07 October 2021
A ruckus has been raised yet again over difficult PSLE math questions.
The new PSLE scoring system with the use of bands rather than absolute scores is designed to reduce the tendency of the PSLE to over-discriminate and over-classify the academic ability of our children. The new scoring system is designed to reduce the impact of, for instance, leaving one or two questions blank or incompletely answered.
One message that we can tell our math PSLE hopefuls is that they should not feel discouraged if they cannot answer a couple of questions, as long as they have put in their best effort and have attempted the rest of the questions to the best of their ability.
Nonetheless, we should take the feelings of these young kids into account, as they may not be able to understand the rationale of being posed such challenging questions.
After all, the vast majority of students are not competing for some prestigious scholarship or a spot in some highly exclusive educational institution. It is more important to have a variety of questions that test different skill sets rather than one or two extraordinary tough questions.