Thinking aloud

Hi anyone reading this blog. Does anyone know what is the rationale for having a major exam after 6 years of education? Why does our country adopt that education system? Why 12 years old? Was there a study done or evidence to show relationship between the maturity of their cognitive abilities at 12 years old which relate to their readiness to sit for a major placement exam?

Why not 13, 14 or 15? I'm actually very curious to know. Sure, I do understand that the purpose of the major exam is for placement purposes but I'm not clear why it must be done when the child is 12.
I think it's too early. 6 years in primary school is too short to be able to fully develop a child holistically. Why can't we have 10 years of education and then give them a major exam?

If "all schools are good schools" tthen there should not be a need to group all the "smart" pupils in one secondary school. And if the idea of putting "smart" kids together is to pitch teaching, then there can always be class banding within a school to ensure differentiated teaching. If all schools are good schools, there should also be fairness in the distribution of resources.

If there is no need to group "smart kids" in secondary school then there is no pressure on parents to aim for their kids to get into these high ranking schools.

The major exam is important. That I know. Yes. I do agree we need exams. They are important. Is there a reason why we can't have it later... Maybe when they turn 15 or 16?

Seeking knowledge should be done meaningfully, at a pace where the child discovers facts rather than have these facts drilled into them. It takes time. It's easier for a teacher to stand there and tell them facts and then make them practice and then test them in the same way they have been practicing. But what's the point?

The most important skill any child needs to learn is how to seek knowledge. These skills take time to teach or rather takes a longer time to be discovered by the child. Learning is no longer just about content. How you learn helps you to pick up important skills that stays with you forever.

Imagine this. A teacher teaches a child about money. She uses worksheets and only worksheets to get pupils to be familiar with exam style questions. Sure they might be able to answer exam questions but beyond exams, this knowledge is meaningless.

Compare this to a project based lesson. A teacher plans a trip to the supermarket or gets her students to work in groups and plan a budget for a birthday party.
Not only do they learn content but also collaborative skills, reasoning skills, planning skills etc. These are skills they need to have in a real life setting. But the latter takes a longer time then drill and practice.

Thankfully, Education here is moving towards that. We are realizing that experiential learning, inquiry based learning helps knowledge building. I truly believe we are on the right track. We are doing it at lower primary but imagine the exciting projects that can be done at primary 6. For example, They can learn to set up a little company and learn to manage a certain capital given. These projects spark interest and we know once pupils are interested, they are capable of anything.

But in reality what do our p6 pupils do? They do practice papers. Other than sharpening their ability to answer exam style questions, what other skills do they learn which inspires them, motivates them and challenges them? Yes they learn to persevere and press on even when things get challenging because preparing for a major exam is indeed stressful. But sometimes after all the effort and things don't go well, it might just mean they don't do well in exam setting but does not mean they have not learnt. And honestly I think 12 years old is a little too young to understand the rationale of a major exam. Most of them would probably want to do well to make their parents proud.

We might have just killed many budding creators, entrepreneurs and creative minds by giving them a premature major exam. This is the age where they should learn to be curious, to test out any ideas that comes to mind, to learn with their peers, not a time when they peg their self worth on how they score for a major exam.

Many school system overseas do not have any major exam until the pupils have at least 10 years of education in school. They use this 10 years to spark the love for learning without having to deal with exam stress.

I might be wrong. Of course there are many factors to consider when we talk about major exams. Changing one thing will affect a million and one things. It's not easy. There is no solution which is able to solve all problems. In fact, introducing something might cause more unwanted repercussions.

However I believe there are so many smart individuals, policy makers out there who are actually in a position to make a difference. I hope they do. Otherwise it just proves the fact that our education system has not been educating these "qualified" people with the right skills to look at things critically. They were probably busy preparing for exams when they were in school.