Education
Man, a 3 week hiatus-gotta be a reocrd even for me, even to the extent that I almost forgot the username for this account! Brain has not hardly been moving for that time, hence the lack of any posts on this blog, for which I must apologise once more. I will probably be blogging weekly until further notice though, because we've entered first year final exam period, starting with the Mocks which will be next week.
I am thus summoned to my books once more, and am reminded yet again what a darn EXAM FACTORY this place is!!! I once spoke of how I felt that by coming here, I say that I have cheated in the game of studies bcause the standard here is much lower, hence making it infintely easier for one to obtain straght As. I take that statement back, but only the claim that I have cheated.
I will first address the sciences-Chemistry, Biology and Maths. My impression of Singapore's education system is that it makes its students contendwith rather challenging concepts and even more challenging papers. Questions asked are rarely repeated. Though questions over the years may emphasize near-identical skills, these are probably considered by the majority of students to be difficult to learn and employ, especially when they're under the pressurizing environment of an exam hall. Hence an A there, I would beileve, would probably be quite indicative of the fact that that the student, having spent 2 or more years of his precious life slaving over his books and past year papers, has acquired these skills.
Yet here, everything seems to be pretty much common sense. This coupled by the midset that if it's not related to the exam, don't talk about it! It seems thus that the students getting straght As across London increased so dramatically examiners had to find a way to decrease it. So they end up doing so by making marking schemes most picky-and annoying. Because even though what you write is right, you don't get marked right. It's gone beyond a case of reading carefully into the question and writing only specifically what's needed-it's knowing specifically what the examiner wants-which is sometimes, I own, but not often the former. So nowadays all I seem to end up doing is just staring at papers and memorizing answer schemes. And I find it most frustrating. You see, Singapore's barrier to and A is the challenging nature of the paper. The barrier to an A here is not the difficulty level but the examiner himself. Equally difficult to overcome, yet not half as sensible as the previous one.
I spent 7 months in the Singapore JC education system which many consider most hellish, 3 in MI followed by 4 in Yishun Junior College-horrid neighbourhood schoools that many consider even more hellish. Yet I loved every single minute of it. My stay in MI somehow caused me to start liking intellectual activity. Academic pursuits are supposed to be considered intellectual activity-Singpore's seemed much so, and so I subconsciously started developing a strange liking for my subjects, and work stopped seeming to be like work. Indeed in days when I felt particularly lightheaded I would start sounding like an annoying 6 year old kid and come up with the most novel statements...
"Can you tell me about the differences between similarities between Osmosis and FF's spell Osmose???"-and many more extremely lame associations.
"Don't eat that donut!!! It's sugar-coated and moist-an ideal environment for bacteria to grow!!!"-said to my cleanliness-obsessed Dad, who told me that I'm thining too much. I conveniently forgot to tell him that should bacteria be placed in such a concentrated sugar soultion, it'd probably lose water by osmosis so fast it'd shrivel up and die!
I am thus summoned to my books once more, and am reminded yet again what a darn EXAM FACTORY this place is!!! I once spoke of how I felt that by coming here, I say that I have cheated in the game of studies bcause the standard here is much lower, hence making it infintely easier for one to obtain straght As. I take that statement back, but only the claim that I have cheated.
I will first address the sciences-Chemistry, Biology and Maths. My impression of Singapore's education system is that it makes its students contendwith rather challenging concepts and even more challenging papers. Questions asked are rarely repeated. Though questions over the years may emphasize near-identical skills, these are probably considered by the majority of students to be difficult to learn and employ, especially when they're under the pressurizing environment of an exam hall. Hence an A there, I would beileve, would probably be quite indicative of the fact that that the student, having spent 2 or more years of his precious life slaving over his books and past year papers, has acquired these skills.
Yet here, everything seems to be pretty much common sense. This coupled by the midset that if it's not related to the exam, don't talk about it! It seems thus that the students getting straght As across London increased so dramatically examiners had to find a way to decrease it. So they end up doing so by making marking schemes most picky-and annoying. Because even though what you write is right, you don't get marked right. It's gone beyond a case of reading carefully into the question and writing only specifically what's needed-it's knowing specifically what the examiner wants-which is sometimes, I own, but not often the former. So nowadays all I seem to end up doing is just staring at papers and memorizing answer schemes. And I find it most frustrating. You see, Singapore's barrier to and A is the challenging nature of the paper. The barrier to an A here is not the difficulty level but the examiner himself. Equally difficult to overcome, yet not half as sensible as the previous one.
I spent 7 months in the Singapore JC education system which many consider most hellish, 3 in MI followed by 4 in Yishun Junior College-horrid neighbourhood schoools that many consider even more hellish. Yet I loved every single minute of it. My stay in MI somehow caused me to start liking intellectual activity. Academic pursuits are supposed to be considered intellectual activity-Singpore's seemed much so, and so I subconsciously started developing a strange liking for my subjects, and work stopped seeming to be like work. Indeed in days when I felt particularly lightheaded I would start sounding like an annoying 6 year old kid and come up with the most novel statements...
"Can you tell me about the differences between similarities between Osmosis and FF's spell Osmose???"-and many more extremely lame associations.
"Don't eat that donut!!! It's sugar-coated and moist-an ideal environment for bacteria to grow!!!"-said to my cleanliness-obsessed Dad, who told me that I'm thining too much. I conveniently forgot to tell him that should bacteria be placed in such a concentrated sugar soultion, it'd probably lose water by osmosis so fast it'd shrivel up and die!
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In short, I liked what I studied there. Pity they have to create something that seems to defy all that the subject stands for here. Perhaps it's a difference in definition of what it does stand for. They seem to say that Science is about being insanely specific. I suppose I disagree when I say that it's not about the answer alone! It's understanding-not just knowing THAT it's A but also WHY it's A, WHY it's not B, C or D, WHY it's also E, and then HOW and WHY all this can in turn be used to prove F. By writing all this down, I'd probably have grabbed what I'd needed in the mark scheme. But in an exam where amount of space to write an answer seems to be a very major limiting factor for me, this simply can't be done.
Even Lit can sometimes seem to be the same thing-specificity all round, though here it's thankfully enough not as vague in terms of what they want you to do. It's like you need to address the question throughout your answer-if the question asks about narrative tech keep saying things like "The author writes....because he wants to creates a...mood.". Indeed, that's different from saying "Chapter X has a very....mood because of its.....". Which like I said is sensible enough. Though it still annoys me because I sometimes try writing in a very lively and engaging way which unfortunately often is not what the examiner wants.
Azrul, I'm thinking about you and your blog again. =P Or anyone else who takes or has taken Lit before. Have you all ever considered this notion before? Stopped to ask exactly WHY that nut refuses to give you an A? "Not good enough" is just too darn vague-surely it's not your brain that's "not good enough" for an A? Perhaps they just aren't bothered with your writing style becaue it's not what they want? No matter that your vocabulary and points raised are relevant enough and indicative of your Einstein-rivalling IQ. Not what they want, no marks.
In short, I liked what I studied there. Pity they have to create something that seems to defy all that the subject stands for here. Perhaps it's a difference in definition of what it does stand for. They seem to say that Science is about being insanely specific. I suppose I disagree when I say that it's not about the answer alone! It's understanding-not just knowing THAT it's A but also WHY it's A, WHY it's not B, C or D, WHY it's also E, and then HOW and WHY all this can in turn be used to prove F. By writing all this down, I'd probably have grabbed what I'd needed in the mark scheme. But in an exam where amount of space to write an answer seems to be a very major limiting factor for me, this simply can't be done.
Even Lit can sometimes seem to be the same thing-specificity all round, though here it's thankfully enough not as vague in terms of what they want you to do. It's like you need to address the question throughout your answer-if the question asks about narrative tech keep saying things like "The author writes....because he wants to creates a...mood.". Indeed, that's different from saying "Chapter X has a very....mood because of its.....". Which like I said is sensible enough. Though it still annoys me because I sometimes try writing in a very lively and engaging way which unfortunately often is not what the examiner wants.
Azrul, I'm thinking about you and your blog again. =P Or anyone else who takes or has taken Lit before. Have you all ever considered this notion before? Stopped to ask exactly WHY that nut refuses to give you an A? "Not good enough" is just too darn vague-surely it's not your brain that's "not good enough" for an A? Perhaps they just aren't bothered with your writing style becaue it's not what they want? No matter that your vocabulary and points raised are relevant enough and indicative of your Einstein-rivalling IQ. Not what they want, no marks.
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Indeed one always talks about how irrelevant what they learn is. Ms Beautifuk once spoke of her as being unable to write an essay on how to replicate the Insulin gene yet is still floored by simple Maths. Well unless you plan to enter those fields later who's bothered with memorizing everything? Common arguement against this is that it's the skills that one learns while trying to memorize all this is what makes your cert valuable-"transferrable skills" they'd call it. And I can't for the life of me think of where this kind of insane degree of specificity is required other than here!!! Can you?
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I may write more some other time. But right now, I've said all I needed to say. Right now though I gotta go stare at more past papers. My exam board Edexcel has a slogan-"Success through qualifications." Darn helluva materialstic-but what can I say? It's true. Your As are the only thing that can prove Oxbridge you are worthy for them. And I'm hoping that university life at Oxbridge will give me a chance to do some REAL subjects-not just a chance to get As in exams. And they'd better not disappoint me.
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Good luck all who'll be taking their exams soon!
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BTW: This blog needs a new layout. Sakura's nice and all, and I hope she had a good brithday this April fools =) but
-My posts are so darn long yet less than 25% of the screen is used to display them.
-The tagboard is so obscure, and what you type there appears almost invisible.
-A tagboard is unsuitable for long comments, which I do welcome. If you've any, do email me. harry_kinomoto@hotmail.com
So yeah. And one more thing-here's something for you all to read should you get bored-a business-style doccument on the creation of the world. I found it as an advertisement under Azrul's tagboard. Don't worry though, it's pretty interesting!
posted by harry_kinomoto at 11:23 am
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3 comments
