ME_Mama:cherryseeker:My kids are in Anderson mid-upper pri. Anyone thinking of sending their kids to Anderson, do reconsider. There are 2 good things about Anderson:
1. It's got a nice English-sounding name
2. It's got black sch shoes
Period.
Majority (not all) of teachers are atrocious... Same problems every term, every year... There is no learning curve... And no one, not even the principal can effect any improvement... Message I, as a parent received about Anderson's teaching and admin staff... No one cares enough about its students to make a change:
Teachers teach at snail's pace at beginning of every term. 1-2 days before exams (yes, even SA2!), they're still giving out worksheets/homework, collecting work to mark or giving out answers and marked papers in a frenzy!!!
Yes, calendar of events said all books and files will be returned to students 2 weeks before exams for revision. But it never happens!!! Some worksheets are held by teachers for whatever reasons I cannot comprehend. Others are on topics which had not even been completely covered (but examinable)! Yet some have been taught but as to why they were not given out to students earlier to complete- I've heard reason like school copier was down!
We teach our kids the importance of making plans, being diligent and start preparations early. But the real challenge I feel for Andersonians is how to manage the negative effect from their teachers' lack of good syllabus and time management.
This Tue was English Paper 2... One of my kid came home finally with marked english practice paper on Mon.
According to exam format communicated by sch, there should be no Compre Cloze but there was!
Wed was Math... On Tue in class, my kid was still given math worksheets to do... And mind you... Those were supposedly completed in early weeks of Term 4.
Tomorrow's mother tongue paper 2... And we still don't know if one of their papers is 1hr or 1hr 15min. Practice paper said 1hr but exam schedule said 1hr 15min. Tried to ask teacher in class, but he's stopped showing up in class as lessons have ceased.
Fri is science... My kid still has worksheets and practice paper held by Sci teacher who collected them just this Mon for marking. Some students who refused to hand in their papers on Mon (for the right or wrong reasons) were told they had to remain behind at dismissal time!
If u handed in the papers, it's an amazing race to have to hunt the teacher down to try get them back at least a day BEFORE the exam.
A new topic was covered since start of term 4. For some strange reason, this Sci teacher put off all worksheets till 1-2 weeks before exams and told students they had to complete all 17 or so worksheets over a weekend!?! Whatever happened to the word 'progressive'? Shouldn't written work be done as a topic is introduced to reinforce the concepts as they are taught? This is not a new, inexperience teacher who does not know what's in store in the syllabus.
Too near exams, too rush, some teachers just got frustrated and said: no time, won't teach remaining chapter(s)... But get this... Chapters not taught are still tested in SAs!
Another issue- mistakes in worksheets, practice papers... My kids were baffled at times to see half of a whole question truncated, gone, cut off totally in a paper. At times, labels in a diagram were wrongly mixed up with labels from another question! Where's the quality check before a paper is sent for mass photocopy?
The SA2 exam format-syllabus-paper duration were full of errors when first published. To date, some still remain uncorrected.
Admin staff lapse... A very negative experience... wrote an email inquiry once... No reply from admin for weeks despite several reminders. Totally frustrated, I copied the principal after a month. Guess what? A long awaited reply! What happened in between? I don't know. But what did it say about admin level of self-motivation, commitment, timeliness, discipline?
There's a lack of communication between admin and teaching staff. An example: I heard an amusing story from parent concerned- a teacher spent days marking a student absent and contacted the parent thereafter, only to be told he had been transferred out of that class! Admin was in the loop on the transfer. But apparently the info stayed in Admin!
These are not isolated incidents. They are repeated every year, every term... Slight variation here and there... But they point to the same underlying problems always.
Some parents have shared on earlier posts- high % of Andersonians go to Normal stream after PSLE. If it's true, I don't really wonder why. It's a great challenge for working parents to spend time and energy to identify and fill gaps left by such teachers.
Of course... These are based on my personal experience with Anderson... There are probably better staff there. But so far, commendable ones I've met - 2. Need I say more?
Sounds really scary. So did u feedback ur anger during the MPS? How is ur kid's result? Really that bad ?
Any parents volunteer or APS teacher can verify or clarify all this? This is worrying.
I totally agreed to cherryseeker. My kid is also in Anderson mid-upper pri.
Even SA2 are over (last paper on 25 Oct), parents will need to wait for a few days to get to know their child's results. I only know about the marks (on 29 Oct - ONLY for 1 subject). Todate, I have yet to receive the exam papers. Although the School has notified us that we will only receive it on 1 November. Why? Once the corrections are done, it can be returned to the child, right?
Oral preparation, teacher only started to prep the child 2 days or eve of the oral examination.
Composition, there are not enough practice on composition, only 4 or 5 compositions practice THIS year and no marks allocation for the compositions done. Same thing, eve of composition exam, students will need to do more but these were not returned to the child. How do we know, where are child \"stand\".
Topics that will be tested in the SA, worksheets were not returned to the child.
Science, lack of practice. Child only get to do 1 practice paper before the SA. For maths, child are give a no. of worksheets for practice. But for science there are hardly.
During the examination week, the child should spend time on revising and not spending time on doing worksheets. And the school also like to practice e-learning during the PSLE marking week. The child needs to complete 16 sets of e-learning (4 sets for 1 subject). Do you think this will help the child? Will the computer explain to the child why he/she get this question wrong?
Even Health Education and Social Studies are tested. Even the SA are over, the poor child still need to revise them. And tell you, the Social Studies are so difficult.
am quite sure the Anderson spirit n culture is still there.