How the AQA History GCSE Works

AQA GCSE History (8145) is examined by two written papers sat at the end of Year 11. There is no coursework and no controlled assessment, so every mark comes from those two exams. Sources and interpretations are printed in the exam booklets, not released in advance, so you meet the specific extracts for the first time on the day.

Paper	Focus	Time	Marks	Weighting
Paper 1	Understanding the modern world	1 hour 45 minutes	84	50%
Paper 2	Shaping the nation	1 hour 45 minutes	84	50%

The two papers are equally weighted: same length, same marks, same share of the grade. The GCSE is untiered, so every student sits the same papers and any grade from 1 to 9 is available. Across the whole qualification, British history makes up at least 40% of the assessment.

AQA History is an optioned specification. You do not study every topic; instead your school picks one option from each of four groups, one for each section of the two papers.

Paper	Section	Group you choose from	Common option
Paper 1	Section A	Period study	Germany 1890–1945
Paper 1	Section B	Wider world depth study	Conflict and Tension: WWI 1894–1918, or the Cold War 1945–1972
Paper 2	Section A	Thematic study	Britain: Health and the People c1000–present
Paper 2	Section B	British depth study + historic environment	Elizabethan England, or Norman England

Each of the four sections is worth roughly a quarter of the qualification. Check with your teacher exactly which four options you are entered for, because your revision only needs to cover those.

Every mark in History is awarded against one of four Assessment Objectives (AOs). Knowing which AO a question targets tells you what kind of answer it wants.

AO	What it rewards	Weighting
AO1	Knowledge and understanding of key features and characteristics	35%
AO2	Explaining and analysing using second-order concepts	35%
AO3	Analysing, evaluating and using sources to reach judgements	15%
AO4	Analysing, evaluating and judging interpretations	15%

AO1 and AO2 are the largest, at 35% each. They are almost always tested together: you cannot analyse the past (AO2) without accurate knowledge to build the analysis on (AO1).

The second-order concepts behind AO2 are the analytical tools of the historian: cause, consequence, change, continuity, significance, similarity and difference. Most essay questions are built around one of them.

Paper 1 has two sections. Section A tests your period study with six questions; Section B tests your wider world depth study with four.

Section	Q	Question type	AO(s)	Marks
A	1	How do interpretations differ?	AO4	4
A	2	Why do interpretations differ?	AO4	4
A	3	How convincing is the interpretation?	AO4	8
A	4	Describe two features	AO1	4
A	5	In what ways… explain	AO1 + AO2	8
A	6	Bullet-point essay (causation/change)	AO1 + AO2	12
B	1	Source analysis: how do you know?	AO3	4
B	2	How useful are two sources?	AO3	12
B	3	Write an account	AO1 + AO2	8
B	4	Essay: how far do you agree?	AO1 + AO2 + SPaG	16 + 4

Section A is worth 40 marks and Section B is worth 44 marks, giving the paper's total of 84. Spend about an hour on each section.

Paper 2 also has two sections. Section A tests your thematic study across roughly a thousand years; Section B tests your British depth study, including its historic environment site.

Section	Q	Question type	AO(s)	Marks
A	1	How useful is the source?	AO3	8
A	2	Explain the significance of…	AO1 + AO2	8
A	3	Explain two ways X and Y were similar/different	AO1 + AO2	8
A	4	Factors essay: how far do you agree?	AO1 + AO2 + SPaG	16 + 4
B	1	How far do you agree with this interpretation?	AO4	8
B	2	Explain what was important about…	AO1 + AO2	8
B	3	Write an account	AO1 + AO2	8
B	4	Historic-environment essay	AO1 + AO2	16

Section A is worth 44 marks and Section B is worth 40 marks, again totalling 84.

SPaG (spelling, punctuation and grammar) is worth 8 marks in total. Those marks sit on just two questions: the Paper 1 Section B 16-mark essay and the Paper 2 Section A 16-mark factors essay. The Paper 2 Section B historic-environment essay is 16 marks with no separate SPaG.

Your grade is built from the raw marks added across both papers. There are 168 raw marks available in total (84 + 84), plus the 8 SPaG marks that are already counted inside those two 16-mark essays.

Because History uses levels-based mark schemes, the examiner does not tick a fixed number of correct points. Instead they read your whole answer, decide which level best describes its quality, then choose a mark within that level. This is why a longer answer is not automatically a better one: reaching the top level depends on the quality of your reasoning, not the quantity of facts.

Grade boundaries are set by AQA after each exam series and vary year to year, so there is no fixed mark for a grade 7 or a grade 9. The practical takeaway is simple: learn what each question type is asking, match your answer to the level descriptors, and secure the marks the question actually targets.

1. Revising options you are not entered for

The spec is optioned. Confirm your four topics with your teacher and revise only those; wasting time on Russia or Migration when you sit Germany and Health helps no one.

2. Ignoring which AO a question targets

A source question (AO3) and an interpretation question (AO4) look similar but reward different skills. Read the command and the AO before you plan.

3. Treating every essay the same

The 12-mark, the 16-mark "how far" and the 16-mark historic-environment essays have different demands. The two 16-mark essays that carry SPaG also reward accurate technical writing.

4. Writing more instead of writing better

Levels-based marking rewards developed, relevant reasoning, not length. A tight, well-argued answer beats a long, unfocused one.

5. Forgetting the timings

Each paper is 1 hour 45 minutes for 84 marks. Spend about an hour per section and match your writing length to the marks on offer.