As we come to the end of week 7, I would like to first start with my thoughts on the class progress.
As I have mentioned this week, 7 weeks have flown by so quickly and we are on to CA1 next week. Looking back on these few weeks, I am disappointed to say that our progress as a whole has taken one step backward. Comparing how you were last year as compared to this year, we were much better in our classroom discipline and class unity last year. In order to take the first few steps to do well for academics, character education is important. Class spirit and self-discipline are the key to enable quality work to be done and for you to be motivated. Without motivation, there is no desire to be disciplined and know what your goals are. Just like Diane Miller in the CA1 Practice paper comprehension open-ended passage, we need to strive for our goals and be the best we can. You need to know that PSLE is no small matter and is your first defining step in your future. What course you do and which school you go will perhaps make the first big impact in your life. 6 YEARS of schoolwork cannot be revised through in just 1 or 2 months. You have to really work hard this year. Every year is in fact, crucial.
I will be clamping down hard on misconduct and if you are not motivating yourself enough, I will come after you to make sure you start now and work hard. Little actions like doing your corrections well, doing your best to remember the skills I teach you to answer questions and your own self-discipline are important parts of teaching and learning in the classroom. Do not disappoint me and the love ones around you as we are all having the belief and hopes that you will mature and do well for each and single examinations. 100% passes is still the goal I have held on from last year.
On to recapping about the important points for today and this week:
English
We have officially finished the first 3 units and have done our filing. Parents, please go through and sign the content page for Units 2 and 3 and have your child to return back to me for acknowledgement on Monday, 25th February. Thank you. :)
For synthesis and transformation, I have spent time to go through the key skills for each specific structure. Especially for direct to indirect speech, I have given you the 3 golden rules that you NEED to remember! There is no point if I were to repeat time and time again but when I asked some of you today about the skills, you could not answer. Here it is again.
Example: Mother asked Shirley, "Have you reminded Father to come back home for dinner tonight?"
STEP 1: Look at the tense of the verb outside the direct speech. In this case here, the verb "asked' tells me that I need to change the tenses of the verbs inside the speech. (Present to past tense) (Past tense to past perfect tense)
STEP 2: Look at the punctuation. Always remember that the subject comes first followed by the verb in a grammatically correct sentence. In this case here, "?" would mean that I need to rearrange the structure with the subject to come first followed by the verb. Subject is 'you' and verb is 'have reminded'.
STEP 3: Look at the speech and highlight the words to be changed. (You --> she) (have reminded --> had reminded) (tonight --> that night).
The answer should be: Mother asked Shirley if she had reminded Father to come back home for dinner that night.
Moving on to the grammar cloze, editing for spelling and grammar and comprehension cloze, we have all looked at the sources and saw that they are taken from the newspapers. You do need to read very widely, especially on newspapers and information text. Information texts describe objects or people and are informative.
They key for comprehension skill is to first, read the passage once through with the blanks. Then, highlight the key words. Can any of the answers be found? Draw the arrows, look out for tenses and whether it is singular or plural. Are there key grammatical structures such as verbs to be in the plural form, present tense after certain words? You need to take note. These are the essential skills. The other skill is for you to read and remember specific vocabulary words that are associated with newspaper articles and information texts content.
For comprehension open-ended, we went through the use of the pre-reading thinking activity each time. For today's passage, we can tell the story based on the questions themselves. By analysing the questions, you do not only copy out what is in the question but think deeper and really analyze. For example:
Q. What did Miller achieve at the 2007 World Transplant Games in Bangkok?
What I know
- Miller competed at the 2007 World Transplant Games in Bangkok.
- She was a competitor / athlete.
- She had a transplant before / injured before.
- She won some awards / medals.
This is how we break down the question and from here, we can really analyze the story.
Q2. Explain fully who the person whose name was scrawled across the swimming cap was.
What I know
- Miller was probably a swimmer.
- There is a name of someone on her swimming cap.
- This person is of important and significance to be on her cap.
- It could be her organ donor / family members / someone who has helped her greatly.
Based on the examples given to you, we can see that the story has developed from just 2 questions themselves. This is really a useful techniques and those who have used it for their practice paper tend to do better in terms of marks. Like what I have said, you cannot expect yourself to have a huge jump in marks so quickly. Practise and work hard and continue to use this strategy to help you for both the comprehension passages. For the comprehension open-ended, make use of the blank space at the last page or a space in Booklet A to jot down What I know (WIK) and What I want to know (WIWTK). You can use point forms.
Science
The workbook has been cleared and returned. You can start revising and pay attention to those important questions I have highlighted to you. Look at your mistakes. Work on the way you answer questions. Are your answers too general and short? As proven last year, questions in the examinations may include what you learnt in your workbook, topical worksheets done in class and the practice papers. So please take the time to go through them.
With the time constraint, English practice papers have been cleared first. We will complete filing for Science by Tuesday together with the energy worksheet and CA practice papers which are with me and will be marked. Start to revise on your workbook, textbook content and P3-P5 topics first.
Items to pass up on Monday:
- Parents' Signature for Unit 2 and 3 files for English
- Science Revision 1 Worksheet
Enjoy your weekend and work hard,
Sincerely,
Mr Nelson Ong
No comments:
Post a Comment