SE A Level Course Guide Nov 2021 Final

C O M P U T E R S C I E N C E

Computer Science OCR

Computer Science teaches you how to solve problems in the real world using technology. It is a core discipline in itself, but has an extremely broad application to a number of industries such as finance, entertainment, medicine, communications, management, consulting, sport and manufacturing. The skills you will learn can be transferred to many disciplines and will be of great benefit in other degree courses such as engineering, physics, mathematics or any type of business or design course to name a few. When taking Computer Science you will learn not only how to program in a variety of languages, but also how computers work and how they communicate with each other. You will learn about the process of writing software and how to develop an idea into a working application for different devices and markets. You will have the chance to design your own software using whatever languages and techniques you wish. Computer Science will be invaluable for all pupils ranging from those who are determined to release their own software and make a “dent in the universe” as Steve Jobs wrote, to anyone interested in technology and its effects on our world today.

The course consists of the following components:

Component 01 (40% of total) • Software Development • Exchanging Data

• Data types, data structures and algorithms • Characteristics of contemporary processors

• Legal, moral, cultural and ethical issues A Level Component 02 (40% of total) • Computational Thinking • Problem solving and programming • Algorithms to solve problems and standard algorithms Component 03 (20% of total) • A coursework project of your own choosing. Most projects revolve around creating a game and demonstrate the following phases of the system development lifecycle.

• Analysis of the problem • Design of the solution • Development of the solution • Evaluation Programming languages

No prior experience of programming or knowledge of a particular programming language is needed for the A Level course. Over the two-year course, you will learn HTML, CSS, JavaScript, Visual Basic and Python with the PyGame library. The course is designed to teach the principles of programming which remain applicable to any programming language. Further opportunities for other languages and experience of different platforms are offered through the Programming Club with robotics, encryption, Raspberry Pi and computational thinking competitions entered throughout the year.

14