All About SAP Schools

[Brenda10]

janet_lee88:

My son has been taking Higher Chinese since P1 (compulsory). Children are intelligent and they will learn to handle. However, I will ask him to drop HCL next year...from what I heard, normal Chinese is not easy either with the new textbook. Anyway, will see how it goes after his SA2 exams.

Dear Janet

One of the stress parts is 作文.

Heard from the CL teacher for those who takes HCL, the expectation is 2.5 pages and CL would be 2 pages. All have to complete by 50 minutes and so more weighting 40 marks.

[janet88]

The weightage for 作文 has dropped starting from this year’s SA2.

Oral marks has increased…my worry for son. Anyway, I don’t want him to continue with HCL next year as the subjects are tougher…why spend so much more time on one subject when the other 3 are equally tough.

[Brenda10]

May be there is changes on the weighting of 作文, my nephew (P6) and dd (P5) are still under the old system.

[sook]

phankao:

Why can't a child survive?

I have 2 elder children in 2 different SAP schools who did not take HCL. No problem there. My daughter just finished her O-level CL. She's still not taking HCL. Ds1 is taking HCL now in sec 1. Not his favourite subject though. He's still weak in it.

Hhmm, i am concerned that those \"drop-out\" from HCL will be 2nd class citizen. I called Poi Ching before to check whether HCL is compulsory from P1. The person answered in very incredulous tone \"Must take HCL, if not , no point coming to Poi Ching'

[verykiasu2010]

sook:

phankao:

Why can't a child survive?

I have 2 elder children in 2 different SAP schools who did not take HCL. No problem there. My daughter just finished her O-level CL. She's still not taking HCL. Ds1 is taking HCL now in sec 1. Not his favourite subject though. He's still weak in it.

Hhmm, i am concerned that those \"drop-out\" from HCL will be 2nd class citizen. I called Poi Ching before to check whether HCL is compulsory from P1. The person answered in very incredulous tone \"Must take HCL, if not , no point coming to Poi Ching'

actually there is no difference between CL and HCL up to pri 3 level

[php]

sook:

phankao:

Why can't a child survive?

I have 2 elder children in 2 different SAP schools who did not take HCL. No problem there. My daughter just finished her O-level CL. She's still not taking HCL. Ds1 is taking HCL now in sec 1. Not his favourite subject though. He's still weak in it.

Hhmm, i am concerned that those \"drop-out\" from HCL will be 2nd class citizen. I called Poi Ching before to check whether HCL is compulsory from P1. The person answered in very incredulous tone \"Must take HCL, if not , no point coming to Poi Ching'

SAP is about taking both English & Chinese as first language. It happens that all SAP schools are among the \"hot\" schools in their respective area. However, if one feels that his/her kid might have difficulty in HCL, it will be wise decision to send his/her kid to a non-SAP schools. There are many good non-SAP schools around, like CHIJ TP, MGS, RGPS, SCGS, SJI, ACS, just to name a few. Ultimately, parents know their kids better and they should make a wise decision where to send their kids to so that the kid will enjoying going to school. I have seen a few parents, finding ways and means to get their kids into SAP schools, and at the end of the day, their kids struggled in their studies, not only they couldn't cope with HCL, but basically all the other subjects. Really pitiful.....

[MMM]

verykiasu2010:

actually there is no difference between CL and HCL up to pri 3 level

Is that true??? I heard the difference is not significant from textbook perspective.

But I think there are still some difference. Eg. SAP school might pegged the question difficulty to different levels. Eg. in my kids' school, bi soon is tested during exams. it's not the total number of bi hua but rather for a particular stroke, which no. should that be. This I feel is alot more challenging. My kid did a neighbourhood school CL paper and she is able to score 90+ but when it comes to SAP school CL paper, this is more obviously challenging for her.

Also within SAP school, the level of CL they are exposed to is different with the class banding. Eg. for those weak in CL, there are less words to learn during tingxie. Meanwhile for those in stronger classes, the words are more, difficult as well as they need to memorise, etc.... so the CL exposure is different.

[php]

MMM:

verykiasu2010:

actually there is no difference between CL and HCL up to pri 3 level

Is that true??? I heard the difference is not significant from textbook perspective.

But I think there are still some difference. Eg. SAP school might pegged the question difficulty to different levels. Eg. in my kids' school, bi soon is tested during exams. it's not the total number of bi hua but rather for a particular stroke, which no. should that be. This I feel is alot more challenging. My kid did a neighbourhood school CL paper and she is able to score 90+ but when it comes to SAP school CL paper, this is more obviously challenging for her.

Also within SAP school, the level of CL they are exposed to is different with the class banding. Eg. for those weak in CL, there are less words to learn during tingxie. Meanwhile for those in stronger classes, the words are more, difficult as well as they need to memorise, etc.... so the CL exposure is different.

For P1-P3, the gap is not so wide but definitely there is differences. For HCL, they are exposed to more difficult words besides those MOE's requirement. They are also expected to write more complex sentences. I believe the gap will be wider in upper primary. My dd has not reached there yet, so not very sure about that.

[Brenda10]

MMM:

Also within SAP school, the level of CL they are exposed to is different with the class banding. Eg. for those weak in CL, there are less words to learn during tingxie. Meanwhile for those in stronger classes, the words are more, difficult as well as they need to memorise, etc.... so the CL exposure is different.

For non-SAP school, I think they are also grouping the children based on their CL result.

[MMM]

Brenda10:

For non-SAP school, I think they are also grouping the children based on their CL result.

I heard in non-SAP school, the focus of the parents is hope that their kids can have good CL score so they can do HCL. I see that for my nephew in Rosyth.