Mid-year exams to be scrapped in all primary, secondary schools by 2023
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P1 and P2 : no exam, fine ! They starting out into primary school from kindergarten, go slow is ok.
By all means, remove (P3 and P4) mid year exam, also ok . After all, P3 and P4 are still quite some time away from Psle.
But, ought to retain P5 mid year exam. Should not remove this because
P5 is the key, important crucial preparatory Psle year. P6 lesser, because P6 is short, only 6 months. After that, Psle Oral begin and all the mock Practice papers come in one by one, by subject. So, P6 effective is a very short year. The key, preparation is all done in P5.
So, if do away with P5 mid year exam, what happen now?
Put all the eggs into one basket. If dont do well in P5 final year end SA2, in any of the 4 core subjects, create even further stress, anxiety and panic for P5 (parents and students), since the runway into P6 has been shortened!
For P5, should have
- Term 1 test, because the jump from P4 to P5, is very big. Students need time to adjust, to adapt to this Transition stage, from P4 into P5.
- mid year exam ought to remain and
- year end exam.
If don’t want P5 Term 1 test, also fine. But for P5, minimum must retain this P5 mid-year exam. Otherwise, end up : even more stressed, than before the change. Of course, many P5 students will cheer, clap hands and shout "hip, hip, hurray". After all, nobody like tests. In their mind, "exam equal to stress, so boring !" You ask them to go out and play, oh! they love to hear the word "play". Play equal to Fun ! -
sevenseals\" post_id=\"2060854\" time=\"1646708755\" user_id=\"124401:
No impact on tuition centre, bec they will still collect tuition $, as per normal, whether got mid year exam or No exam (scrapped). Tuition centre more concerned about collecting $ fees, be it charged by month or by Term basis
Good for the students and parents, less stress. But not sure if it is good for the tuition centres.
https://www.todayonline.com/singapore/mid-year-exams-be-scrapped-all-primary-secondary-schools-2023-1838311 -
Personally , I can’t see any benefit from scraping the mid year exams . This will break their momentum of preparing for exams and would be hard to pick up on towards the year end exams. Children these days are mostly into computer gaming and this would give them an excuse to play more since they are no exams , I’m speaking more of my 3 children in primary and secondary schools currently.
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Besides the points mentioned by various posters, there’s also the issue of time management (during exam) and getting used to seating for exams for a consecutive number of days.
For example, even with the existing arrangement, many Sec 3 students find it a challenge to complete the HCL Paper 2 during Year End exam because throughout the year, they are only tested on certain components in WAs.
The lack of experience in handling certain components can also be a challenge - such as oral examination. During normal school days, it’s already difficult to give everyone the opportunity to speak up - as in answer multiple questions like how they do in the communication part of the exam (unless there are arrangements for teachers to test/practice with individual students). -
phtthp\" post_id=\"2060859\" time=\"1646710063\" user_id=\"35251:
I'm sure the tuition centres will start promoting their in-house mid-year exams - that will be an attraction!
No impact on tuition centre, bec they will still collect tuotion $, whether got mid year exam or No exam.
Personally, I think the problem with mid-year exams is that parents get too worked up about them. I was in school in the 70s-80s, and mid-year exams didn't cause such great angst. We studied a bit, worried a bit, groaned or grinned when we saw the results, and life just moved on. I think they are good practice, and since schools are going to give timed practice papers instead of mid-year exams, I really don't see much difference. -
chenlaoshi\" post_id=\"2060871\" time=\"1646715408\" user_id=\"162894:
Chenlaoshi, timely to see this.. yes my child was not able to finish the recent full P2 WA in school.. not sure if can pass or not. Is it not unusual To fail the P2 at EOY?
For example, even with the existing arrangement, many Sec 3 students find it a challenge to complete the HCL Paper 2 during Year End exam because throughout the year, they are only tested on certain components in WAs. -
I’m sure there will be small local tests that teachers will do for their topics, to assess how well the students absorbed the material. Hopefully, that would allow some form of continuous assessment to go on. But now it’s going to be done on the individual teachers’ level, so teachers become very important.
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Kiasuparents web traffic may be effected. Parents will peruse the pages once a year instead of 2 or 3 times.
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newbieks\" post_id=\"2060894\" time=\"1646726573\" user_id=\"178749:
newbieks,
Chenlaoshi, timely to see this.. yes my child was not able to finish the recent full P2 WA in school.. not sure if can pass or not. Is it not unusual To fail the P2 at EOY?
Since it's just the beginning of the year + I believe your child didn't sit for a written paper that was as long as this one last year (Pri 1), it is understandable why he/she couldn't finish the paper.
However, it is advisable to try and analyze/find out the reasons (such as unfamiliar due to lack of practice; lack of confidence/nervousness; difficulty level of the paper; time management - spent too much time on certain sections).
From my observations, unless the child's foundation in the language is weak, he/she is unlikely to fail at EOY exam (by then, he/she should have been used to the tested components and even in the event that a few questions were incomplete, those lost marks shouldn't result in failure).
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