This examination is suitable for the development of your skills in any of the following D&T areas: Resistant Materials, Graphic Products, Electronics and Engineering. Whilst it is advisable to have studied a D&T subject at GCSE level, it is possible to take this course without having done so.

It’s a designed world.
Think about the objects that you love.  Your mobile phone with its delicious curves was designed on a computer screen.  The car you yearn for started life as a reduced size clay model.  A building that you admire sprang from the drawing board of an architect.  And it’s not a new phenomenon.  Our fascination with design goes back to flint arrow heads and earthenware ports.

As a designer you are at the crossroads of a number of skills.  Of course you need creativity in order to imagine the shape and function of the object, but you’ll also need to know about manufacturing processes, materials and marketing.

Bringing Ideas to Life.
Design is an enormously satisfying career.  You have an idea and, with the use of tools, it comes to life.  Imagine how satisfying it must be for the person who designed the iPhone or Razr to hold the finished product in their hand.

Your Key Learning Topics.
Your A Level studies cover four main topics and you study two of these each year.

In ‘Materials, Components and Application’ you’ll look at materials, production processes and the impact of cost and design.  In ‘Learning Through Designing and Making’ you’ll produce some coursework using your own design with a range of materials and media.

In the second year you’ll get to grips with ‘Design and Manufacture’ – helping you to appreciate the relationship between design and technology, or form and function.  ‘Design and Making in Practice’ is the practical coursework part.  You’ll make an object and record the processed that you went through.

Where will success take me?
Product Design could take you into a number of exciting career paths.  There is product or automotive design, or maybe CAD for industry appeals to you more.  This course could take you into architecture, teaching, manufacturing, advertising or mechanical/electrical engineering.

What Skills Will I Learn?
This course will help you develop a number of skills.

• How to assemble date and assess it
• How to investigate facts and use deduction
• How to put over your point of view fluently
• How to work as part of a team to achieve results
• How to take responsibility for your own learning

Will it fit in my life?
3D Design goes well with other subjects.  If you want a career in design you might also consider Art and Design, Business Studies or computing as companion A Levels.  For future engineers this course combines well with mathematics and science based subjects.