Review Underway of the Educational System

[Musings]

coast:

I am impressed with MOE minister Heng Swee Keat's insight. A lot of what he said makes sense (how the schools implement the policies is another issue). But I cannot help but feel that MOE might overlook certain issues due to wrong assumptions. E.g., does MOE have the statistics on tuition/ enrichment (80% of our kids? 90%? average money spent per kid on tuition?). Is it really the schools cannot do anything about the over-reliance on external help/ resources? Yes certain parents will always send their kids to expensive tuition/ enrichment no matter what. But we came from a system that VERY FEW relied on tuition during our days ... why such an over-reliance now? We need to explore in depth the issues raised and analysed the statistics and try to do something about it. Otherwise, it is very unfair for kids whose parents cannot afford the time to home tuition or time/ money to send their kids for tuition/ enrichment. As for the many parents who are doing it extensively now, at what price? Not just the $$$ but how it impacts the child's balanced life?

Actually my views are that the high incidence of kids having tuition is not necessarily attributed to any problem with the school's teaching.

Personally, I send my kids for tuition on weekdays just to occupy their time (after school) and get them to practice what is taught in school since I am a FTWM. On weekends, I supervise the kids myself. No matter how wonderful the school teachers are, what is taught needs to be reinforced. I know many parents send kids to tuition for the same reason. Conversely, I also see kids who while away their time at home after school because no parents around to supervise - playing computer games, watching TV. Not saying these cannot be allowed but young kids tend to over-indulge w/o adult supervision.

When I was young, I didn't need tuition because mum was a SAHM and made sure I did tons of assessement books after school each day to get the necessary practice! She was not v highly educated but just place great emphasis on education.

In fact many parents are capable of teaching their own kids but choose to outsource it to external tutors etc because they are more affluent than before. This is a personal choice.

How it impacts on child's life depends on how parents manage all these enrichment - which is out of MOE's hands. This was a point made by Mr Heng as well. Parents just need to be discerning and be clear why the kids need tuition - to practice or to improve due to lagging behind or to aim to top the class?

Not saying there is nothing to improve with school system but my point is no matter wonderful the school system, there will always be a need for tuition. At least I know my kids still need it.

[Musings]

coast:

Oppsgal:

Wish the educational system can remove unnecessary subject such as history, literature etc..so more time can be spent on those major subjects.


If history subject can be simply into summary version will be good. :frustrated: Hard to remember anything after years later since not much of this is used in work life.

Hope you don't mind but I strongly believe in a holistic education. There is alot to learn from history, literature, ... a master in major subjects does not equate a successful career. Many skills \"essential\" for success (well, what is successful to begin with) are not \"learnt' from \"core\" subjects.

You certainly have your reasons being frustrated (and I think I would agree on those reasons too). But there should be other ways to resolve those issues than removing history, literature ...

Fully agree! Humanities are extremely important in training a person's character, values and outlook. I may be biased as I am a pure Humanities student at O and A levels.

In fact employers are finding that people trained in just technical subjects - deemed more useful like maths, science and physics are very silo in their thinking and this is not encouraged. Look at the trend towards a multi-disciplinary broad based curriculum in universities - even for engineering - see model espoused in Singapore University of Technology and Design's curriculum.

[Funz]

Oppsgal:

Wish the educational system can remove unnecessary subject such as history, literature etc..so more time can be spent on those major subjects.


If history subject can be simply into summary version will be good. :frustrated: Hard to remember anything after years later since not much of this is used in work life.

Humanities have their place in the educational system. Literature builds one's flair for the language which may pave the way for a law/mass comm/advertising career. History is good for, law/political/social studies.

I on the other hand am still wondering why was I taught stuff like tangent, co-tangent, sin, cosin in E math. Haha but if the only teach general application stuff they will end up with nothing to teach.

[Chenonceau]

Musings:

Not saying there is nothing to improve with school system but my point is no matter wonderful the school system, there will always be a need for tuition. At least I know my kids still need it.

THAT was what MOE said! So I decided that there is money to be made.

My son has no tuition. I teach him myself. He ranks 2nd in class and 16th in level. BECAUSE I am involved in teaching him, I am more aware of the gaps in MOE's teaching methods than most people. It goes FAR beyond ensuring that a child does TONS OF assessments today. I find myself flipping research on learning heuristics to figure out how to teach my son.

Many parents in KSP buy tons of assessment books but still are at a loss to teach
(1) Science answering skills
(2) Science logic
(3) English creative writing
(4) Chinese creative writing
(5) Math heuristics

If they want to keep the syllabus so difficult (and skills heavy), then something must be done to improve teaching methods. Else, they should be less ambitious with the syllabus. It isn't that our kids can't keep up. MOE can't keep up with its own syllabus and so parents have to step in to teach.

[Chenonceau]

Oppsgal:

Wish the educational system can remove unnecessary subject such as history, literature etc..so more time can be spent on those major subjects.

A sense of history is part of being human. For many many people, History is a major subject. We cannot delete subjects without regards for the interests and skills of other students who may like these subjects, be good at them, and use them to contribute.

Many many policy makers in Singapore today were Humanities students.

I too, was schooled in the Humanities and it has taught me skills in
(1) clarity of thinking
(2) strong logical processes
(3) coherent argumentation
(4) critical thinking
plus others...

Not everyone graduates into a job where people only use math and language.

[Sun_2010]

Funz:

Oppsgal:

Wish the educational system can remove unnecessary subject such as history, literature etc..so more time can be spent on those major subjects.


If history subject can be simply into summary version will be good. :frustrated: Hard to remember anything after years later since not much of this is used in work life.

Humanities have their place in the educational system. Literature builds one's flair for the language which may pave the way for a law/mass comm/advertising career. History is good for, law/political/social studies.

I on the other hand am still wondering why was I taught stuff like tangent, co-tangent, sin, cosin in E math. Haha but if the only teach general application stuff they will end up with nothing to teach.

If this was asked 20 yrs ago I would have totally agreed. sin and cos and parabolas and calulus - my passtimes...
And history my nightmare
but to be honest - how often have I used them in the last 10 years - if I exclude the time I spend introducing some of these concepts to DD - zilch.

Maybe boring statistics is something that would have served me better ...

So yes, IMHO History/Literature are definetely as important as the \"core\" subjects at pre Uni level

[concern2]

coast:

Oppsgal:

Wish the educational system can remove unnecessary subject such as history, literature etc..so more time can be spent on those major subjects.


If history subject can be simply into summary version will be good. :frustrated: Hard to remember anything after years later since not much of this is used in work life.

Hope you don't mind but I strongly believe in a holistic education. There is alot to learn from history, literature, ... a master in major subjects does not equate a successful career. Many skills \"essential\" for success (well, what is successful to begin with) are not \"learnt' from \"core\" subjects.

You certainly have your reasons being frustrated (and I think I would agree on those reasons too). But there should be other ways to resolve those issues than removing history, literature ...

Agree. Who would have thought typography is important at all? Too much focus is being put on 'money-making' subjects to be deemed relevant - not to imply you are saying that, but in the context of Singapore, it seems to be the case. There is much to learn from history and literature than meets the eye. These humanity subjects are what makes us more human than merely meeting the figures. And these are the very subjects we already paying too little attention to...Just my personal opinion..

[Chenonceau]

DS came home yesterday and told me that his CL Teacher had asked the whole class to hand up the materials provided by their tuition teachers so that she could compile a booklet and give out to the class.


If this does not show that MOE is lacking in educational resources and methods, I dunno what does.

[concern2]

Chenonceau:

DS came home yesterday and told me that his CL Teacher had asked the whole class to hand up the materials provided by their tuition teachers so that she could compile a booklet and give out to the class.


If this does not show that MOE is lacking in educational resources and methods, I dunno what does.

:scared: like that also can ah!?

[michyms]

Chenoceau, I am horrified by such a request! I hope it's because the CL teacher wants to expose the students and not because she is too lazy to make her own notes :faint: