Week 6

Dear all,

This is a short week and with the slow ease back into the school curriculum, let us go through some of the key points we have been through last week so far:

English:

We went through comprehension MCQ and used the strategy of the pre-reading thinking activity to help us understand the passage through the questions. 'What I know' and 'What I want to know'. For both comprehension open-ended and MCQ, this strategy is useful and helps us to break down the passage first through reading the questions and understanding the questions.

Always find time to write down 'What I know' and 'What I want to know' first before going through the passage. Do not be afraid of time wastage as this will definitely help you to score. It is also important to note that we need time to perfect and practise this skill. Do not expect that this strategy will definitely work instantly. We have had 3 practices so far based on the first 3 units for English. You need to also practise this skill as you carry out your own revision at home.

We went through phrasal verbs (verbs paired with a preposition) and this is a common item for grammar or vocabulary questions so you need to perfect this and have more practice on this aspect.

We also went through News Stimulus today and the comprehension cloze. The key idea for today's lesson was learning about high-risk occupations and the importance of these jobs of the society. The example cited in the news article was about mining and how miners risked their lives while providing valuable resources for the society. Without these miners who put their lives on the line in order to uncover resources, we will enjoy the resources we have today. As such, they are also paid highly. In the article, we explored the dangers of mining and how a mine explosion in China killed many victims.

Please read through newspaper articles and be updated with current knowledge and affairs as this will aid you greatly for comprehension cloze, grammar cloze, vocabulary cloze and editing for spelling and grammar.

For composition, the results for the second unit's continuous/scenario writing was not as ideal as compared to the first unit picture composition. Your strengths lie in picture composition. Many of you need to use guided pictures to give you a better focus so knowing yourself, choose the one which gives you better confidence and ability to do well.

For continuous writing, you have to be able to really analyze and break down the scenario before you write. Many of you are not using the main points of the questions and as such, write out of point. Also, many of you are still not elaborating and writing about the supporting details.

For example: The topic for this composition was "Once, you were treated unfairly by someone in your family. You were blamed for something which was actually not your fault."

The keywords are treated unfairly by someone in your family and blamed for something not your fault. You must focus on who the main characters are first. Some of you wrote about being blamed by friends instead. Some of you did not focus on being wrongly accused. There was no mention that someone had accused you and most importantly, HOW and WHY were you accused?

Another key skill for those with major spelling mistakes and find spelling difficult, stick to a usual group of words and keep practising these words over and over again so that you can use them for all compositions. Some of you used the introduction I have given to you as the focus writing for Unit 1 for this composition and that is good. Remember to edit and adapt what I have given to you! Do not just copy blindly. Use it for the specific scenarios.

Science:

You need to be very familiar with the energy conversions. Identify the stages and how many arrows are needed. Then, look at each stage and see if there are more than 1 energy at that stage.

Sources are energy are objects in which the type of energy gets its energy from.
Example: Fuels, Sun, Food, Electricity, etc.

To end off this post, here are some last few words:

• Do not forget to finish up your homework of Vocabulary Cloze and MCQ to be submitted tomorrow.
• Dear parents, I do apologize if I have not been prompt in  replying your queries and messages as it has been an extremely busy few weeks so far. I will find the time to reply and send some of your child's feedback and progress through the email or phone in the next few weeks.
• This is week 6 and week 8 will be your CA1. Please study hard!

Enjoy the photos of the Chingay Parade for P6.

Thank you,
Sincerely,
Mr Nelson Ong