What is different from the N level and O level Food and Nutrition Syllabus?

 I feel that N levels is a stepping stone of O levels. An apparent answer to this question would be the difficulty level of the subject being the main difference. Students get to experience the bulk of the subject at N levels. However as they say the devil is in the detail, certain details in selective topic areas are excluded at N levels. More complex principles are covered at O levels and students are expected to be of higher academic capabilities to not only understand these principles but to also to also apply them.

For example, at N levels, students are only expected to only familiarize themselves with the principles of food science. At O levels, this is no longer the case. Candidates are required to display a clear understanding of the principles of food science. In accordance to this aim, topics covered in theory at N levels, do not include topics such as digestion, and the science of food processing. This leads to a difference in the format of their written paper as well. The allocation of marks between the three sections are differently distributed. There is a significant increase in the weightage of marks in open ended questions for O levels as compared to N level. This is because, open ended questions requires more critical thinking and students will be assessed on how they merge their comprehension of theory and demonstrate application.  This thus gives away the differences in duration of both papers where students in O level will require more time with their exam scripts due to the requirement of higher order thinking.

In coursework, investigation and information gathering in research and development coursework is not included in N levels as students have not been equipped with the knowledge or the principles that need to be applied unlike the O level students. Hence at N levels, in place of the investigation and information synthesis, emphasis is put on them making informed decisions, having good time management skills and exposure of different food preparation techniques in varied situations and cooking methods. They are not required to draw conclusions from experiments, however, they are expected to justify the decisions they make in coursework. Despite all these differences, as mentioned in the beginning, the essence of the subject is still both same in both N and O levels. In my opinion, N levels is a good preparation that students undergo to perform better at O levels at a proper pace.