All About T-Score
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atutor2001:
For Chinese language, we need to compete with students from China who can get full mark (many Chinese teachers told me that some of their compo are so good that giving full mark is an injustice to the quality). Tamil/Hindi... is the toughest - based on feedback from my Indian friends and their explanation on the character, structure... Therefore, Malay language is the best because it uses alphabets just like English which make it easier to comprehend and remember.Flowermonaster:
[quote=\"atutor2001\"]If you want your kid to have a higher chance of coming in TOP (i.e. 1st in Sg) in PSLE, let him/her take Malay as MT. Tamil as MT will greatly reduce your chance.
How to? Especially when we, parents don't speak nor understand that language? I thought to do well in languages we need to speak, listen, write & read more?
As for T-score, the mean and SD, (for reasons best not discussed here), of Malay language is likely to be lowest among the 3 languages. So if one does exceptionally well, wow! your T-score will soar. So why wait, act now. (just joking - don't bombard me ok)[/quote]if the mean and SD is low, the t-score will be low, how the t-score will soar ? -
verykiasu2010:
Aiyoh, must read with focus.
if the mean and SD is low, the t-score will be low, how the t-score will soar ?atutor2001:
For Chinese language, we need to compete with students from China who can get full mark (many Chinese teachers told me that some of their compo are so good that giving full mark is an injustice to the quality). Tamil/Hindi... is the toughest - based on feedback from my Indian friends and their explanation on the character, structure... Therefore, Malay language is the best because it uses alphabets just like English which make it easier to comprehend and remember.
As for T-score, the mean and SD, (for reasons best not discussed here), of Malay language is likely to be lowest among the 3 languages. So if one does exceptionally well, wow! your T-score will soar. So why wait, act now. (just joking - don't bombard me ok)
T=50+10(X-Y)/Z
If Y and Z are low (national figure) and your X (individual figure) is exceptionally high, the answer is obvious. -
atutor2001:
Aiyoh, must read with focus.
if the mean and SD is low, the t-score will be low, how the t-score will soar ?verykiasu2010:
[quote=\"atutor2001\"]For Chinese language, we need to compete with students from China who can get full mark (many Chinese teachers told me that some of their compo are so good that giving full mark is an injustice to the quality). Tamil/Hindi... is the toughest - based on feedback from my Indian friends and their explanation on the character, structure... Therefore, Malay language is the best because it uses alphabets just like English which make it easier to comprehend and remember.
As for T-score, the mean and SD, (for reasons best not discussed here), of Malay language is likely to be lowest among the 3 languages. So if one does exceptionally well, wow! your T-score will soar. So why wait, act now. (just joking - don't bombard me ok)
T=50+10(X-Y)/Z
If Y and Z are low (national figure) and your X (individual figure) is exceptionally high, the answer is obvious.[/quote]yes, but if the paper is \"easy\" then the mean will be high (many others will do very well - the exceptionally well and very well could be only very few marks in between) and the SD will be small, non-native speaker/use of the language will be even harder-pressed to compete with native speaker, right ? -
verykiasu2010:
hehehe this part I don't want to discuss. I can only say that if we remove all China students from the equation, the mean of Chinese will drop. But the reason for local Chinese not doing well in their MT is not the same as that of the Malay students not doing well in their MT (anyone staying in Singapore long enough will know).
yes, but if the paper is \"easy\" then the mean will be high (many others will do very well - the exceptionally well and very well could be only very few marks in between) and the SD will be small, non-native speaker/use of the language will be even harder-pressed to compete with native speaker, right ? -
atutor2001:
hehehe this part I don't want to discuss. I can only say that if we remove all China students from the equation, the mean of Chinese will drop. But the reason for local Chinese not doing well in their MT is not the same as that of the Malay students not doing well in their MT (anyone staying in Singapore long enough will know).verykiasu2010:
yes, but if the paper is \"easy\" then the mean will be high (many others will do very well - the exceptionally well and very well could be only very few marks in between) and the SD will be small, non-native speaker/use of the language will be even harder-pressed to compete with native speaker, right ?
I don't think it will make a difference, even if we remove all the China students from the equation. Chinese being the majority here, the number of China students here probably makes up to only 3-4% of the ttl no of Chinese students sitting for psle.
As for Malay or Tamil students not doing well in their MT, are you aware that MOE has been putting in so much effort to simplify the Chinese MT in schools to cater for these students, but the standard of the Malay and Tamil remains the same? DS form teacher told me this last year: It is easier for the Chinese ppl to score in their MT as it is already made simpler for them as compared to the Malay n Tamil ppl. That is why they are using the t-score system, since the standard of the papers are not the same. -
junrahmat:
Yes the Chinese paper has been simplified for the local kids to cope (my youngest kid was in the first batch that benefited from it).
.... are you aware that MOE has been putting in so much effort to simplify the Chinese MT in schools to cater for these students, but the standard of the Malay and Tamil remains the same? ...
The problem that local kids are facing with the Chinese paper is because Chinese is no longer the true \"mother tongue\" at home. Many kids don't converse in Mandarin at home let alone read or write Chinese. In this sense, taking Chinese as MT to them is no different from taking Malay because Chinese characters, sentences are \"alien\" to them. Therefore, if they choose Malay as MT instead, they may find it easier to learn. For a start, the alphabets used are the same as English and the pronunciation will also have some similarity as English. Therefore, despite the Chinese paper having been simplified, the local kids may still find it easier to handle Malay than Chinese. That is why I am jokingly saying that if we are that desperate over the T-score, taking Malay may be a better option - not that Malay MT is a easier paper but more that the local Chinese kids today may find it easier to learn Malay than Chinese since they actually no longer have the so call \"mother tongue\" advantage in Chinese. -
that is why it is a national ranking exercise for the purpose of picking a secondary
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atutor2001:
ML sentence structure is oso different from the Inglish one, some more it is confusing between orang and orange :rotflmao: :rotflmao:
Yes the Chinese paper has been simplified for the local kids to cope (my youngest kid was in the first batch that benefited from it).junrahmat:
.... are you aware that MOE has been putting in so much effort to simplify the Chinese MT in schools to cater for these students, but the standard of the Malay and Tamil remains the same? ...
The problem that local kids are facing with the Chinese paper is because Chinese is no longer the true \"mother tongue\" at home. Many kids don't converse in Mandarin at home let alone read or write Chinese. In this sense, taking Chinese as MT to them is no different from taking Malay because Chinese characters, sentences are \"alien\" to them. Therefore, if they choose Malay as MT instead, they may find it easier to learn. For a start, the alphabets used are the same as English and the pronunciation will also have some similarity as English. Therefore, despite the Chinese paper having been simplified, the local kids may still find it easier to handle Malay than Chinese. That is why I am jokingly saying that if we are that desperate over the T-score, taking Malay may be a better option - not that Malay MT is a easier paper but more that kids today may find it easier to learn Malay than Chinese since they actually no longer has the so call \"mother tongue\" advantage in Chinese. -
atutor2001:
while, it might be true, that Malay might be easier to score than Chinese, in the longer term, Chinese could be the main language for business in the region. The reason LKY chose English as the main language for Singapore, was because of economic reasons. Now China, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Korea, Japan are the economic super powers in this region. In the long term, it would be advantageous to know chinese in order to leverage on the economic might of these countries. It is very likely, that when our children enters the workforce, they will be assigned overseas posting, most likely in a Mandarin speaking environment or at the very least, deal with Mandarin speaking clients. Don't lose the dialects, they'll come in handy in Taiwan and Hong Kong.
Yes the Chinese paper has been simplified for the local kids to cope (my youngest kid was in the first batch that benefited from it).junrahmat:
.... are you aware that MOE has been putting in so much effort to simplify the Chinese MT in schools to cater for these students, but the standard of the Malay and Tamil remains the same? ...
The problem that local kids are facing with the Chinese paper is because Chinese is no longer the true \"mother tongue\" at home. Many kids don't converse in Mandarin at home let alone read or write Chinese. In this sense, taking Chinese as MT to them is no different from taking Malay because Chinese characters, sentences are \"alien\" to them. Therefore, if they choose Malay as MT instead, they may find it easier to learn. For a start, the alphabets used are the same as English and the pronunciation will also have some similarity as English. Therefore, despite the Chinese paper having been simplified, the local kids may still find it easier to handle Malay than Chinese. That is why I am jokingly saying that if we are that desperate over the T-score, taking Malay may be a better option - not that Malay MT is a easier paper but more that the local Chinese kids today may find it easier to learn Malay than Chinese since they actually no longer have the so call \"mother tongue\" advantage in Chinese.
Working with MNCs, the \"ang moh\" will prefer to send someone well versed in Mandarin to take care of the branch offices in these mandarin speaking countries, or to create new markets there.
T scores are just short terms gains. Ultimately, we need to communicate effectively in both languages to gain a competitive edge in this asia pacific region. -
Technically speaking Malay is indeed easier to score than Chinese BUT Chinese in my opinion is easier to learn.
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