PSLE Preparations

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* Big disclaimer here : I am only sharing what we did to prepare for PSLE. It is by no means the reason why David did well for his PSLE. We can only give glory to God for his results. We are no experts, having only graduated 1 out of 7 children from PSLE. 6 more to go! 🙂 But since a few people have asked, I thought it would be nice to share our PSLE preparations, as well as have a record of it somewhere!

Those who have better ideas and methods, do comment so that everyone can gain from each other’s generosity.

Consistent work i.e. slow and steady wins the race

My motto for our homeschooling journey has always been, “Slow and steady wins the race”. Work done consistently and regularly is better than huge chunks of work done sporadically. And this is what I have tried to drum into the children. This is also why we do not follow the public school’s calendar, preferring to school all year round with a 6-weeks on and 1-week off schedule.

Curriculum used

As mentioned in previous homeschooling posts, we follow the Ministry of Education’s (MOE) syllabus and textbooks very closely from the moment they start Primary One (this was for the younger children). Especially for Maths, Science and Chinese. Why? Doing it this way ensures that both the children and I are familiar with the local syllabus and requirements.

For David, we had to do a little detour as we had started him out with curriculum from Bob Jones University Press and then realised that it could never prepare him for PSLE.

I know many other homeschooling families use American curriculum but in the final year or 2 (P5 & P6) will switch to the local curriculum and have to make sure that their child is familiar with it. There is also a rush to fill in the gaps that the US curriculum did not cover. With 7 children to teach, I simply do not have the time to do this. I’d rather take the “boring” route.

So, besides Bible and English, which we use Student of the Word (SOW), I chose to use all of MOE‘s recommended textbooks for Maths, Science and Chinese. Once we finish going through the textbooks, I hit  Popular Bookstore to suss out assessment books that I think are helpful.

Assessment Books Used

Here are the titles we have used and like :

1. Science: All of Janet Sim’s books (Challenging Science and 3-in-1 series).
2. Maths: Problem Solving Processes by Fabian Ng, Maths Companion by Andrew Er and Fan-Maths by Li Fang Lan.
3. English: Challenging 4-in-1 English and Excel in Comprehension.

Then there are the assessment books we used and didn’t like, too many to list here. But I used them all the same just to get them used to doing the daily work. Remember – slow and steady wins the race.

For Chinese, I rely a fair bit on the tutor to advise me the better books. She has been a godsend to our family.

Reading

Then there is reading.

I would pick a book that I think is appropriate and make him read me a chapter or I read him a chapter one to two times per week. He then narrates it back to me (a la Charlotte Mason but not quite :P). I had previously assumed that he would have understood the passage he had read since he was able to narrate it back to me.

But it was not so in our experience. Or maybe I am doing it wrong? Anyhow, I still did it the “old fashioned way” and would ask him questions pertaining to the passage just to make sure that he understood. This would count towards practising for the Oral component of the English paper as well.

Tuition*

Yes, we do use tuition as one of the tools in our homeschool and definitely for our PSLE preparations.

I do not see why homeschoolers need to shy away from tuition. We do not have to do everything ourselves just because we are homeschoolers. More power to you if you can teach all subjects without external help. But in our case, we needed and wanted the extra help. Tuition is just a tool in our homeschool. Just like how TV can be a very useful tool when you have lots of little ones at home.

All the children start Chinese tuition at age 5 and I have largely the Chinese tutor to thank for doing a good job with them. But we did it on our own for the other 3 subjects until the end of last year.

How You Answer is More Important Than What You Know i.e. KEYWORDS

I had come to realise that I was not able to teach David HOW to answer his Science Paper 2 questions. Often times it is not that he did not know the answer but that he wasn’t answering it the way he should.

Well, I did not know the way he should be answering the questions either since I am not MOE-trained nor do I have any Science teacher friends.

The solution was tuition. He would be taught the way!  😛 It would be so silly to lose marks just because we are not answering questions the way the powers that be want them to be answered, isn’t it?

As for Maths, although I actually took A and E maths in secondary school and got As in them, I am largely a terrible Maths student. Don’t ask me how I got my As! So there was no way I could help him in Maths by the time he hit Primary 5. Henson is the Maths expert but sadly his schedule does not permit him to teach David. He doesn’t even have time to mark his work 🙁 So again the solution is tuition.

God Provides

While I was wondering which tuition centre I should send David to, a friend recommended her sons’ Science tuition teacher. Thank you, Sam! And guess what? The tutor ran the tuition centre from the bomb shelter unit at the next block to ours! And this Science tutor ran the Centre with a Maths tutor!

How cool is the providence of God?

David could just go to and fro from Maths and Science tuition by himself! It wouldn’t interrupt my schedule with the younger ones at all! I am still marvelling at His provision!

Daily Schedule

Here’s our daily schedule for all school-aged children :

After breakfast, we do our Bible (SOW for the older ones). Then we proceed to complete the work assigned each day, covering all 4 subjects except Science which is only done Mondays to Thursdays. They all work independently, coming to me only if they do not understand what is required. Usually, all work is completed before lunch and I will grade their work in the afternoon. I will then go through their work and correct/teach what they do not understand. Then we would be done for the day.

This schedule is adhered to rain or shine except on their birthdays and public holidays. We school 4 weeks and take 1 week off. (This schedule had to be changed to 6 weeks on and 1 week off when David moved on to using curriculum from Abeka.) We also take 2 weeks off for Christmas, and 1 week off for Chinese New Year.

This way, we do not forget too much of what we have learnt and we do not have to rev up our engines too hard to get re-started after each break.

Test Papers

By the time June rolled around, he would have finished up all his P6 syllabus. So, I would pull out the Top Schools’ Exam Papers to practice. We did a test paper and review it daily. (Please note: This is only for David, not the rest of the children and only for the PSLE year.)

Oral and Listening Comprehension

We only practised this formally with a book** I found in Popular (sorry, I can’t remember the title since I forgot to file it in my files 🙁 ) after June since we had been doing read alouds regularly. Again, there is a format for doing this. One can’t just randomly start talking about the picture given. And the book did teach it. I hope I would be able to find it when it is time for the next child to take PSLE!

That’s it

I don’t think I have anything more to add. If there is something you want to know which I did not touch on, do comment or email me and if I know the answer I will let you know.

*I realised I wasn’t clear about this – we only sent David for Maths and Science tuition in Primary 6. Before that we were plodding on on our own, using the assessment books I listed.

** The book is called Just Oral Practice and Just Listening Comprehension. It is a 2-in-1 book. The book is divided into 2 with half concentrating on Oral and the other half on Listening Comprehension. Sadly it is no longer available. 

UPDATE  2017:

In 2015, the format for the English Oral component was changed. The child no longer talks and describes a scene depicted, Instead, the picture now has only a SINGLE item (eg picture of a bottle of vitamins or bicycle or library). The child will have to talk about that item with prompts by the examiner.

In 2017, the format for the Chinese Oral component has been changed to substitute a static picture with a video clip. The child is to read the “passage” off the screen and then watch a video clip related to the passage. Questions will be asked based on the video.

RELATED POSTS

What’s After PSLE?
Post PSLE Homeschooling FAQs
Choosing Our High School/Secondary School Curriculum
Tuition
Take Slow, Small and Steady Steps to Achieve Your Goals
Our Homeschool Schedule

*** Post Updated 20th August 2017 ***

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