Syllabus

Syllabus

Use this syllabus for exams in 2024 and 2025.

Exams are available in the June and November series.

Aims

The aims of this course are to enable students to develop:

• computational thinking skills
• an understanding of the main principles of solving problems using computers
• an understanding of the component parts of computer systems and how they interrelate, including software, data, hardware, communication and people
• an understanding of the different methods of communication and the functionality of networks and the internet
• the skills necessary to apply this understanding to develop computer based solutions to problems.

Content overview

AS Level content

• 1 Information representation
  • 1.1 Data Representation
  • 1.2 Multimedia – Graphics, Sound
  • 1.3 Compression
• 2 Communication
  • 2.1 Networks including the internet
• 3 Hardware
  • 3.1 Computers and their components
  • 3.2 Logic Gates and Logic Circuits
• 4 Processor Fundamentals
  • 4.1 Central Processing Unit (CPU) Architecture
  • 4.2 Assembly Language
  • 4.3 Bit manipulation
• 5 System Software
  • 5.1 Operating Systems
  • 5.2 Language Translators
• 6 Security, privacy and data integrity
  • 6.1 Data Security
  • 6.2 Data Integrity
• 7 Ethics and Ownership
  • 7.1 Ethics and Ownership
• 8 Databases
  • 8.1 Database Concepts
  • 8.2 Database Management Systems (DBMS)
  • 8.3 Data Definition Language (DDL) and Data Manipulation Language (DML)
• 9 Algorithm Design and Problem-solving
  • 9.1 Computational Thinking Skills
  • 9.2 Algorithms
• 10 Data Types and Structures
  • 10.1 Data Types and Records
  • 10.2 Arrays
  • 10.3 Files
  • 10.4 Introduction to Abstract Data Types (ADT)
• 11 Programming
  • 11.1 Programming Basics
  • 11.2 Constructs
  • 11.3 Structured Programming
• 12 Software Development
  • 12.1 Program Development Life cycle
  • 12.2 Program Design
  • 12.3 Program Testing and Maintenance

A Level content

• 13 Data Representation
  • 13.1 User-defined data types
  • 13.2 File organisation and access
  • 13.3 Floating-point numbers, representation and manipulation
• 14 Communication and internet technologies
  • 14.1 Protocols
  • 14.2 Circuit switching, packet switching
• 15 Hardware and Virtual Machines
  • 15.1 Processors, Parallel Processing and Virtual Machines
  • 15.2 Boolean Algebra and Logic Circuits
• 16 System Software
  • 16.1 Purposes of an Operating System (OS)
  • 16.2 Translation Software
• 17 Security
  • 17.1 Encryption, Encryption Protocols and Digital certificates
• 18 Artificial Intelligence (AI)
  • 18.1 Artificial Intelligence
• 19 Computational thinking and Problem-solving
  • 19.1 Algorithms
  • 19.2 Recursion
• 20 Further Programming
  • 20.1 Programming Paradigms
  • 20.2 File Processing and Exception Handling

Assessment overview

At AS Level candidates take papers 1 and 2. At A Level candidates take all four papers. Calculators must not be used in any paper.

Paper 1 Theory Fundamentals

1 hour 30 minutes

75 marks

Paper 1 will assess sections 1 to 8 of the syllabus content.

Written paper.

Externally assessed.

Candidates answer all questions.

50% of the AS Level 25% of the A Level

Paper 2 Fundamental Problem-solving and Programming Skills

2 hours

75 marks

Paper 2 will assess sections 9 to 12 of the syllabus content.

Candidates will need to write answers in pseudocode.

Written paper.

Externally assessed.

Candidates answer all questions.

50% of the AS Level 25% of the A Level

Paper 3 Advanced Theory

1 hour 30 minutes

75 marks

Paper 3 will assess sections 13 to 20 of the syllabus content.

Written paper.

Externally assessed.

Candidates answer all questions.

25% of the A Level

Paper 4 Practical

2 hours 30 minutes

75 marks

Paper 4 will assess sections 19 to 20 of the syllabus content, except for low-level and declarative programming.

Candidates will submit complete program code and evidence of testing.

Candidates will be required to use either Java (console mode), Visual Basic* (console mode) or Python (console mode) programming languages.

Externally assessed.

Candidates answer all questions on a computer without internet or email facility.

25% of the A Level

Assessment objectives

The assessment objectives (AOs) are:

AO1

Demonstrate knowledge and understanding of the principles and concepts of computer science, including abstraction, logic, algorithms and data representation.

AO2

Apply knowledge and understanding of the principles and concepts of computer science, including to analyse problems in computational terms.

AO3

Design, program and evaluate computer systems to solve problems, making reasoned judgements about these.

Weighting for assessment objectives

The approximate weightings allocated to each of the assessment objectives (AOs) are summarised below.

Assessment objectives as a percentage of each qualification

Assessment objective	Weighting in AS Level %	Weighting in A Level %
AO1	30	30
AO2	40	30
AO3	30	40
Total	100	100

Assessment objectives as a percentage of each component

Assessment objective	Weighting	in	components	%
	Paper 1	Paper 2	Paper 3	Paper 4
AO1	60	0	60	0
AO2	40	40	40	0
AO3	0	60	0	100
Total	100	100	100	100