2013 PSLE Discussions and Strategy

[sharonkhoo]

Jennifer:

He is bright. But he is not meant for Sg present system.


Well, just gotta do whatever we can, at least for PSLE.

When my daughter got fed up with the 'Singapore way' of doing things, I would try to show her the big picture. Basically, I convinced her that even if she didn't like it, for the sake of getting into her choice of school, she needed to just do it the way that the markers wanted. I told her that she could throw the 'silly' ways out once she had done with the exams, and just retain the content. (Actually, not all the requirements are that silly, but I feel they should give more leeway in Pr school, but that's another discussion). She is bright too, so I told her that she should use her intelligence to learn the methods required and 'just do it' since we couldn't change the system (at least not within her time frame). Maybe you can try that argument with your son?

[Jennifer]

slmkhoo:

Jennifer:

He is bright. But he is not meant for Sg present system.


Well, just gotta do whatever we can, at least for PSLE.

When my daughter got fed up with the 'Singapore way' of doing things, I would try to show her the big picture. Basically, I convinced her that even if she didn't like it, for the sake of getting into her choice of school, she needed to just do it the way that the markers wanted. I told her that she could throw the 'silly' ways out once she had done with the exams, and just retain the content. (Actually, not all the requirements are that silly, but I feel they should give more leeway in Pr school, but that's another discussion). She is bright too, so I told her that she should use her intelligence to learn the methods required and 'just do it' since we couldn't change the system (at least not within her time frame). Maybe you can try that argument with your son?

Done so many many times. Hard nut to crack

[ammonite]

Jennifer:

slmkhoo:

[quote=\"Jennifer\"]He is bright. But he is not meant for Sg present system.


Well, just gotta do whatever we can, at least for PSLE.

When my daughter got fed up with the 'Singapore way' of doing things, I would try to show her the big picture. Basically, I convinced her that even if she didn't like it, for the sake of getting into her choice of school, she needed to just do it the way that the markers wanted. I told her that she could throw the 'silly' ways out once she had done with the exams, and just retain the content. (Actually, not all the requirements are that silly, but I feel they should give more leeway in Pr school, but that's another discussion). She is bright too, so I told her that she should use her intelligence to learn the methods required and 'just do it' since we couldn't change the system (at least not within her time frame). Maybe you can try that argument with your son?

Done so many many times. Hard nut to crack [/quote]Jennifer,
From your earlier posts, it seems that your son has the knowledge, it is only answering techniques. It also seems that he does have an idea of what is required, but does not wish to follow. (apologies if this is wrong!)

My ds was also annoyed with \"answering techniques\". He feels that the marking scheme is taking him for an idiot (ie some things are so obvious, must I state it?!)

The two things that convinced him to follow - 1) imagine he is explaining to an alien who does not know anything about Earth. This is because scientific enquiry and precision is required for new unknown things and that is what they are being trained to do. 2) if he really thinks it is so silly, just take it that the markers are moronic and he needs to explain clearly to them so they can understand that he understands.

I also told him that some of the markers are not science teachers, so they will just follow the marking scheme. He has seen my relatives marking mountains of paper and kinda get that the marking scheme helps them to get through the pile.

So it is with a lot of eye rolling but he did follow after that. Mine is younger though, so perhaps still mallaeble.

[Jennifer]

ammonite:

Jennifer:

[quote=\"slmkhoo\"]
When my daughter got fed up with the 'Singapore way' of doing things, I would try to show her the big picture. Basically, I convinced her that even if she didn't like it, for the sake of getting into her choice of school, she needed to just do it the way that the markers wanted. I told her that she could throw the 'silly' ways out once she had done with the exams, and just retain the content. (Actually, not all the requirements are that silly, but I feel they should give more leeway in Pr school, but that's another discussion). She is bright too, so I told her that she should use her intelligence to learn the methods required and 'just do it' since we couldn't change the system (at least not within her time frame). Maybe you can try that argument with your son?

Done so many many times. Hard nut to crack

Jennifer,
From your earlier posts, it seems that your son has the knowledge, it is only answering techniques. It also seems that he does have an idea of what is required, but does not wish to follow. (apologies if this is wrong!)

My ds was also annoyed with \"answering techniques\". He feels that the marking scheme is taking him for an idiot (ie some things are so obvious, must I state it?!)

The two things that convinced him to follow - 1) imagine he is explaining to an alien who does not know anything about Earth. This is because scientific enquiry and precision is required for new unknown things and that is what they are being trained to do. 2) if he really thinks it is so silly, just take it that the markers are moronic and he needs to explain clearly to them so they can understand that he understands.

I also told him that some of the markers are not science teachers, so they will just follow the marking scheme. He has seen my relatives marking mountains of paper and kinda get that the marking scheme helps them to get through the pile.

So it is with a lot of eye rolling but he did follow after that. Mine is younger though, so perhaps still mallaeble.[/quote] :thankyou: :thankyou:

I take comfort to know that I am not alone. Will let ah boy read your post when he comes home. Sometimes, children listen to other adults more than they listen to their parents

[ahxuan.031873ymail.031873com]

slmkhoo:

My daughter was preparing for PSLE 2011, so I don't know if things have changed. I used to download from those websites with free papers - MissKoh? or something like that. There were others too, I think.

Hi slmkhoo,
Thanks for the info.

[elkniwt]

nz:

TheAnswer:

RGPS breaks down its marking scheme to show mark allocations. I would think it serves as a good guideline. Shows what's acceptable and what's not.


For the guide book, it's good for extra reading

Hi,
Where can I find the RGPS paper with marking scheme? I had downloaded RGPS papers before but can't seem to find the marking scheme. Thanks.

Hi nz,

You can try this link for Science papers :
http://www.orlesson.org/orp/ScienceExam.html

[ahxuan.031873ymail.031873com]

elkniwt:

nz:

[quote=\"TheAnswer\"]RGPS breaks down its marking scheme to show mark allocations. I would think it serves as a good guideline. Shows what's acceptable and what's not.


For the guide book, it's good for extra reading

Hi,
Where can I find the RGPS paper with marking scheme? I had downloaded RGPS papers before but can't seem to find the marking scheme. Thanks.

Hi nz,

You can try this link for Science papers :
http://www.orlesson.org/orp/ScienceExam.html[/quote]
Hi elkniwt,
Thanks so much!

[kiasuparentsirock]

TravelMummy:

Can anyone recommend some really good sample English compo to read? DS is still not scoring well. Apart from a few decent phrase books from Popular, i can't seem to find any really good sample compos. Any particular titles to recommend? Thanks.

So far in popular I have yet to see any good sample compositions :sad: . However, you can request to see a composition that has been scored 40/40.Click the link below.
http://www.kiasuparents.com/kiasu/forum/viewtopic.php?f=69&t=60613&start=10

[Jennifer]

growupmom:

Jennifer:

My worst fear materialised.


Prelim Sci results r made known today.

Section A 54/60 whereas section B 25/40

Paper was not returned today.

Eversince the tutor cant come anymore due to pregnancy complication and replaced by another tutor, I hv the feeling that this tutor (who is one of the owners of the centre) is not reaching out to ah boy.

Now I hv another subj to deal with at home :faint:

Jennifer,

I also realised my DS has issues with MCQ. The key to A* in science is the Section A actually. Also a heavily penalised section, as the wrong answer is straight away 2 marks gone.

I have been doing only Section A with my boy, but getting beyond 56 is tough for him. Usually the type of qtns he gets wrong are those with answers like - A and B, B only, etc. Some of the options are so close, he makes mistakes . I must confess some are too close to decipher for me too :gloomy: . The other type of qtns are those with graphs - I have gotten him to make sure he writes some notes beside the graphs to understand what is going on.

Try and analyse what mistakes ur boy has made and zoom into them. Cheer up :hugs: - maybe it is just a one off badly done paper, how did his classmates do??

Sorry, I missed your post.

:thankyou: for your sharing.

We have not seen the paper yet. But ah boy confirmed this round, the qns were all sensible ones, unlike what we got last year P5 SA2.

[Jennifer]

Ah boy came back with good news about his OE CL compreh A组 - he finally got a very good score 14.5/15, half mark deducted for 错别字.


He also passed his B组, though not high 12.5/19 but he passed.

This time round, he followed my instructions to lift the key word/phrase from the passage n put into his answers.

And also check his written answers for 错别字 and missing 名词, making sure the sentence is 通顺

Phew.