A Level Sociology

Course summary

In the first year, you will study: • Education and methods in context: You will consider the role of education in society. You’ll also learn how to apply your own sociology research methods to the study of education. • Research methods: You will learn how to conduct your own sociological research, from interviews to reviewing documents and official statistics. • You will also study families and households, which includes family types, such as nuclear families, gay families and lone parent families, as well as childhood, demographics and power relationships within the family. In the second year, you will study: • Crime and deviance with theory and methods: You will learn about criminal and deviant behaviour, including factors that might lead a person to follow this path in life and how the criminal justice system works. • Theory and methods: you will expand your knowledge of research methods and study sociological theory, including Functionalism, Marxism, Feminism and the New Right. • You will also study Beliefs in Society, which includes why we have religion according to the different approaches, who is more religious? Which class, age, gender and ethnicity and why? Is society becoming secular or is the rise in new religious movements changing what and how people worship?