Primary School Leaving Examination Research Articles

‘The big crossroad’: Parenting, risk and educational transitions in Singapore

Singapore’s education system is globally recognized for its high academic standards. In this paper, I explore how Singaporean parents navigate sentiments of uncertainty and risk in relation to their children’s education. While academic achievements are still considered crucial to foster a competitive population, there has been a shift of attention in education policy towards social-emotional skills and holistic education. This reconceptualization of learning is partly grounded in a concern about children’s psychological well-being, but it is also construed as essential to thrive in the 21st century. The findings show that parents’ sentiments of uncertainty and risk management are complicated, and indeed heightened, by the paradoxical expectations with regard to children’s education. Sentiments of fear of regret and guilt were particularly conspicuous in the parents’ narratives and heightened during specific educational transitions, such as the Primary School Leaving Examination.

Multiple-Choice Versus Short Answer Items in Assessing Students’ Mathematical Skills: Evidence from Secondary Schools in Tanzania

Assessment plays a crucial role in improving teachers’ classroom practices. The information gathered from the assessment informs teachers about students’ learning progress. Multiple-choice items (MCIs) as one of the assessment tools have been used to assess mathematical skills at different educational levels in the world, including Tanzania. However, there has been an outcry that some pupils pass the Primary School Leaving Examination (PSLE) and join secondary education without mastering basic mathematical skills. This study aimed to (i) determine the extent to which MCIs and Short Answer Items (SAIs) assess students’ mathematical skills and (ii) determine whether there is a difference in assessing students’ mathematical skills in secondary schools between MCIs and SAIs. 387 Form I students from four public and two private secondary schools participated in the study. Data were collected using two equivalent mathematics tests and analysed using descriptive statistics. The findings revealed that MCIs had a high mean score of 30.44, and SAIs had a relatively low mean score of 26.2028. The study further found that only 7.49% of students-maintained scores in MCIs and SAIs, while 81.65% and 10.85% had scored higher in MCIs and SAIs, respectively. The study recommends that an effective assessment tool should contain more SAIs than MCIs due to their relative advantage in assessing students’ mathematical skills as opposed to MCIs

Meritocracy in Singaporean Educational System: Inequality in Admission to Secondary Schools

This paper explores the fairness of meritocracy concerning admission to secondary schools based on the Primary School Leaving Examination (PSLE) in Singapore. The Ministry of Education has consistently adopted the ideology of meritocracy as so to select talented students, stimulate effort, and optimize the allocation of rewards. The PSLE results can largely determine students’ educational tracks and even career orientation in Singapore. The paper shows how the principle of meritocracy works and how the government uses meritocratic belief in the education system. The paper argues that meritocracy has posed a threat to equality in admission to secondary schools in Singapore. The findings indicate that the meritocratic policy does not recognize both the importance of family SES and the gap between elite schools and neighbourhood schools in the Singapore education system. Students with wealthy and well-educated parents and students in elite schools are more likely to acquire better educational attainment, since they tend to gain more cultural capital from family and social capital from school. The principle of meritocracy fails to allocate opportunities fairly to students and can lead to inequality in education and exacerbate educational stratification.

Curriculum and assessment mismatch: Examining the role of images in literacy assessments

In light of the shift towards incorporating multimodality in the curriculum, it is of interest and value to examine the extent to which multimodal literacy is assessed in national and international literacy tests. This is so as to surface any misalignment between the two and highlight gaps which curriculum planners and assessment designers can address. Given the significant influence that the nature of assessment has in shaping classroom practices and teaching priorities, it is imperative that assessment is aligned with curriculum goals. Our paper examines the assessment items in the visual text comprehension in Singapore’s national examinations, the Graduate Certificate of Education Ordinary Level (GCE O’ Level) and the Primary School Leaving Examination (PSLE), for the English Language exam, as well as the literacy components of Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) and Progress in International Reading Literacy Study (PIRLS) reading items. We adopt the approach of an earlier study by Unsworth et al. (2019) and position our work as a replication study, extended to a new context. In adopting a common approach, we hope to offer an independent verification of the framework, analyses and findings from the earlier study and contribute towards consolidating and building up proven practices in the analysis of text-image relations within the field of multimodal studies. Our results similarly show an overall low proportion of test items that deal with images and image-language relations in the Singapore and international assessments. While the proportion of questions where the image is essential or supports answering the question is higher for the Singapore GCE O’ Level exams, the role of images in the PSLE and international assessments is limited, which suggests a greater focus on assessing multimodal literacy is required. As curriculum reforms to incorporate multimodality in education become more commonplace around the world, we argue that attention on assessment must be the next frontier of change.

PARENTAL RESPONSIBILITIES TOWARDS TECHNOLOGY INTEGRATION FOR OUT-OF-SCHOOL TIME LEARNING

This paper is an assessment of parental responsibilities in relation to supporting integration of technology in the context of out-of-school time (OST) learning. The assessment involved 78 parents from Arusha, Dar es Salaam and Mwanza regions in Tanzania. The aim was to discover the practices among parents in supporting their children to use educational technology in the home context. Criterion sampling applied and 11 best schools were picked from 11 divisions based on the 2015 NECTA Primary School Leaving Examination (PSLE) results. It is shown that parents have the potential to support the use of educational technology among children through procurement of educational technology, guiding material on the use of educational technology and giving instructions on the use of educational technology. Parents can also guide pupils on best to write summaries of key concepts, and also give questions on learned concepts. Moreover, parents are also potential for identifying useful programmes for use with educational technology thereby making children use technology for educational pursuits and avoid technology abuse and thus enhance their academic performance. The findings suggest the need for the schools to cooperate with parents and communities with a view to fostering the parental roles in the utilization of educational technology for OST learning. Further studies on how to improve the parental support towards the educational technology use by OST learners is inevitable in this digital world.

Validity of Standard Four Attainment Scores in Predicting Agriculture Primary School Leaving Examination Results

Establishing how current academic performance relates to future performance is key to helping educators fine tuning their assessment practice. At present high failure rate of Agriculture subject at Primary Leaving Examination (PSLE) has been of a great concern in Botswana. To determine the relationship between the standard four attainment scores and Primary Leaving Examination scores key in tracing the origin of failure observed at primary school leaving examination. The main focus of this study was to determine the validity of standard four attainment scores in predicting performance at standard seven Primary School Leaving Examination (PSLE). A quantitative study of correlational research design used secondary data scores obtained from Botswana Examination Council (BEC) to determine the correlation coefficient (r) between the two sets of scores. The study indicated that there was strong correlation, r=.8 at P= .00, between standard four attainment scores and PSLE scores, therefore the null hypothesis that states that there is no significant relationship between standard four attainment scores and PSLE scores was rejected. It was concluded that high failure rate obtaining at PSLE is related to poor foundation laid at lower levels. It is recommended that standard four attainment scores or performance should save as criterion for moving into upper primary (standard 5-7) and subsequently seating for PSLE.

Gender as a Factor in Predicting Academic Performance in Agriculture in Primary School Leaving Examination in Gaborone, Botswana

The study looked at gender as it relates to academic performance of students in Agriculture Primary School Leaving Examination in Gaborone schools. The research was quantitative ex-post facto type design. The sample composed of 3781 (1751 males and 2030 females) students who wrote PSLE in 2012. The sample was taken from 43 primary schools in Gaborone area which included private and government schools. The results which included students’ scores were obtained from Botswana Examinations Council academic records and were not manipulated in any way. The results were then subjected to testing using Statistical Package for Social Sciences at significance level of 0.05. An independent t-test was conducted to determine significance difference and value of -5.964 which is statistically significance (P = 0.00) obtained and therefore the null hypothesis that states that there is no significant difference between males and females was rejected. The analysis revealed that girls performed better than boys and moreover there is a significant difference between males and females’ academic performance. It was therefore, recommended that the Gaborone Regional Education office intensify research to establish how other variables such as location, parental support and economic status of parents contribute to poor Primary School leaving Examinations.

Computer-Assisted Instruction and Language Learning: Evidence from Mavis Computel’s English–Yoruba Talking Books

This article examines the effectiveness of computer-assisted language instruction using Mavis Computel’s English–Yoruba talking books and pen. Using a developmental design, 21 children, aged 10, from highly educated Yoruba families were divided into an experimental and a control group. The groups were subjected to a study session in the same venue and at the same time but in different classes for three academic terms. Both groups wrote the Yoruba paper in the compulsory National Primary School Leaving Examination written along with other students. Though the experimental group did well in the examination, the control group performed much better. The contents of the books are structured according to the NERDC curriculum. This methodological approach the talking books adopt to the teaching of Yoruba enables the users to teach themselves through imitation, repetition, and audio-visual content. This article encourages government collaboration in the further development of the talking books.

Strategies Used by Teachers of English in Public Schools to Enhance Pupils’ Performance on Primary School Leaving Examination in Magu District, Tanzania

Strategies Used by Teachers of English in Public Schools to Enhance Pupils’ Performance on Primary School Leaving Examination in Magu District, Tanzania

Fostering Creativity in the Classroom for High Ability Students: Context Does Matter

Researchers have argued for the importance of the classroom context in developing students’ creative potential. However, the emphasis on a performative learning culture in the classroom does not favour creativity. Thus, how creative potential can be realised as one of the educational goals in the classrooms remains a key question. This study measured creativity across three secondary schools using the Wallach-Kogan Creative Thinking Test (WKCT). A total of 283 students enrolled in the Express programme and 290 students enrolled in the Integrated Programme (IP) volunteered in the study. The same cohort of students took the 38-item WKCT twice; once at the beginning of Secondary One and then at the end of Secondary Three. Four aspects of creativity, namely fluency, flexibility, unusualness, and uniqueness, were investigated. Our analyses showed that (i) IP students showed a greater increase in scores over time when compared to Express students; (ii) when Programme and PSLE (Primary School Leaving Examination) were used to predict creativity scores in a multiple regression, the predictive power of Programme increased from Secondary 1 to Secondary 3 while that of PSLE decreased; and (iii) flexibility scores were more resistant to change than fluency scores. These findings suggest that the classroom context matters and that the removal of high-stakes examination can provide room for the development of creative potential.

Reading Aloud as a Technique for Developing Teachers’ Awareness of English Phonology

Reading Aloud as a Technique for Developing Teachers’ Awareness of English Phonology

English

This paper examines regional differentials in pass rates in Primary School Leaving Examination (PSLE) in Mainland Tanzania. In particular, the paper investigates the effects of pupil-teacher ratio (PTR), pupil-latrine ratio (PLR), pupil-classroom ratio (PCR), availability of electricity in schools, and secondary school and above education of women and men aged 15-49 years on the percentage of students passing the PSLE. The paper employs a multilevel framework using aggregate regional data from Basic Education Statistics in Tanzania (BEST) and Tanzania Demographic and Health Survey (TDHS). The results indicate that regional pass rates in PSLE are negatively associated with regional PTR and PLR, and that there are regional differences in these education resources. However, their effects were found to be statistically insignificant. Education of women on the other hand, was positively and significantly related to the pass rate in the PSLE. Accordingly, there is a need for formulating education policies that would promote the enrolment of women in higher education in Tanzania so as to ensure that children achieve progress in education and social economic development later in life. In addition, measures to ensure efficient allocation of resources are needed in order to address apparent regional disparities regarding access to essential education resources. Keywords : contextual analysis; efficient allocation; pass rates; primary school leaving examination; Tanzania

The Effects of Exposure to General Anesthesia in Infancy on Academic Performance at Age 12

Recent evidence from juvenile animal models has shown that exposure to anesthetic drugs above threshold doses during a critical neurodevelopmental window causes widespread neuronal apoptosis, resulting in irreversible brain damage and subsequent learning difficulties. The relevance of this to human infants having general anesthesia for minor surgery is unknown. In this pilot observational cohort study, we sought to determine whether children exposed to general anesthesia for minor surgery during infancy exhibited differences in academic achievement at age 12 years, as evidenced by (1) lower aggregate scores in the Singapore standardized Primary School Leaving Examination (PSLE) and (2) formally diagnosed learning disability, compared with children who were never exposed to anesthesia or sedation. We compared 100 full-term, apparently healthy children aged 12 years who were exposed to general anesthesia for minor surgery before age 1 at our institution with an age-matched cohort of 106 children who were never exposed to anesthesia or sedation. Parents of children completed a 20-minute telephone interview with questions regarding their children's medical history, school environment, and home environment. The difference in mean PSLE aggregate scores (3.0; 95% confidence interval [CI], -8.3 to 14.3) between exposed (197.0; 95% CI, 185.6-208.4) and control groups (194.0; 95% CI, 182.9-205.1) was not statistically significant (P = 0.603). The presence of formally diagnosed learning disability was 15% (15 of 100) in the exposed group compared with 3.77% (4 of 106) in the control group (P < 0.001). The odds ratio for a formal diagnosis of learning disability in those exposed to general anesthesia relative to controls was 4.5 (95% CI, 1.44-14.1). The odds of a formal diagnosis of learning disability by age 12 years in apparently healthy children exposed to general anesthesia for minor surgery during infancy were 4.5 times greater than their peers who had never been exposed to anesthesia. However, study precision was inadequate to detect a clinically relevant difference in PSLE scores.

Analysis of Pupils’ Difficulties in Solving Questions Related to Fractions: The Case of Primary School Leaving Examination in Tanzania

In this paper, analysis of the performance of candidates in Mathematics in Primary School Leaving Examination was conducted with the aim of highlighting difficulties encountered in solving fraction-related problems. The analysis has indicated that a considerable number of candidates could not perform correct operations related to fractions. They tended to confuse fraction concepts with whole number concepts. For instance, in questions involving addition of fractions, they were treating numerators and denominators as separate entities. Possible reasons for such difficulties in solving questions related to fractions include lack of understanding of appropriate procedures to apply in solving a problem, the complexity of the task, over-generalization of procedures even in situations which are inappropriate. It is recommended that a protocol analysis be conducted in order to gain a deep understanding of the thought process of candidates when attempting questions related to fractions so that teachers may use relevant teaching methods that would facilitate meaningful learning of fractions.

Let’s Leverage on Twitter Framework in Propagating Malay Proverbs (Peribahasa) to the New Generation. Our Proverbs: Use it! (Peribahasa Kita: Gunakanlah!)

Proverbs or better known as Peribahasa, in the Malay Language has been an integral component in learning and understanding the Malay culture. It is also part of the Malay Language curriculum to be imparted to our students during their primary, secondary education and even for their postsecondary education in junior colleges in preparation for the Primary School Leaving Examination (PSLE), Singapore-Cambridge General Certificate of Education Normal, Ordinary, Advanced Level examinations in Singapore. With the advent of today’s information & communication technology, raises the concept of New Media literacy among our youths. One of the commonly New Media tools that the majority youths in the ASEAN region, especially Singapore, have adopting is Twitter (http://twitter.com). Twitter is a micro-blogging service that allows users to tweet about any topics within the 140-character limit and follow others to receive their tweets. In this paper, the illustration of the twitter technology proposed by the technology librarian with national reference librarian (specialised in language development – Malay) are to explore, deploy and leverage on the capability to create a knowledge awareness and immersive model in propagating Malay Proverbs (Peribahasa) to the new generation within the Twitter sphere. This initiative is introduced to strategically spread them through the digital engagement among the new generation and at the same times expose the surface knowledge of peribahasa among the online community. Most language learners do not need even more passive input in form of texts, lectures or videos. This input is readily available in numerous forms on the Internet. Basically, they need is the opportunity to actively produce peribahasa language and the chance to use them as tool of communication. This addresses for instructional methods and tools promoting ‘active’ learning allowing to express themselves and interact in the target language and cultural. The paper will explores and discusses (i) on the technology - twitter, (ii) digital demo graph and cultural, (iii) the use of language (peribahasa), (vi) the framework and lastly (v) the benefit and return of investment.