| |
SINGAPORE: Education Minister Ng Eng Hen has urged teachers to respond quickly to a wider spread of language abilities among future cohorts of students, even though the weighting of mother tongue in PSLE will not be cut.
In a letter to mother tongue teachers, Dr Ng said his ministry plans to do more - not less - for the subject in schools.
The Singapore Centre for Chinese Language (SCCL) has been tasked to train teachers to teach Chinese to a new generation of students who are more comfortable with English.
Over the next few months, it will increase the number of courses.
Dr Chin Chee Kuen, executive director, SCCL, says: "Our focus is on training up the child's oral proficiency, making it the foundation for the student to progress on to other skills like reading and writing."
"The mother tongue subject is undergoing a review, and there have been moves towards a more differentiated approach.
From 2012, all primary one students will be tested in their proficiency in mother tongue, at the start of the year. They will then be grouped with others at the same level, and taught the subject accordingly.
The Chinese language centre will develop the assessment tools, with the focus on assessing the student's oral abilities.
And in class, teachers could monitor the child's progress in mother tongue oral, and come up with suitable lesson plans based on how far he or she has progressed.
But one expert notes that an appropriate examination structure must also be designed.
Associate Professor Lee Cher Leng, Department of Chinese Studies, National University of Singapore, says currently there is no correlation between what is taught in class, and what is being tested.
Professor Lee says: "On the one hand, you have textbooks. On the other hand, the exam has nothing to do with the text. So all teachers do not know what to do. If they learn the text well, they're afraid of losing out on the real-life issues that they're supposed to prepare the kids, in terms of comprehension. But if they focus on that, the kids do not have a foundation of the phrases or the words to begin with."
Professor Lee also cautions that early assessments could lead to parents putting pressure on their children.
But the language centre was quick to stress that having a proficiency-based system does not equate to streaming.
- CNA/jy
|
