AQA · Pearson Edexcel · OCR. A separate book for each
The assessment objectives below are worded almost identically whichever board you teach. What differs is the weight each one carries, and that is what decides where a department spends its time. Each book quotes its own board’s specification word for word, and the first 8 pages of each are open to read here.
Read off the GCSE History specification. The weightings, the mark scheme levels and what separates a middle answer from a top one are set out board by board inside each book.
AQA 8145. Two papers, two hours each, 84 marks each, four sections of 40 marks. AQA is the only one of the three that spreads interpretations across both papers, 10% on Paper 1 and 5% on Paper 2. That means no paper can be taught without source and interpretation work, which is a different curriculum problem from the one the other two boards set.
AO1Knowledge
AO2Explanation
AO3Sources
AO4Interpretations
AQA GCSE History (8145) specification, with the assessment objective weighting table reconciled against it·31 pages, 24 sections·For teachers, heads of department and SLT. Not a student revision guide
Pearson Edexcel 1HI0. Three papers of three different lengths and weights (30%, 40% and 30%), and every mark for interpretations is on Paper 3, with none anywhere else. Paper 2 is the mirror image: 40% of the qualification with no AO3 and no AO4 at all. Two papers, two completely different demands, and a department teaching them the same way is preparing for neither.
AO1Knowledge
AO2Explanation
AO3Sources
AO4Interpretations
Pearson Edexcel GCSE (9–1) History (1HI0) specification, with the assessment objective weighting table reconciled against it·31 pages, 24 sections·For teachers, heads of department and SLT. Not a student revision guide
Cambridge OCR History A (Explaining the Modern World), J410. The board runs two GCSE histories and this edition names which. Three component groups at 50%, 25% and 25%, with every interpretation mark inside Group 1, which is also half the qualification. The thematic study carries no AO3 and no AO4 at all: a quarter of the grade on knowledge and explanation alone.
AO1Knowledge
AO2Explanation
AO3Sources
AO4Interpretations
Cambridge OCR GCSE (9–1) History A (Explaining the Modern World), J410, with the assessment objective weighting table reconciled against it·31 pages, 24 sections·For teachers, heads of department and SLT. Not a student revision guide
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