Raffles Girls' School (Secondary) [*IP]

[pirated]

Why do I always hear that the teachers don’t teach for this school and the students very westernized?


Parents / students please enlighten

[Overmars]

pirated:

Why do I always hear that the teachers don't teach for this school and the students very westernized?


Parents / students please enlighten

Oh my, which era are you living in? That sounds like a quote from time gone by.

I think we need to define what we mean by \"teachers teaching\". Does it mean spoonfeeding? Giving endless worksheets and remedial lessons? Giving answers for everything? If yes, then most teachers in the top schools don't teach.

\"Westernized...\": how do you do define that? Does speaking good English constitute that? Or saying one doesn't like Chinese language? Or they only listen to Western pop? But that's just a preference right? And do you think SAP school students are not \"westernised\"?

Sorry, don't mean to sound irritated but exactly where did you \"hear\" all this from?

[pirated]

Overmars:

pirated:

Why do I always hear that the teachers don't teach for this school and the students very westernized?


Parents / students please enlighten

Oh my, which era are you living in? That sounds like a quote from time gone by.

I think we need to define what we mean by \"teachers teaching\". Does it mean spoonfeeding? Giving endless worksheets and remedial lessons? Giving answers for everything? If yes, then most teachers in the top schools don't teach.

\"Westernized...\": how do you do define that? Does speaking good English constitute that? Or saying one doesn't like Chinese language? Or they only listen to Western pop? But that's just a preference right? And do you think SAP school students are not \"westernised\"?

Sorry, don't mean to sound irritated but exactly where did you \"hear\" all this from?

Children complain to parents, patents gossip, parents got to fork out tuition money .... and these kids all went in with T score 26x...wonder what happened in the system / school?

[Overmars]

pirated:

Overmars:

[quote=\"pirated\"]Why do I always hear that the teachers don't teach for this school and the students very westernized?


Parents / students please enlighten

Oh my, which era are you living in? That sounds like a quote from time gone by.

I think we need to define what we mean by \"teachers teaching\". Does it mean spoonfeeding? Giving endless worksheets and remedial lessons? Giving answers for everything? If yes, then most teachers in the top schools don't teach.

\"Westernized...\": how do you do define that? Does speaking good English constitute that? Or saying one doesn't like Chinese language? Or they only listen to Western pop? But that's just a preference right? And do you think SAP school students are not \"westernised\"?

Sorry, don't mean to sound irritated but exactly where did you \"hear\" all this from?

Children complain to parents, patents gossip, parents got to fork out tuition money .... and these kids all went in with T score 26x...wonder what happened in the system / school?[/quote]It is always easy and convenient to just blame the system and blame the school.

However, we have to remember that we are also part of the system.

[pirated]

One part of the system ask the other part of the system lor

[VALyap]

"westernized" is more of preference towards "pop culture" …don’t think the gals are! "KPOP" is more prevalence!


The truth is, all IP schools, it seems the students are trained to do self-learning rather than spoon-feeding! The learning concepts are thought instead so that the gals can do their self-learning.

Understands, from P6 to Sec 1, in RGS there will be lots of adjustments and culture shock! (small fish in big pond!)These are smart gals at least T-score 26x. they will find their ways after the initial culture shock 3-6months….

take it easy…. provide extra coaching only if needed, there are many do NOT need tuition, gals play hard and still do well…
just look at the Median score for all the exams if you know what I meant!

[sharonkhoo]

I have no idea what other students do in the school in terms of tuition as my daughter is the kind who doesn’t ask. However, yes, it’s true that there is little highly-guided (aka spoonfeeding) teaching. But the teachers do teach - it’s just that their teaching is more stimulation and pointing the way rather than making sure they cover the details very minutely. Students are expected to take the initiative to learn through self-study and thinking, and seek clarification if needed. Those who don’t will find it tough, or will probably seek tuition. It’s also much tougher to teach using this style of teaching than just telling the students what you want to them to learn and keeping them to it. Giving them freedom to think and ask means that you have to be ready to answer a wider range of questions and point them back to the facts if they have strayed.


Whether this is a desired way of teaching is up to the parent to decide, but I definitely like it for my daughter who is in this school. It would not suit my other daughter, so I have not even considered having her try for this school or any similar one.

As for being westernised, maybe. In RGS, since many students are non-Chinese, being ‘Asian’ could mean separating into a lot of cliques, so using English as the medium is the most inclusive. Everyone finds their own mixture of cultures and I find the mix very enriching. And my other daughter, in a much less high-achieving school, has the same experience in terms of the mix of cultures, so I’m not sure that it’s a feature of RGS specifically. The schools which are more different are probably the SAP schools which are much more ‘Chinese’.

[Choco05]

pirated:

Overmars:

[quote=\"pirated\"]Why do I always hear that the teachers don't teach for this school and the students very westernized?


Parents / students please enlighten

Oh my, which era are you living in? That sounds like a quote from time gone by.

I think we need to define what we mean by \"teachers teaching\". Does it mean spoonfeeding? Giving endless worksheets and remedial lessons? Giving answers for everything? If yes, then most teachers in the top schools don't teach.

\"Westernized...\": how do you do define that? Does speaking good English constitute that? Or saying one doesn't like Chinese language? Or they only listen to Western pop? But that's just a preference right? And do you think SAP school students are not \"westernised\"?

Sorry, don't mean to sound irritated but exactly where did you \"hear\" all this from?

Children complain to parents, patents gossip, parents got to fork out tuition money .... and these kids all went in with T score 26x...wonder what happened in the system / school?[/quote]I must not have posted in about 2 years, but look who is back! Time passes way too fast. Poof. Suddenly i have graduated.

You know, almost everybody in there has a T score of at least 260. A lot of times, how well one does is not dependent on how the teachers teach. If that is the case, there will never be bad students right? Then we will just get classes and classes of 4.0s because the teacher is good. I want that person as a teacher too, then.

I feel quite liberated now that i have graduated and i feel like i can finally say what i think. How come RGS girls are not allowed to get tuition? When the public finds out that most of us have tuition they go all shocked and shake their heads as if it's a crime. Okay, i agree that those with more than 4 tuitions are going a bit far, but those are very rare. Usually we just have people having tuition for the one subject they cannot do, like math, or chinese. Personally, i really don't see a reason as to why we cannot find help. Everyone has their weak areas, right? What's wrong with getting a little extra help to succeed?

If you talk about westernization, isn't the whole of Singapore Westernized? It doesn't mean if you go to a SAP school everyone converses in Chinese.

[Choco05]

MotherHen:

Is it still possible to change CCA in year 3?

of course.

[Overmars]

Children complain to parents, patents gossip, parents got to fork out tuition money … and these kids all went in with T score 26x…wonder what happened in the system / school?[/quote]

I must not have posted in about 2 years, but look who is back! Time passes way too fast. Poof. Suddenly i have graduated.

You know, almost everybody in there has a T score of at least 260. A lot of times, how well one does is not dependent on how the teachers teach. If that is the case, there will never be bad students right? Then we will just get classes and classes of 4.0s because the teacher is good. I want that person as a teacher too, then.

I feel quite liberated now that i have graduated and i feel like i can finally say what i think. How come RGS girls are not allowed to get tuition? When the public finds out that most of us have tuition they go all shocked and shake their heads as if it’s a crime. Okay, i agree that those with more than 4 tuitions are going a bit far, but those are very rare. Usually we just have people having tuition for the one subject they cannot do, like math, or chinese. Personally, i really don’t see a reason as to why we cannot find help. Everyone has their weak areas, right? What’s wrong with getting a little extra help to succeed?

If you talk about westernization, isn’t the whole of Singapore Westernized? It doesn’t mean if you go to a SAP school everyone converses in Chinese.[/quote]

Well said. Look at the article in Sunday times today. Clearly it’s become a case of the haves wanting more. Is it because teachers are not teaching? That’s just a convenient excuse.