Recently I came across a 'complaint' letter from a mom in TODAY newspapers about how her son is asking her to buy teacher's guidebooks for all his school's subjects from the net, so that he can get all the answers from the guidebooks for his school workbooks. Apparently, her son claimed that alot of his classmates parents bought the guidebooks online and they always know the right answers to complete their workbooks.
She then went on to complain that the authorities need to ensure that these guidebooks are not readily available for purchase online, as it is unfair that these children get the advantage.
I was appalled to read something like that on the papers; not on the premise that children was getting the unfair advantage over others, but rather, how parents' kiasu-ism have 走火入魔 and have resorted to the easy way out to ensure that their child excel in school. I wonder what kind of values these parents are imparting to their children? Something to the tune of; it is important to always have the right answers and it does not matter how you get it. Or maybe getting the teacher's guidebook does not constitute as cheating as the parent have the license to the right answers to help them to coach their child at home.
As for the mom that wrote the complaint, she seemed more concerned about other children getting the unfair advantage (sounds like another kiasu parent who gets extremely concern when other children seem to be doing much better than her own), rather than being concerned that parents were imparting the wrong values to children.
So many thoughts crossed my mind when I read this article; these parents were just victims of the Singapore educational system, a system of meritocracy, a system where parents fumble to get their child ready for primary 1, ensuring that they have the necessary 'skills' and 'knowledge' before they enter primary school. A system where teachers will be calling you up to tell you that your child is lagging behind when your child got 95/100, while the rest of the children got 98-99/100 for their test. It is important to encourage children to give their best effort for everything that they do, however, is constantly telling the child that he/she is 'never good enough' the only way to get that message across?
There is something fundamentally wrong with the educational system when parents prepare children for education, rather than allowing what education is suppose to do in its definition; to develop the knowledge, skill, or character of students.
Education in Singapore has been confined to the four corners of subject content of math, english, chinese and science when children enter primary school and will be further confined when they reach higher levels. Late developers rarely get a chance in our system. They often get stream-lined in lower secondary, and most will not get a second chance unless parents can afford an overseas education during university.
Think about this quotes about education;
“The aim of education should be to teach us rather how to think, than what to think—rather to improve our minds, so as to enable us to think for ourselves, than to load the memory with the thoughts of other men.” ~Bill Beattie
“The one real object of education is to leave a man in the condition of continually asking questions.” ~Bishop Creighton
Is education in our local context really helping children to think for themselves, or encouraging them to ask questions? Maybe some things have improved these few years, but there is still alot of room for improvement. One way to start is that parents' need to take stock of their actions. I cannot understand why many parents are in a great rush, always anxious for a greater development in their child. Does it make a whole world of difference when the child is an early reader at 2 or 3? Is it really to the benefit of the child is he/she learns to read well ahead of their peers or are achievements like that there to feed their parent's ego? Is this something to be so proud of when a child in primary 3 is able to do primary 5 or 6 workbooks and assessments? And the one that really takes the cake is that of parents that send their child for gifted enrichment to ensure that they ace the gifted exams in primary 4.
I understand that parents all care for their children and want their best for their them. But surely this is not the way to ensure that your child gets ahead in life. We have to reflect by doing all of that, our child will indeed have a great future ahead of him/her. What good is a person to society if they are highly intelligent and are great academics, but have no regard for integrity, shows no responsibility for their actions or the world around them, no compassion for the poor, old and sick or have no respect for young and old. All they will care is for themselves. Is that how future going to look like? A vast population of selfish and conceited adults?
Despite all these whinge-ing about the education system in Singapore, my child will still go to in mainstream school when he enters primary school. The only difference will be that I will be that mom who will be concerned over the process rather than the product, will want my child to have a love of learning (most likely not acquired from school), will give my child ample time for fun and play, help my child to learn about life and hope that he will one day become that person of character and integrity.
So what if my child is average? What matters is that he will be happy. And I will not be expecting that he will become a teacher's pet anytime soon.
if those homework are not taken into account towards the final grade, i think those students who understand and work on their homework themselves might benefit more than those who merely copied from those guide books. BUT when it comes to tests and exams. I hope the teachers won’t be so stupid to use questions directly from guidebooks and assessment books in the market.
I agree with u that that’s the reality of the school system here. Everything is judged by the number of ‘ticks’ one have in their test paper.
Maybe the homework has some weightage in the final grade, as I don’t understand why a guidebook is needed by the parents. Can’t they just trust the teachers in school to do their job? Or does it really make the difference in their coaching if they have all the answers in the workbook.
agree with shirley.
guidebook is merely a reference point or for some a security blanket.
it does not equate that the students understood what was taught. pen and paper tests is just one form of assessment for learning. hence formative assessment is playing a bigger role now. but mindset of parents towards summative asssessment like exams must be changed.
it will take time.
exciting time.
.-= kole´s last blog ..Muses: A day of Randomness =-.
Well, as long as parent’s mindset towards summative assessment don’t change, nothing much changes. Ultimately it will be parent’s attitude towards results and learning that set the tone for the child’s experience in learning, on whether it will be a positive or negative one.
Although schools are making effort to move towards focusing on the process rather than the product (especially in the lower primary), the change of mindset in both teachers and parents are extremely slow. I’m also a parent who doesn’t mind if my children get average results in school. I’d want them to have fun and a love for learning. I’ve withdrawn my elder boy from the Kindy he was in and I told his teacher that the reason is bcos their school focuses too much on drilling and I want my child to learn thru play instead of being drilled with worksheets after worksheets. Guess what she told me? She said they changed their system to more drilling cos many parents want to see more worksheets and homework. After they’ve changed to this drilling system, many parents are very happy. You can imagine how disgusted I felt.
.-= Ing´s last blog ..Best Friends =-.
Teachers and parents set the tone for learning in the kids…if that does not change, nothing will change much in the education system
Kudos on your decision to withdraw Isaac from his Kindy! I will also do the same. Too many schools are like the one you mentioned, going for what the ‘customers’ wants rather than following the grain of early childhood education. These teachers and principals of schools are education professionals and they just ignore what they know about the development of children and prefer to go with the ignorance of the parents, all for the sake of making money.
Ing, i was quite stun when i saw your reply on the school ur elder boy is in. It’s so horrid to drill young kids with so many assignments! You made the right choice to withdrew him from that school. It could make things worst when the kid reached P6 because they will find learning a torture instead of fun.
Let me share one true story to all readers here. I witnessed a neighbour’s kid’s result going from excellent to fail many years ago. To the point that he had to withdraw from school for a period of time due to depression.
You see, he was an ace kid when he was in primary school because his mum forced him to do assessment books after assessment books. He had tuition packed over the weekends, so while my brother (very much younger than me but same age as the kid) was happily playing all over the playground and getting his hands and feet dirty everyday, that kid was busy studying at home.
True, that kid scored fantastic results in PSLE, much better than my little brother. However, my bro grew up to LOVE school and he always shared what he learn when he came home. He excelled in all subjects in Secondary while that kid who underwent drilling etc ended up suffering from depression at a later stage. So which learning style is worst in the long run?
When I met up with that kid recently, I realized he is in university now. Felt happy for him. My mum told me that his mum has decided to let him study at his own will after that depression period. See what happen? He did well even without gg thru drilling. ^_^ Guess that mum went thru the ‘lesson’ the hard way at the expense of her son’s psychological health.
I would want my boy to go thru learning via playing mode when he grows up.
Ing Reply:
June 27th, 2010 at 3:38 pm
>Shirley,
Drilling is definitely a terrible thing for young children. I’m glad that mum realised it in the end, but it’s sad for her boy to have to go through depression because of the pressure given.
.-= Ing´s last blog ..June Holiday Outings =-.
Lots of food for thought here. I think its a vicious cycle: The parents demands shape the education system, and the demands of the education system for mainly knowledge acquisition also make the parents scurry to push their kids harder. Right now I think teachers are stuck in the middle, having to try to “appease” kiasu parents’ demands, while trying to meet up to performance indicators, learning objectives, syllabuses etc. Its tough, I must say! I think the education system is trying to slowly make the move towards learning for lifeskills/character building etc, but its hampered by stumbling blocks like an exam-oriented system (since ultimately it seems what most people are concerned about are the certs, and what numbers there are on it :(), and the rote-learning culture that has been here for awhile.
From a teacher’s point of view, quite alot of students are very uncomfortable without spoonfed learning, even at the higher levels (Sec/JC. Just ask the teachers who teach project work!). They flounder when given more open-ended projects, and many times echo the sentiments of their parents, asking if the project was counted to their grades! Plus we have parents asking for more worksheets, asking for extra remedial classes (and worse still some of these are for students who don’t bother paying attention in class!).
So while we are making that slow, painful crawl towards lifelong learning, I think parents would really help to take the first step by encouraging learning through play, exploration etc at home, just like how you parents are doing! (Great job btw! And Rachel, I think your site would be instrumental in this aspect too.) This would help to set the stage for the way children would approach their learning as they move through our education system later on, and hopefully change our learning culture!
.-= Jus´s last blog ..You are my sunshine- =-.
So true..it is a slow process which I hope that will change for the better in the next 4-5 years