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Modern History or Legal Studies (1 Viewer)

Ethaw

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I am changing from biology.
Which do you prefer/which is more enjoyable?
Which is harder?

I know modern scales better but I got the impression it was harder.
Modern is also fairly humanities heavy and I do eng ext 1 so I think i'd be fairly good at it, however, I don't want to be overly swamped by essays. (not that legal isn't humanities heavy either).
 

futuremidwife

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Which do you think you'll do BETTER in? Modern and Legal are both heavy in content, and require a lot of essays both internally and in the external exams. Both require consistency, and upmost effort to maximise the most marks.

For me, I would go modern history due to my unfathomable love for it. I loathed anything law-related. So yeah, you decide which once you'd do better in.

TIP: Have a discussion with your history teachers in year 10, and see if its the subject for you. That'll help you rule out one subject.

I hope that aids you in your decision.
 
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Martin_SSEDU

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I did legal studies and I can say it was pretty enjoyable, I had a good teacher which made it that much better. Honestly, just go with the one you feel that you'll enjoy the most. With legal studies I enjoyed it because I was learning things about society around me and I was able to apply a lot of common sense and case studies to help me understand it better.
 

4025808

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Modern - you learn a lot of 19th-20th century related history, which can be very interesting if you like story telling. Analysis on the other hand isn't so much.
Legal - you learn a lot of stuff that actually affects your society, legislations, stuff related to crime, as well as applying common sense to situations :p

Imo I did both modern history and legal studies - I found modern to be a lot more difficult because you had source analysis (which for my school was marked harshly), as well as having to memorize a crap tonne of facts and figures, and then having to construct an essay out of it. You were pretty much fucked if you studied one thing and then got a different question to what you were studying, simply because the facts and stuff are all very different. That said, modern history was still interesting despite having a crappy teacher.

On the other hand in legal studies - I studied 4 topics, but that pretty much felt like 2 topics. I did Crime - International crime, and then linked it to World Order. Then I did family law and that linked very well to human rights. The crime topic relates well to human rights. I didn't actually end up studying for world order because I used stuff from international crime to answer my essay question. Literally legal studies has very well linked topics. A lot of the legislation/cases can actually be used not only in one, but two or even three topics - probably meaning a lot less to remember :)

Plus legal studies is easy to BS if you tell me. Sure it doesn't scale as well as modern but imo it's a lot less work than required.
 
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Ethaw

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OK thanks everyone. I ended up doing modern and yes it does seem to be a lot of essays and work!
I feel that I'd do better in legal and it'd work with my workload better but at least with modern the work is definitely somewhat interesting. :)
 

nathan98

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Legal isn't hard if you have the right mind for it. The only thing with legal I find difficult is just the content. Its basically easy but you have to remember heaps. With Modern you basically focus on the 19th and 20th Century e.g Franco- Prussian War. Im a Year 11 Student currently and have chosen both these subjects. So far they are both enjoyable).
 

clown50nh

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I've heard modern is very interesting- but legal studies is to.
 

MrInoeverthin

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I've heard modern is very interesting- but legal studies is to.
Both subjects are content heavy and you need to understand its content as well as remember it as well.

If you're considering studying a more interesting subject, I suggest you go with Modern History.

(Yes, bias included hehe ;))
 

MrInoeverthin

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For me, I would go modern history due to my unfathomable love for it. I loathed anything law-related. So yeah, you decide which once you'd do better in.

TIP: Have a discussion with your history teachers in year 10, and see if its the subject for you. That'll help you rule out one subject.

I hope that aids you in your decision.
Nawwww,

You like history too? ;)
 

4025808

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Both subjects do have a lot of content - and can be dry unless if you can find a way to link the topics together, thus reducing the amount of work necessary.

That said, I'd definitely say both subjects are interesting in their own ways - it might just be the assessment tasks that would kill you (i.e. source analysis, essays, memorizing lots of facts, figures, legislation, etc).
 

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