2012 PSLE Discussions and Strategy

[Chenonceau]

mn:

beanbear:

[quote=\"mn\"]My ds will be having his prelim next week from Tuesday and he will be done with all the subject papers by next week. His teachers has given him 3 sets of papers as homework. Now I am confused whether to make him complete the homework or revise for his prelims.

How will the papers serve as revision if there are no answers? If child cannot self-mark & do corrections, how will doing it help him to learn? Feedback is important for learning.

Thanks beanbear, they don't come with answers. Ds is worried that he needs to complete his homework. Ok I've made up my mind, I'm going to write a note to his teacher. Unable to complete hw due to revising for EXAM.[/quote] :rotflmao: :rotflmao: :rotflmao:

[mummy so kiasu]

Essential:

mummy so kiasu:

[quote=\"Essential\"]Those who posted about Chinese oral is it PSLE oral Or

Yes. I think your kid is not taking PSLE this year, right?

My kid is taking PSLE oral[/quote]All the best to your kid's coming PSLE! :rahrah:

[janet88]

If my son is piled with several sets of past year papers, I will ask him to do what he can...with a note to the teacher that quality is more impt than quantity. Son told me there could be long days in school during the sep 1 week hol, now I am wondering whether it is fruitful :roll:

[august24]

Anyone knows during psle, for CL, do they leave a blank page for the compre OE or will it be passage in front & qns printed at the back of the same page? Ds have problem flipping to look for ans & is usually not able to complete it within required time.

[pertunia]

Hi, my son is taking PSLE in 2013. Just wondering if any schools finish the P5 syllabus early and start on P6 syllabus during the P5 year? I see 6A and 6B syllabus for Maths, Science and Chinese. Does it mean the schools cram all the syllabus within half year in P6? Can the students absorb so much? Just thinking ahead so I can help my son better. Thanks a lot.

[Chenonceau]

pertunia:

Hi, my son is taking PSLE in 2013. Just wondering if any schools finish the P5 syllabus early and start on P6 syllabus during the P5 year? I see 6A and 6B syllabus for Maths, Science and Chinese. Does it mean the schools cram all the syllabus within half year in P6? Can the students absorb so much? Just thinking ahead so I can help my son better. Thanks a lot.

DS' school targeted to finish the textbook material in May 2012. This did not prevent them from testing things that were not in textbooks (and not in any notes)... and not yet taught in class... e.g. Science answering technique etc... The kids all did very badly in CA1.

The P6 textbooks document so little of what is required for PSLE that if you fear you cannot absorb the material therein by end P5, then you will be ill-prepared for PSLE. For DS, we covered all the P6 basics at home by end P5... and then from Jan to March of P6, we did the extras NOT in textbook but tested in PSLE. DS still did quite badly in CA1 because we had not had time to practice the skills not yet taught but tested.

By SA1, we had had enough time to practice. He did better there.... and then he got bored so I signed him up with an American high school to do a literature module. All that practice can get boring but better master the textbook basics early, than late. This said, it still depends on how well your child can absorb.

[pertunia]

Chenonceau,


Thanks for your quick reply. I find that if I teach the Maths basics in advance, my son absorbs a lot better. He needs more time to grasp the concepts and it works well for him. Just wonder if we can manage to cram the entire P6 syallabus into the p5 holidays. For P5, we started on the basics for P5B in the June hols so that’s only half a year of work. We will need to do entire P6 year in the year-end hols.

How about the Chinese? My boy’s character recognition is not so strong so he takes longer time to master too. Do you do the entire Chinese syllabus in the P5 year-end hols?

Thanks so much for your inputs. Really appreciate it.

[Chenonceau]

pertunia:

Chenonceau,


Thanks for your quick reply. I find that if I teach the Maths basics in advance, my son absorbs a lot better. He needs more time to grasp the concepts and it works well for him. Just wonder if we can manage to cram the entire P6 syallabus into the p5 holidays. For P5, we started on the basics for P5B in the June hols so that's only half a year of work. We will need to do entire P6 year in the year-end hols.

How about the Chinese? My boy's character recognition is not so strong so he takes longer time to master too. Do you do the entire Chinese syllabus in the P5 year-end hols?

Thanks so much for your inputs. Really appreciate it.

For Chinese, I dun do the textbooks at all. I leave that to the school. My son is not stupid so I dun need to cover what the school is covering already. 75% of PSLE Chinese tests BEYOND textbooks... I used the following strategies for Chinese...

(1) Potato Chinese - http://petunialee.blogspot.sg/2012/07/potato-chinese-from-reciting-to-writing.html
(2) Chinese Oral Practices - http://petunialee.blogspot.sg/2012/08/preparing-for-psle-oral.html

Chinese, unlike Math, you dun need the textbook basics to read/learn other things. For both English and Chinese, we put in place an aggressive reading program.

In fact, in NONE of the subjects did we use textbooks. We used textbooks as a guide to what to cover only. I taught DS from other books. Our textbooks are useless. We only looked at them once or twice. Can't do well at PSLE by studying textbooks.

But yes... my son mastered the P6 tingxie lists for the whole year by March 2012. You can find it in Popular. It's called a 手册.

[pertunia]

Which 手册 did you buy? Do you have a pic or the name and publisher? Will go pick this up.


My son is just an average student plus he needs a longer time to master concepts compared to his peers. With a longer lead time, he can perform quite ok, like average or above average. He is definitely not a top student. And I can’t push too hard cos he is epileptic. (His epilepsy started 4 years back. Had status epilepticus and landed in ICU for a month and warded for 3 months. After discharge, he has been good so far). He needs a lot of sleep and can’t be overly stressed. Teaching in advance takes stress off his homework that the teacher gives so that’s good for him. Otherwise he will be sweating over the homework every day and worrying that he cannot complete them in time.

Thanks for the tips. Comes in really handy!

[happyheart]

Bedoktutor:

happyheart:

Need help from experienced mummies here...DS is not strong in MT so chinese oral is a struggle. We did picture discussion but it will not take long for him to forget almost everything 1) chinese name for the place 2) descriptive words about the people and happenings 3) Thoughts and opinions of what happened.


How do you organise the notes and drill them into your children? DS is taking psle next year, I am afraid whatever we do this year will be forgotten by next year!

Hi,
There are quite a number of useful CL oral books available at Popular bookstores. These books do contain words in EL but translated to CL. Eg like what do you call shop asistants, cashiers, dentists, pharmacists in mandarin. They also have model answers for picture discussions. Pupils can do self-learning or taught by parents. Memorising some useful phrases can come in handy during the oral exam.

To be proficient in languages, daily speaking, listening ( TV and radio) and wide reading, all these are proven effective.

I agree, Bedoktutor. The translation from EL to CL is quite a challenge :p. I am now trying to get him to remember the terms in CL. Hopefully, we can pick up slowly with more practice. Thanks for your advice.