Help selecting HL Subjects- English or Psychology?

[Arumey]

Hi, would anyone be able to give me any advice regarding the difficulty of my chosen HL subjects? I'm going into the IB program next year and our subject choices are due in soon. I know two of my SL subjects are going to be Japanese and Math, but I'm not sure what my third SL/HL subject could be. My other four subjects are English, Psychology, Chemistry and Biology, so I can take one of those at SL. My plan was to do HL English, Psychology and Chemistry, but I've been talking to one of the Year 11 IB students, who's informed that I've chosen incredibly difficult subjects for my HL. Psychology and English are especially difficult at high level apparently, and he's recommended doing Economics HL and English SL, leaving my two sciences for my second and third HL. The only problem is that I'm doing Business Studies this year, and I find it incredibly boring. Psychology is something I'm very keen to learn about though, so would my interest in Psychology make up for the difficulty of the course?

I'm also interested in doing English HL, as I really want to improve my litererary abilities (although I'm sure the SL will do well in that anyway). I'm not top of my class for English, but I'm in the English Literature course and I'm an A student overall. The other option I might consider is seeing if I can take four HL subjects, and then dropping the most difficult.

From what I gathered though, English HL is extremely difficult to get a seven in, and Psychology HL is a lot of memorising studies and drawing conclusions from them. The guy I talked to said he was doing both at a HL and it was a terrible decision, but I haven't talked to many of the other IB students about it.

Edited August 2, 2015 by Arumey

[avalinelegato]

Hey there!

 

First of all, when it comes to choosing your subjects, I think it's extremely important to choose based on your personal preferences. Of course it's fine to ask others for advice, but always keep in mind that each individual has different inclinations towards different subjects. The definition of the term "difficult" is subjective, imo. Just because your friend might not enjoy HL English and HL Psychology, that doesn't mean that you would feel the same as he does. Maybe your friend just doesn't enjoy the two subjects as much as you do?

 

Before you decide, "oh I'm interested in Psychology, I'm gonna take this subject!", I suggest that you take a look at the syllabus. Take a look at their notes, their textbooks, their essays and ask yourself whether you'd enjoy learning and doing those work. I have to admit that I took psychology based on the assumption that I'd get to learn about abnormal psychology- which was correct - but at the same time there's so much more to the psychology syllabus. Thankfully, I still enjoyed the syllabus nevertheless! Different people have different claims as to whether the gap between HL and SL Psychology is massive- the difference between HL and SL Psychology is that in HL, you take two options instead of one, plus an extra paper. Some people wouldn't find an extra option a huge burden, while others would. (This is why I say it's important to take a look at the syllabus and see whether you'd enjoy it )

 

I'm taking HL English Language & Literature, so I'm not sure if it's the same as HL English Language (which I'm assuming is the one you're taking- please correct me if I'm wrong! ) What I can say is, I LOVE the language part of English. We got to learn about language and power, language in advertising, language and taboo, etc etc and I loved it so much! Maybe other people might beg to differ, but as I said, it's about perspective Don't let your friend tell you that you're making a wrong choice to take HL English, just like how you shouldn't let my post decide your choice of taking HL English either. Ask yourself which subject you'd like the best. Perhaps you can also ask your teacher for some feedback regarding whether your performance in your English Literature course now would be sufficient/good enough for HL English? Regarding the difficulty of obtaining a 7 at HL, I'm honestly not sure how true this is. I'm not saying it's easy to get a 7 at HL, it's just that my teacher has never actually told us anything about this, so I can't make a final judgment :/

 

I do not take HL Economics, so I'm not able to say much about this subject, apologies. I'm not sure whether it's closely related to business; some of my friends told me that there is a link between these two subjects, but others also say that economics requires more maths than business and is actually pretty different from business. Do you like maths? If you do, then maybe HL Economics is an okay option?

 

Four HL subjects- that's what I'm currently doing! I dont plan on taking all four in my final exam though, I'm taking this option because I couldn't (and still can't) decide which of the 3 HLs I should choose. Therefore, I'd suggest that you first take a look at the syllabus for each of the subjects you're considering. If you still can't decide which 3 to choose, then you can take 4 and then later drop one of them, just like what you've mentioned in your post

 

TL;DR - Look at the syllabus for each of the subjects you have in mind and then decide Best of luck!

 

(Edited because I realised there was another difference between HL and SL Psychology- updated in my answer above )

Edited August 7, 2015 by avalinelegato

[ShootingStar16]

Honestly, everyone has their strengths and weaknesses. Idk much about psych so can't really help with that (sorry )... If you're good at English, go for English Lit HL. When I was in pre-IB, the grade 12 IB kids told me to avoid HL English Lit like the plague and to not take full IB, but I took it and it's not easy. What makes it frustrating is when you get a passage where you aren't able to examine and pick apart the literary details. However, English isn't the hardest and it's a lot of fun because the books you read are really interesting World Lit got me interested in reading other works in translation. The reason why English is hard to get a 7 in is that it is soo subjective. One examiner could think your essay was good and give you a 7 and another could think it sucks and give you a 5. My English teacher told me that usually, 1 or 2 people get a 7 in English Lit HL at my school every year. Try to do well on the IA's for English (which consist of the IOP and IOC) because you will never know what will happen on the exams. The IOP is not moderated by IB alone and it's not that hard to do decent on when you have a solid topic and can present it effectively. I hear the IOC is stressful and it is a taped commentary on a randomly chosen passage from one of the texts you have studied in class. That is what gets moderated by IB  and what you get will affect your IOP mark (which is super weird because some people will have different teachers). Also, you can always practice annotating passages to help improve your commentary skills. You also have this huge Works in Translation paper that is externally assessed, but you get lots of time to do that just like the IOP and you also get a lot of prep time for the IOC. Another thing I suggest is asking around about what the IB English teacher is like. Having a good teacher for English Lit is totally a plus. 

 

Hope I helped a bit! 

Edited August 2, 2015 by ShootingStar16

[Excalibre]

I really don't know what type of person you talked to regarding taking up English A HL, because as of now you have 3 individuals (including me) that found English to be one of the most interesting subjects in their course of study. Obviously, I'm not undermining that person, since it's been mentioned by both posters that difficulty in a language subject (in this case English HL) is quite subjective (I'm sure ShootingStar16 has done justice in explaining why).

The specific course that I took was English A: Language and Literature HL, and it was definitely one of the most interesting subjects. Like avalinelegato also mentioned, The language part of the course includes a wide range of texts, some of which make for interesting analysis. I even found WT1 and the IOP to be fun! Mainly because you are awarded a lot of space for free thought and given some level of freedom in choosing the topic (though this may vary from school to school). So I'd second the suggestion to have a look at the syllabus and decide for yourself what it is you want to do.

 

Oh and if you're good at writing essays and have an interest in the subject, then you'll most likely not find English HL to be difficult. I had both attributes to some moderate extent and I got away with a 6 by the end of it.

Edited August 2, 2015 by Excalibre