2016 PSLE Discussions (Born in 2004)

[MrsKiasu]

The level of difficulties may just go up and up..even ordinary mom like me now thinking that we better try some MO qns

[lee_yl]

Before taking the exam, no one will know how they will score. So to be safe, they go in prepared (or over-prepared). Will the new AL Banding stop parents from sending their children to tuition/enrichmention if they know that MOE will con’t to set tough maths paper with MO questions?

[twin2003]

Looking at the questions in the link, they don’t look like MO questions… they just require the students to be careful in answering.

[Gabby]

I think the debate on those difficult questions will never go away. The fact is, not all students will be great in Math whether they are exposed or not. It is simply not possible for ALL students to get a A* in Math or any subject for that matter. There are some students who are good, and may become better with increased exposure to more difficult questions. There are those who already struggle with basic questions and they will just be clueless when given those more challenging "thinking" questions. I always feel very inspired when I read stories of students who overcame challenging circumstances and did very well in the PSLE.


Seriously, end of the day, do we expect all our kids to be getting 100 for every subject? I can see the difference in competency even among my kids, not to mention the thousands out there.

And for those who lost a few marks here and there, but still confident that your raw score is above 85,90 and more… Don’t worry unduly, your t-score will still be better than many. You have put in your best, now you just need to wait for the harvest. All the best for the remaining papers.

[jetsetter]

ChiefKiasu:

champion31:

The govt now tells us that we shouldn't push our kids hard for PSLE and that exams are not the be all end all. And yet they keep setting high standards for their exams that forces us to turn to tuition. How can they say one thing and then do another, expecting us to just hope for the best? They don't want us to have a tuition culture in our education system but yet they're not helping us by lowering standards. I'm pretty good at maths when I was in school, growing up and even in JC, but even I am stumped on some of the questions at P6 levels these days. If you ask us not to be 'kiasu' then at least try and make exams more manageable for 12 year olds or else it's just going to be a vicious cycle.

I think the idea is that MOE will continue to set hard maths papers in order to be able to separate the great from the good students, but because the grades will no longer differentiate those who scored 90 from those who scored 100, we are supposed to have our stress level come down and not quibble over our kids not being able to answer 1 or 2 MO type questions.

It's always been the case all these years, no? There'll always be 1 or 2 diff questions for a small bunch of candidates who are also taking the same national exams.

I rem I was very well prepared for the PSLE Math paper, having done so many assessment books from Bras Basah's Popular store. There was nothing I couldn't solve that was covered in the main syllabus by my sch teachers. But come PSLE day, I was stumped by 2 challenging questions (prob sums) I think. I'd never seen anything like that before and took very long to solve them. I didn't even finish solving them but wrote a few lines to earn some marks. Fast fwd decades later... I now suspect they were meant for a small % of students from another stream or those who'd been exposed to them somehow. But fret not, if your other papers are done well, you'll still get a good T-score (phew!!! not AL system!).

[ChiefKiasu]

I don’t think anyone is advocating getting 100 marks here. The key question being posed is whether it is fair that only some students are exposed to "similar" types of questions by their school teachers, while the rest of the students will be seeing such questions for the first time of their lives. Of course one can always blame individual competencies that it is no point trying to teach slower students the techniques since they will only be more stressed, but the PSLE is intended as a standard exam for everyone, and so should be baselined only on material that should have been taught to all.


There is a difference between "I taught you but you don’t understand" and "I don’t teach you because you will never understand", especially if regardless of whether students understood, they are being tested with the same material.

Again, I have no idea on whether the questions in this year’s math exam is really MO-level or just a little more tricky questions, so we may all be barking up the wrong tree.

[phtthp]

This year under Section B or C psle Maths paper :

How many qn set are MO type of qn ?

If is only one or two qn, probably they trying to sieve out A* from A.

But if quite a few, then is of concern, because not fair to those who never been exposed before by their Maths Tr in school

[Ender]

twin2003:

Looking at the questions in the link, they don't look like MO questions... they just require the students to be careful in answering.

The video presentation? I agree they are not MO level questions.
Can someone post the MO questions?

[lee_yl]

[quote]https://s22.postimg.org/lnixb78nl/image.jpg\">[/quote]
Just curious, this light blub question resemble a MO type interval questions?

[MrsKiasu]

OT…leeyl…are you left handed?