2013 PSLE Discussions and Strategy

[ngl2010]

I am just wondering... Is today full day for your DC? Usually Children's Day celebration is half day, right? :?

[Wishace]

ngl2010:

I am just wondering... Is today full day for your DC? Usually Children's Day celebration is half day, right? :?

Nope DS school is full day today. Anyway it is his last Children Day so I felt that it is ok that he spent more time in school with his classmates / friends.

[Shan]

DS's school also full day. I prefer that as well cos otherwise he will be playing computer games non-stop.

[lim72]

I think its wonderful to celebrate Children’s day after PSLE instead of during the exam.

[ngl2010]

Thank you. My memory must have failed me. I thought all celebration day (Teacher's Day, Children's Day, etc) is half day :oops:

[Suz855]

ngl2010:

Thank you. My memory must have failed me. I thought all celebration day (Teacher's Day, Children's Day, etc) is half day :oops:

The new system, teachers' day n children Day celebration both will always be Thursday, Friday is officially declare as school holiday, r n r for both teachers n children.

Instead of 1 day break(1/2 n 1/2) they get 2 days off and another 1 day of celebration

[sharonkhoo]

Jennifer:

Reading EL storybooks helps in scoring in CONTENT but might not help in scoring for LANGUAGE, except being exposed to more vocabulary.


Up to now, ah boy has not mastered the usage of conjunctions in his writing. Style is monotonous = uninteresting. Worse if the structure is mainly dialogue style. Not enough is focused on the feelings, actions, settings.

Older authors are better in descriptions of surroundings, feelings, actions. But I think this young generation will find such boring - not action packed.

So, must select books very carefully.

I have noticed (reading the fiction my kids' read) that modern writing for younger readers seems to be high on dialogue and low on narration. That may be OK when there is no word and time limit, but under exam conditions, I find that the story will be very 'thin'. I finally made it a rule for my daughter that she could not use more than a few lines of dialogue at a time, and that there had to be narrative passages in between to give background, description etc.

For vocab and language use, if the family is mainly English-speaking, you can try throwing lots of different words into everyday speech. In my family, we play a lot with different ways of saying things, synonyms, idioms etc, so my kids usually find that they have already encountered most things they read in class. Have an easy-to-lookup dictionary handy, or be prepared to be a walking/talking dictionary for your kids - it really does help. The downside is that my kids' Chinese is poor, but since mine is too, my speaking more Chinese won't help them.

[ngl2010]

Suz855:

ngl2010:

Thank you. My memory must have failed me. I thought all celebration day (Teacher's Day, Children's Day, etc) is half day :oops:

The new system, teachers' day n children Day celebration both will always be Thursday, Friday is officially declare as school holiday, r n r for both teachers n children.

Instead of 1 day break(1/2 n 1/2) they get 2 days off and another 1 day of celebration

Thank you. I didn't it has been changed. Do you know when they changed it? I'm just curious because the last Teacher's Day celebration was still half day although the day after that was a holiday for the children.

[ngl2010]

slmkhoo:

Jennifer:

Reading EL storybooks helps in scoring in CONTENT but might not help in scoring for LANGUAGE, except being exposed to more vocabulary.


Up to now, ah boy has not mastered the usage of conjunctions in his writing. Style is monotonous = uninteresting. Worse if the structure is mainly dialogue style. Not enough is focused on the feelings, actions, settings.

Older authors are better in descriptions of surroundings, feelings, actions. But I think this young generation will find such boring - not action packed.

So, must select books very carefully.

I have noticed (reading the fiction my kids' read) that modern writing for younger readers seems to be high on dialogue and low on narration. That may be OK when there is no word and time limit, but under exam conditions, I find that the story will be very 'thin'. I finally made it a rule for my daughter that she could not use more than a few lines of dialogue at a time, and that there had to be narrative passages in between to give background, description etc.

For vocab and language use, if the family is mainly English-speaking, you can try throwing lots of different words into everyday speech. In my family, we play a lot with different ways of saying things, synonyms, idioms etc, so my kids usually find that they have already encountered most things they read in class. Have an easy-to-lookup dictionary handy, or be prepared to be a walking/talking dictionary for your kids - it really does help. The downside is that my kids' Chinese is poor, but since mine is too, my speaking more Chinese won't help them.

Agree for English language. For Chinese picture compo, must put in dialogues to make the pictures alive. Of course must put in a lot of good phrases including cheng yu and su yu.

[Triple Js]

my DDs only had tuition for both Maths & Sci. as for both languages, they pick up thru reading. DD1 makes use of phrases from her reading for her compo... but not DD2... :faint:

one read with interest :boogie: , while theo ther one just read blindly.. :slapshead:
so DD1's tasks now is to impart her writing skills for DD2 to inherit. i'll have to wait after DD2 got her SA2 results to see how much she has inheritted from DD1. :evil: