Parents, not enrichment centres, are key to result
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ksi:
I am also against this 'terrorism' approach at P5 but is this out of some kind of desperate measures? I don't know but it is something MOE should investigate. Such an approach takes the joy out of learning. Even if a child eventually mugged to get good PSLE results, I believe the damage caused by such an exam takes a long time to heal for the joy of learning and what if a child does not recover from it?
We are all part of this complex educational system but there are a few levers that are being used more heavily than others. For example, you'll find that most if not all educators will expound on the importance of creating the result called \"joy of learning\" or \"holistic development of children\" and what lever can we use to create this result? Creative teaching methodologies, engaging child-teacher relationships, focus on the intangible variables such as Level of Children's Interest in the Classroom, Child's level of Attentiveness, Level of Motivation to learn more, etc. But do we truly truly track these variables? Are we really interested to grow these variables? Do we believe these variables will translate into more tangible results like high exam grades? I suspect the answer is \"no\" because many of our behaviours (teachers, parents, policy-makers) show that we \"prefer\" to grow the performance-related variables such as Number of Passes, Number of High Quality Passes, Number of Excellent Scores, Number of qualifiers to higher education, Number of qualifiers to ivy-league education. As long as we track such variables with more gusto than variables like level of children's eyes lighting up during a lesson, our focus of attention is towards making more difficult assessments and creating more strategies towards excelling in those assessments.
So how do we as individual family members with our own child deal with living in a system that focuses on performance-based variables than joy of learning variables? I really have to confront what I can change and what I cannot. I have to ask myself \"What kind of education experience do I want my child to have? In a system where performance assessment is emphasized with clear criteria what is excellent, what is normal and what what is sub-standards so clearly laid out, I have to confront and ask myself - do I want to subscribe to those standards? Can I redefine those performance criteria so that my child can still work towards achievement but with self-confidence and self-esteem intact? What is really good enough for my child to strive towards while maintaining his needs to enjoy other aspects of life, and maintaining his sanity? When am I imposing standards that will push my child towards a path of psychological damage that will take years of adulthood therapy to heal? \" These questions and more are what I grapple with in my moments of quiet reflection. I continue to search for answers as I don't have absolute clarity on all these questions. My realization at this point is : As a parent, I have great power over how my child feels about himself and about his performance. What I choose to focus my attention on in terms of what is good enough and what is not has far reaching consequences on his formation into adulthood. I must choose to use this power wisely. -
ksi:
I am also against this 'terrorism' approach at P5 but is this out of some kind of desperate measures? I don't know but it is something MOE should investigate. Such an approach takes the joy out of learning. Even if a child eventually mugged to get good PSLE results, I believe the damage caused by such an exam takes a long time to heal for the joy of learning and what if a child does not recover from it?
Last year (p5) was absolutely mad :mad:
Sitting for extremely tough school exams is very demoralizing...whole idea of wake up call is stupid!!! So what if schools shock the hell out of students, and then parents get all jittery and scramble to find tutors but poor kids are suffering. They dont learn more because they want to, but because schools force them. To me, setting tough exam papers is face-saving for schools...they don't want word to spread around that their school exam papers are chicken feed. -
I am now really curious to know if most people are facing this challenge of a killer exam at P5 for their children. This might be the panic button triggered in P5 across the island to land most kids in tuition.
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ksi:
I am now really curious to know if most people are facing this challenge of a killer exam at P5 for their children. This might be the panic button triggered in P5 across the island to land most kids in tuition.
The CA1 next month may be the first heart attack....don't know if many parents/kids will face it, but myself and several friends did. The dip in P3 was a little scary but nothing compared to p5. -
janet_lee88:
Just to confirm, your friends' kids and yours are all from different schools? If so, how many schools would that be? :scratchhead:ksi:
I am now really curious to know if most people are facing this challenge of a killer exam at P5 for their children. This might be the panic button triggered in P5 across the island to land most kids in tuition.
The CA1 next month may be the first heart attack....don't know if many parents/kids will face it, but myself and several friends did. The dip in P3 was a little scary but nothing compared to p5. -
What worst than P5 was what a school did to their P6 prelim. The paper was a killer that it affected the overall score of the students. Most of them cried and the Principal 'consoled' them by stating that he expected the students to move on to the affiliated school so he saw no effect on them whatsoever. :stompfeet: What if the student didn't wish to go to the affiliated school? :faint:
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Dump MOE school and go for international school. MOE school plus tuition $, plus enrichment $ = to international school fee. International school is more relax and produces more foreign talents. MOE school has to depend on tuition centre to produce exam smart but talent void kids.
MOE should seriously engaged so-called top tuition centres like LL, etc. to give MOE teachers tuition or to teach their teachers how to teach. By the way those teachers who eventually attend this tuition cum training should have distinction in PSLE, O and A levels for their respective subject. And preferably the top 10% student of NIE. This is to ensure the continuity of producing singapore-made-exam-smart-only children. -
looking4Tutor:
MOE should seriously engaged so-called top tuition centres like LL, etc. to give MOE teachers tuition or to teach their teachers how to teach. By the way those teachers who eventually attend this tuition cum training should have distinction in PSLE, O and A levels for their respective subject. And preferably the top 10% student of NIE. This is to ensure the continuity of producing singapore-made-exam-smart-only children.
This is something I totally agree...MOE teachers are not trained to teach subjects they are doing in school. They should be going for upgrading courses to teach kids how to handle the tough exam papers set.
It's not just 1 or 2 schools which set WAKE-UP exam papers but generally most schools do that. -
looking4Tutor:
Dump MOE school and go for international school. MOE school plus tuition $, plus enrichment $ = to international school fee. International school is more relax and produces more foreign talents.
I agree. We just see the overall fees for international schools. If we add top tuition/enrichment centres fees + ASSESSMENT books, it will definitely exceed the fees of international school.
MOE should seriously engaged so-called top tuition centres like LL, etc. to give MOE teachers tuition or to teach their teachers how to teach. By the way those teachers who eventually attend this tuition cum training should have distinction in PSLE, O and A levels for their respective subject. And preferably the top 10% student of NIE. This is to ensure the continuity of producing singapore-made-exam-smart-only children
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looking4Tutor:
Cannot dump MOE school at primary school level otherwise MOE bo seng li...Dump MOE school and go for international school. MOE school plus tuition $, plus enrichment $ = to international school fee. International school is more relax and produces more foreign talents. MOE school has to depend on tuition centre to produce exam smart but talent void kids.
MOE should seriously engaged so-called top tuition centres like LL, etc. to give MOE teachers tuition or to teach their teachers how to teach. By the way those teachers who eventually attend this tuition cum training should have distinction in PSLE, O and A levels for their respective subject. And preferably the top 10% student of NIE. This is to ensure the continuity of producing singapore-made-exam-smart-only children.
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