2016 PSLE Discussions (Born in 2004)

[randwick]

janet88:

starlight1968sg:

janet, may want to explore shortening slightly the timing of the paper once your dd gets the hang of it.

eg if the paper is 2hr, perhaps at home can aim to complete it at 1hr 45min.

starlight,
she has extra time for her written papers. it's 15 minutes for math (I think). paper 1 is 50 minutes for most of the students. if i time her, i only give additional 5 minutes...so she has max 2 minutes for each question.
but for word problems, the extra time does come in handy.

So Janet, does the extra time help your DD? Do you find a difference/better performance in her score at home (with 5 min extra) vs her score in actual exam (with 15 min extra)?

Many kids can score better at home than at school even when the given time is the same, and some better under pressure in school. My DD belongs to the first group - score better at home. Sigh

[janet88]

randwick:

So Janet, does the extra time help your DD? Do you find a difference/better performance in her score at home (with 5 min extra) vs her score in actual exam (with 15 min extra)?

Many kids can score better at home than at school even when the given time is the same, and some better under pressure in school. My DD belongs to the first group - score better at home. Sigh

my daughter does better at home...it's frustrating when she can get 56 out of 60 for science mcq at home but not in school.

the extra time is useful for math word problems and comprehension open ended.

[ilovelaksa]

I am wondering, what is the number of pages your child writes for Chinese compo and English compo?

My dd’s Chinese teacher told her class that they MUST write at least 4 pages. She is in a Higher Chinese class.
Dd got 27/40 for a 2.5 pg compo once. Reason was she did not meet the requisite min of 4 pages but subsequently gets btw 36-38 if she writes 4 pages or more. There are ppl in her class who writes 6-8 pages regularly! I think 4 pages is too much under exam conditions. She is also confused as her Chinese exam essays gets 36-37 even though she writes only 2.5 pages.
It is the same for her Eng teacher. High marks are only given for those who writes in excess of 5-6 A4 pages. And yes, there are those that writes 7 pages or more. I can’t understand how this helps to train the kids for exams.

[hquek]

ilovelaksa:

I am wondering, what is the number of pages your child writes for Chinese compo and English compo?

My dd's Chinese teacher told her class that they MUST write at least 4 pages. She is in a Higher Chinese class.
Dd got 27/40 for a 2.5 pg compo once. Reason was she did not meet the requisite min of 4 pages but subsequently gets btw 36-38 if she writes 4 pages or more. There are ppl in her class who writes 6-8 pages regularly! I think 4 pages is too much under exam conditions. She is also confused as her Chinese exam essays gets 36-37 even though she writes only 2.5 pages.
It is the same for her Eng teacher. High marks are only given for those who writes in excess of 5-6 A4 pages. And yes, there are those that writes 7 pages or more. I can't understand how this helps to train the kids for exams.

BUT....the more they write, the more wrong they can be. I don't know exactly how much but I think for HMT, maybe about 3? (DS1 Chinese not that good, asking him to write more is just to open up more weakness to scrutiny). His English is better and he probably can do 5-6 pages.

I just know for sure that kids MUST not veer off course, else how many pages also won't rescue. Then plus big handwriting? I had a classmate in sec school who dashed 3 words per line (I couldn't read) and she can do many many pages...but if one were to condense it, I think it's probably usual length.

To me, it's not the number of pages but rather whether the compo sticks to the topic, good phrases used to show language mastery, no spelling/grammar mistakes, story flow that makes a good compo. I don't think the examiner want to read 7 pages of tedious and repetitive :imdrowning:

[jedamum]

Imo, for p6, normal Chinese compo and Eng compo, I told my boy to stick to 3~3.25 pages. Any more he would run out of time to write a proper conclusion. Any lesser, his story would not have sufficient plot. My p4 kid writes about 2 pages for Chinese compo and 5~6 for Eng. I told him to up the Chinese to 2.5 pages and cut the Eng to 4pages as both resulted in rushed endings ~ he needs to include more details to conclude Chinese compo and allocate more time for Eng compo conclusion instead of rushing because too many twists in the plot. A well written plot with a bad ending will not get a good grade.

[janet88]

for compo, i told my daughter to stick to 3 pages or else there will not be a conclusive story, besides too short a compo cannot pass.

[Sun_2010]

hquek:

ilovelaksa:

I am wondering, what is the number of pages your child writes for Chinese compo and English compo?

My dd's Chinese teacher told her class that they MUST write at least 4 pages. She is in a Higher Chinese class.
Dd got 27/40 for a 2.5 pg compo once. Reason was she did not meet the requisite min of 4 pages but subsequently gets btw 36-38 if she writes 4 pages or more. There are ppl in her class who writes 6-8 pages regularly! I think 4 pages is too much under exam conditions. She is also confused as her Chinese exam essays gets 36-37 even though she writes only 2.5 pages.
It is the same for her Eng teacher. High marks are only given for those who writes in excess of 5-6 A4 pages. And yes, there are those that writes 7 pages or more. I can't understand how this helps to train the kids for exams.

BUT....the more they write, the more wrong they can be. I don't know exactly how much but I think for HMT, maybe about 3? (DS1 Chinese not that good, asking him to write more is just to open up more weakness to scrutiny). His English is better and he probably can do 5-6 pages.

I just know for sure that kids MUST not veer off course, else how many pages also won't rescue. Then plus big handwriting? I had a classmate in sec school who dashed 3 words per line (I couldn't read) and she can do many many pages...but if one were to condense it, I think it's probably usual length.

To me, it's not the number of pages but rather whether the compo sticks to the topic, good phrases used to show language mastery, no spelling/grammar mistakes, story flow that makes a good compo. I don't think the examiner want to read 7 pages of tedious and repetitive :imdrowning:

Totally agree.
Meandering plot, disconnected info, repetitive description, elaborate but not very relevant intro /setting can take up pages but I don't think the teachers want that.

My advice for DS is about 350 -500 words for eng compo which could be 3-4 pages given DS's writing style he has about 120 words per page.

[ilovelaksa]

janet88:

for compo, i told my daughter to stick to 3 pages or else there will not be a conclusive story, besides too short a compo cannot pass.

Do you mean the teacher fails the essay if it is less than 3 pages?

[hquek]

ilovelaksa:

janet88:

for compo, i told my daughter to stick to 3 pages or else there will not be a conclusive story, besides too short a compo cannot pass.

Do you mean the teacher fails the essay if it is less than 3 pages?

I rather think that if a compo is too short, a bit hard to be a good story. But so true like what jedamum said, kids must allocate enough time for a good ending...else a lot of effort wasted. Not too sure how long they have to write a compo but my impression is that time is in very short supply.

So planning have to be super fast and spot on - cannot spend time to think about embroidering dragons and phoenixes and end up with no time to execute....

[StillThinking]

hquek:

ilovelaksa:

[quote=\"janet88\"]for compo, i told my daughter to stick to 3 pages or else there will not be a conclusive story, besides too short a compo cannot pass.

Do you mean the teacher fails the essay if it is less than 3 pages?

I rather think that if a compo is too short, a bit hard to be a good story. But so true like what jedamum said, kids must allocate enough time for a good ending...else a lot of effort wasted. Not too sure how long they have to write a compo but my impression is that time is in very short supply.

So planning have to be super fast and spot on - cannot spend time to think about embroidering dragons and phoenixes and end up with no time to execute....[/quote]Well, it doesn't need to be a good story, it only needs to make sense and be relevant. The way to score high is really having no mistakes.