Today’s Mailbag in the Life section of the Straits Times presents a mixed bag of views written by Singapore parents about the recent preliminary recommendations made by the Primary Education Review and Implementation (PERI) Committee. However, in my view all of them except one, sidestepped the real issue of the usefulness of written examinations or tests as a gauge of meaningful learning.

The first writer obviously thinks that the way to go around the examinations is through being “diligent” and “consistent”. It is interesting she was angry at the Straits Times Money editor, Ignatius Low, who argued in favor of examinations perhaps because he had found a way of doing well in the examinations through cramming! If anyone can do well in examinations by cramming, and let us face it that this does happen regularly, what value is the examination in terms of real learning? If the writer argues that examinations teaches diligence and consistency, then what is so bad about cramming as it can be argued that it is learning how to tackle a problem (the examinations) in a smart and efficient way? The point here is that both have something in common about the examinations. The examinations heavy syllabi itself don’t seem teach students anything of real value intellectually. The supposed good values of the examinations is in the building of character which I am certain can be done in some other way. They can be learned without examinations.

The lack of meaningful intellectual learning is further raised by another parent, again perhaps unconsciously. She wrote:

“Learning is a lifelong process. It is not for exams. A person who does well is not necessarily smarter than the one who does not.

How often have we seen children keeping away their textbooks once the exams are over? They think they do not have to learn anymore.”

While one may argue that children are not the best judges of things, this is an example where children have realized the meaninglessness of examinations. They are the ones who go through it and the accompanying stress that comes with it. They know deep down all of the examinations is almost for nothing really meaningful in terms of their intellectual development.

The next writer who is a parent of three boys. wrote about how her second son almost had a mental breakdown when he was going to sit for the PSLE “because of all the worksheets and remedial classes his school insisted on.” She had to tell his teacher and school principal to “back off”. This is one parent who dares go against the grain. Many Singapore parents would have just swallowed the same from their children’s school.

A third parent is against the scrapping of the examinations for Primary 1 and 2 pupils as recommended by PERI. She said:

“Kids are highly adaptable and having exams early gives them an idea of what the experience is about. Parents can also use the exams during the first two years of primary school as a testing ground and guide them in preparing for more important exams in the future.”

Here is a parent saying that the purpose of having examinations is so that students know how to take examinations! This shows how the Singapore school system which is examination-dependent has become a farce! It is not about learning. It is about the examinations only!

Another parent, wrote about how she used to do “intensive training” for her children only when the exams came around but has had to change her intensive training routine into a year round thing when “small tests” became the norm in Singapore schools.

Lastly, still another parent argued for the retention of the examinations only because the “small tests” or “topical tests” as has been recommended by PERI, “can be draining or stressful.” She went on to say that there is “no difference in stress levels when it comes to holding examinations or small tests.” She was the only one who seemed to have considered alternative modes of assessment but in her view these alternative modes, like project work, “is subjective” and “not an objective and transparent system of assessment.”

A careful reading of these letters show that none of them to argue for the need for high stakes examinations for what they were purported to be for in the first place, which is they are tests of the intellectual knowledge and skills that the students have learned in school. We would expect that since the issue is examinations this ought to be the first thing addressed yet while they quibble over small or big written tests none seems to have a view of whether the examinatiuons really test anything worthwhile. Even PERI falls into the same mindset. The reason given by PERI for having or not having examinations is because of the stress levels not because whether such written tests really offer any valuable assessment of any meaningful learning taking place. The real issue is, therefore, sidestepped. Again as I have stated in my last post, this is not a surprise since the PERI has largely consulted the same people who have perpetuated the exam culture in Singapore.