Recommendation of changes to reduce Stress for PSLE
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Coolkidsrock2:
Don't praise me...in case I get swell headed. :rotflmao:
Hi Janet, think you had been doing a very good job of guiding your DC. It is not a matter of how highly educated the parent is. The teaching can be outsourced to a tutor. It is more about being there for them, being their parent during these critical years. This is something that cannot be outsourced. It makes a difference having a parent beside them as they study. I have a friend who does that every night even though DC are in secondary school. Not teaching, just being there.janet_lee88:
There will be changes to Science, Geography, Math & maybe history for next year 's Sec 1...our kids are just done with PSLE :faint:
I am not highly educated. So there is a limit I can coach my kids. For the highly-educated parents, they are worrying too early when they have not even started a family.
Your insights have always been enlightening and such critical thinking skill, you can pass on to your DC. While this may be something schools are supposed to teach, sometimes, it does not necessary turn out this way.
SAHMs are very 伟大. It takes a lot to be a SAHM. Think I will lose my sanity if I have to stay home with DC. -
Peony:
And that inspired my DD!! I love it when I retrieve the iPad, and I see all the \"places\" she's been!! She goes beyond the syllabus out of her own interest.[/quote]They do learn very interesting things that range far and wide beyond the syllabus. Strangely, this has the effect of helping them retain the syllabus better.
Haha! So funny! For Math, I dun bother. I passed DS all the best books I could lay my hands on. Then I asked him \"Do you understand?\" If he said \"Yes\", I believed him. Thank God for a particular helpful Daddy from KSP AND the PSLE Math thread. If rely on his teacher... and his school notes... gone liao.Chenonceau:
[quote=\"Nebbermind\"]Aiyah! Donch envy me lah. Everyone has his own set of problem when it comes to our kids' education. Just that sometimes we willingly let it overwhelm us.
Science is a different monster. Gotta rely on good revision books which have side notes to explain why the question is answer that way. personally, donch need too many, just 2 or at most 3 for ref.
Math...*LOL*...I still struggle with P4 work!!! Was revising SA2...and I asked my girl how she managed to draw the model...then she told me \"U TAUGHT ME!!\" :oops: Took me awhile to understand my own solution!!! :slapshead:
Science is my DS' thing. In P3, he tried to ask me about lysosome action. I didn't know, so I showed him how to google and he just took off from from Google. Thank God for Youtube and Google. After that, to check in, I asked him to teach me. When I mark his Science papers, if he challenges my marking.... I am usually wrong. Very embarrassing. -
Coolkidsrock2:
:lovesite: :goodpost: Yet another warm and edifying post I read this morning. Hmmmm... forum must be having a good day.
Hi Janet, think you had been doing a very good job of guiding your DC. It is not a matter of how highly educated the parent is. The teaching can be outsourced to a tutor. It is more about being there for them, being their parent during these critical years. This is something that cannot be outsourced. It makes a difference having a parent beside them as they study. I have a friend who does that every night even though DC are in secondary school. Not teaching, just being there.janet_lee88:
There will be changes to Science, Geography, Math & maybe history for next year 's Sec 1...our kids are just done with PSLE :faint:
I am not highly educated. So there is a limit I can coach my kids. For the highly-educated parents, they are worrying too early when they have not even started a family.
Education will change, hopefully for the better. Quality of teachers should also be upgraded. Just thinking, wouldn't it be a good idea for MOE to 'interview' the students?
Your insights have always been enlightening and such critical thinking skill, you can pass on to your DC. While this may be something schools are supposed to teach, sometimes, it does not necessary turn out this way.
SAHMs are very 伟大. It takes a lot to be a SAHM. Think I will lose my sanity if I have to stay home with DC. -
Chenonceau:
Are the work you questions and Science paper given to the teacher part of the school assignment?I can't tell you how much I envy you.
My DS' Math & Science teacher (HOD some more) doesn't answer questions. We asked a few Math questions and she kept saying she'll revert and never did. 1 month before prelims, I gave her a Science paper 2 that I had marked and I asked her to critique the way I had marked a few of the questions (because not confident mah.... since I am a humanities student).
I explained that I knew she was busy and that I understood how tough it is to be a teacher... and I was prepared to help my son myself instead of drawing upon her time. She smiled and chatted and chirped with me. I sent one email reminder after 3 weeks. Till now, after PSLE, NOTHING.
Without the LiSC book, DS and I would be quite quite lost. I am not trying to complain anymore. I know MOE is moving to fix these issues. But when I hear how your teachers respond by giving extra time to the child, I can't help but feel jealous. Very jealous. DS teacher wouldn't even give ME the little bit of time I needed so that I could help her teach my child Science.
I think the difference is that if it is your own material, I would believe that teachers will not be interested in attending to them. It could be because:
1) it is of unrealistic difficulty level set by some branded schools.
2) if every child comes with even 1 question, there will be 40 qns/day
3) if other parents find out she is giving 'special attention' privately to any student, it may lead to a complaint.
For my case, I was sure my kid was not the only weaker one which was why I asked if there was any plans for remedial class. Only, I left the option up to her as she deems fit and not to my expectation.
I guess that explains why the diff in response.
Juz my 2cents -
Nebbermind:
The questions were from a stack of GEP practice exams I obtained from a friend.
Are the work you questions and Science paper given to the teacher part of the school assignment?
I think the difference is that if it is your own material, I would believe that teachers will not be interested in attending to them. It could be because:
1) it is of unrealistic difficulty level set by some branded schools.
2) if every child comes with even 1 question, there will be 40 qns/day
3) if other parents find out she is giving 'special attention' privately to any student, it may lead to a complaint.
For my case, I was sure my kid was not the only weaker one which was why I asked if there was any plans for remedial class. Only, I left the option up to her as she deems fit and not to my expectation.
I guess that explains why the diff in response.
Juz my 2cents
They were way more difficult than work handled in class but on par with (if not more easy) than my son's school exams.
Empathise With Teacher And Understand
I was sensitive to the fact that Teachers can't give a lot of individual attention so in 2 years this was our ONLY request for Science help. More often than not, my son does not do the assigned Science homework (saved her a lot of marking really). We are stubborn about play time and so I deleted homework that was inappropriate and wrote excuse letters.
Answering Technique is Relevant Regardless of Question Content
In fact, my approach to her was to ask for some guidance for ME to be able to help my son with further questions on answering technique. Indeed the teacher's exam debrief for CA1 Science, where almost half the class failed, was \"You all know your stuff... but you didn't master the answering technique.\" So... it really doesn't matter where the questions come from, the focus of my request for help wasn't so much in tricky questions but in answering technique.
Best Teacher for his Worst Subject
In P5 and P6, the teacher with the best attitude was his Chinese teacher. Knowing that my son is poor in compo, she agreed to mark 2 extra-curricular compos a month for him so that our own private comp marker could take a cue from teacher's marking and mark my son's DAILY compos. However Chinese is my son's worst subject and we had too little time to catch up on too much (since I didn't wake up till P5).
Basic Teaching Only in Math, English and Science
The only responsible teacher he had in P5 & 6 taught him his worst subject - Chinese. If I lay back and nicely just follow his teachers' basic teaching in English, Math and Science... he would fail all the three subjects in which he has the highest potential because his exams can be MORE difficult than top school papers. Then for sure, my poor boy would end up with t-score below 200 - which is below his capability.
Ask Teacher about work done in class? There is NOTHING to ask the teacher about what is done in class. You would really have to be t-score below 200 potential to NOT be able to understand what went on in class because it is so basic. Maybe that is why the teacher sticks closely to textbook and assigns homework from workbook? So that no one will ask uncomfortable questions.
I arranged with Teacher to excuse DS from EVERY workbook homework. DS simply didn't do assigned homework because the discrepancy with school exams was so stark. Without being queried by me, this teacher offered the explanation that some kids in the class could not handle the basics so she had to cover them. That's fine and good. I understand and empathize. All I needed was that she give me some guidance on how Science OE is marked so that I could handle the marking at home and save her the trouble of teaching beyond the basics.
If Cannot Ask Teacher Beyond Classwork Then Tuition is Necessary
In essence,
(1) if Teacher covers the basics only and
(2) the PSLE tests at the level of the GEP and
(3) parents cannot ask questions at the level of GEP testing because these were not set by Teacher...
... then it is not surprising that so many people pay for tuition. It's not a question of being kiasu. Unless you wanna fail, it is necessary. At least in this particular situation. This said, DS had no tuition... but then I myself know how much I had to do for him in place of ...
(1) tuition we did not believe in
(2) sufficient teaching -
Chenonceau:
Same here...the only responsible and really teaching person was his Chinese teacher...she gave the class extra practice for oral and listening. Even the worksheets were good stuff.The only responsible teacher he had in P5 & 6 taught him his worst subject - Chinese. If I lay back and nicely just follow his teachers' basic teaching in English, Math and Science... he would fail all the three subjects in which he has the highest potential because his exams can be MORE difficult than top school papers. Then for sure, my poor boy would end up with t-score below 200 - which is below his capability.
Chenonceau, you are lucky not to not have anyone biting your bum when you said your son's teachers are teaching just the basic. Don't mean to insult you or anyone here, but I should have used a nick when I first signed in. -
janet_lee88:
Same here...the only responsible and really teaching person was his Chinese teacher...she gave the class extra practice for oral and listening. Even the worksheets were good stuff.Chenonceau:
The only responsible teacher he had in P5 & 6 taught him his worst subject - Chinese. If I lay back and nicely just follow his teachers' basic teaching in English, Math and Science... he would fail all the three subjects in which he has the highest potential because his exams can be MORE difficult than top school papers. Then for sure, my poor boy would end up with t-score below 200 - which is below his capability.
Chenonceau, you are lucky not to not have anyone biting your bum when you said your son's teachers are teaching just the basic. Don't mean to insult you or anyone here, but I should have used a nick when I first signed in.
It doesn't matter to me anymore. All is water under the bridge. MOE is moving to improve by...
(1) providing a portal from which students anywhere in Singapore can access material of all difficulty levels (I hope this is so... I have never seen the portal) so that people like me and DS who don't believe in tuition can have easier access to learning resources
(2) removing barriers to interschool sharing by tempering inter-school competition (i.e., removal of banding) so that schools who produce good materials will share them with teachers in other schools (via the portal?)
(3) distributing resources according to need and not according to school performance (so that good schools get gooder... and poor schools get poorer)
(4) changing teacher appraisal so as to bring ethos, pride and passion back to teachers rather than always dangling $$$$ in front of them.
These are big big systemic changes and it takes people with guts to make it happen. Systemic changes like this will certainly shape individual teacher behavior. Hopefully, in time to come, the situation in mainstream (non high ability) education will improve. There is hope for a better tomorrow in mainstream. For us, it's over... and we can just smile and say \"Whatever didn't kill us.... made us stronger.\"
Time to revel in the rainbows of life. -
janet_lee88:
I really felt vindicated this year when DD's P6 teachers kept asking the class \"what did (p5 teacher's name) teach you last year?\"
Same here...the only responsible and really teaching person was his Chinese teacher...she gave the class extra practice for oral and listening. Even the worksheets were good stuff.Chenonceau:
The only responsible teacher he had in P5 & 6 taught him his worst subject - Chinese. If I lay back and nicely just follow his teachers' basic teaching in English, Math and Science... he would fail all the three subjects in which he has the highest potential because his exams can be MORE difficult than top school papers. Then for sure, my poor boy would end up with t-score below 200 - which is below his capability.
Chenonceau, you are lucky not to not have anyone biting your bum when you said your son's teachers are teaching just the basic. Don't mean to insult you or anyone here, but I should have used a nick when I first signed in.
Even they realised the lack of teaching... Of even some BASIC stuff. They had to work extra hard to make up for the \"loss\". I was more relaxed this year when DD had truly committed teacher that TAUGHT. -
Lilac66:
To me, the ability to analyse and understand areas of weakness, identifying sources of help or remedies, and then following through with what needs to be done faithfully.
I like what you brought up.DKWhy:
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But kids who have mastered enough self learning skills in their early years will not suffer so much in sec schools coz chances are they will have the ‘inbuilt mechanism’ akin to ‘survival instinct’ to auto learn to adjust, adapt and survive within manageable stress. This ability comes from those chances that were given to them by not-so-KC and not-so-KS parents when they were allowed to learn to swim on own. This natural innate ability either can be built slowly or can also be taken away slowly by their very own parents during their early years.
But sorry just asking coz when we discuss about self-learning skills for kids of such age, what type of skills are specifically looking at or inculcating?
For discussion sake, we'll use MAths since this is one area where parents have most grouses about- say a child is not able to grasp the model concept for in class, what does he do? Ask the teacher in class or get help from parents. What if the child is not able to clear his doubts either because the teacher is has got too much on her plate to attend to him personally or the parents are not sufficiently equipped to help him? What should he or we parents do if we want to inculcate self-learning attitude? Let's presume the child does not have tuition.
For models, which was a problem for us, I helped my son determine that he could solve the problems but did not know how to draw the models. So it is not that he was bad at Maths per se, but unfamiliar with the model method.
I instructed him to ask his teacher, and I emailed her privately. She would then go through the models with him for another five minutes at her desk when giving out holiday homework.
On my side, I sourced for a book on models and went through that with him in small doses. Eventually I could hand him the book, instruct him to look at the examples in a section and attempt any question of his own choosing. He could refer to the examples anytime. We would do only three sums each time. Over a few months, he became very comfortable with models though i still encourage him to consider other more efficient methods of solving the sums. -
Chenonceau:
:lovesite:
These are big big systemic changes and it takes people with guts to make it happen. Systemic changes like this will certainly shape individual teacher behavior. Hopefully, in time to come, the situation in mainstream (non high ability) education will improve. There is hope for a better tomorrow in mainstream. For us, it's over... and we can just smile and say \"Whatever didn't kill us.... made us stronger.\"
Time to revel in the rainbows of life.
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