The Ultimate OCR A Level Computer Science Dictionary (version 1.0)

As Salamu Alaykum Wa Rahmatullahi Wa Barakatuh World!

For my second blog post i'm going to share my A level Computer Science notes (which are for OCR in case that wasn't already clear by the title) for the new H046/H446 specification. 

I plan to create resources for other exam boards as well as for GCSE Computer Science InShaAllah but first I will be making them for OCR since that's the one i'm doing, so for those not doing OCR you're just going to have to hang in there!

I initially just wanted to share the exact notes I used for my own independent study and leave it at that but I realised my notes won't make a lot of sense to anyone except me! Therefore, this will known as version 1 of "The Ultimate OCR A level Computer Science Dictionary" and I will update my notes to make them more "user friendly" in the next version by tomorrow InShaAllah.

As the Head of Computer Science at my old school always used to say about A level Computer Science: "A level Computer Science is just definitions". Now this isn't exactly 100% true but I have come to notice that most of the specification just wants you to know stuff along with the obvious practical side of programming and a bit of math here and there. Hence, these are made entirely from OCR past papers from both the old and new specifications. I used (almost) no random websites or textbooks because they may just contain a load of waffle that won't be worth any marks in the final exam. Certain other resources were used when information could not be found regarding a certain topic via the past papers which I will make another blog post about.

All you need to know that this (as the name dictionary implies) is essentially a list that consists of every single definition or key word/term or whatever you want to call them that is required for the H046/H446 specification. There are less than 250 definitions you need to know so if you memorised say, 2 a day from the start of school in September, you would have essentially learnt about 80% of the specification by January. The rest of the year you could dedicate to doing past papers and focusing more on the practical stuff (the math and programming). The more you memorise per day, the quicker you'll have learnt the theoretical part of the course! Obviously I am not insinuating in any way that this is the best resource out there, but what I am saying is that this resource is very concise and relevant to the spec which makes it a great revision tool (#stay humble).

But that's enough talk from me, I want to hear from you guys, please comment below on how you find this resource so I can use your feedback to create better resources in the future InShaAllah. 

Here's the link: The Ultimate OCR A Level Computer Science Dictionary (v1.0)

Hope this helps!