also provide a good grounding for other subject areas that require computational thinking and analytical skills. The A Level specification in computer science contains both theory and practical elements. The theory elements will enable you to develop an understanding of: • the characteristics of contemporary processors • input, output and storage devices • software and software development • exchanging data • data types, data structures and algorithms • legal, moral, cultural and ethical issues • elements of computational thinking • problem solving and programming • algorithms to solve problems and standard algorithms The A level has a practical programming project which forms 20% of the overall assessment and is designed to allow students to explore their core programming skills and expertise and apply them to a project of their own choice and design. Analysis of the problem, Design of the solution, Developing the solution and Testing and Evaluation.