Stage 1: Learning from Testing Experts in USA
It all started with some high calibre MOE officials attending a course in the USA which taught them that a good exam should be one that differentiates the A from the A*. Thenceforth, much effort then went into the PSLE to make it a good differentiating exam. There
MUST always be 2 or 3 questions at the higher end of the difficulty spectrum to sieve out the A* from the hoi polloi.
Stage 2: Applying What Was Learnt Without Using Good Judgment (nor Critical Thinking)
When you have a hammer, everything looks like a nail.
Very soon, the school preliminary PSLE exams in Primary 6 followed suit. Not long after, schools began this practice of setting differentiating exams at every CA and SA from Primary 1 to Primary 5.
By right, Teachers should teach 100% of the material tested. The children would then differentiate themselves along the spectrum of questions based on...
(1) their ability to follow lessons
(2) their drive to excel
(3) their ability to work hard
The proportion of A* versus A needed to follow the bell curve, else, the exam is not properly differentiating. Indeed, at the very extreme of such reasoning, I've even been taught that if even 1 student scores 100% on an exam, then it isn't differentiating enough because the exam is unable to pinpoint with exactitude whether that 100% student's ability lies just above the 100% or way beyond the 100%.
The problem though is that the bell curve (or normal distribution curve) is a natural statistical feature of large populations. Issues arise when we decide to force smaller populations into the bell curve. School populations are quite small indeed, especially when you're looking at a single level at any one time for any one exam.
Stage 3: The Catalysts For Frenzy (Harder Exams and Wealthy Parents)
Soon, teachers began to realise that if they tested ONLY all that they had taught, the entire top class would get 100%. Teachers began to feel that they'd done something wrong. Principals and HODs well versed in the GOLDEN WAY OF DIFFERENTIATING EXAMS began to look askance at these Teachers who set such easy exams. Oh dear me... your exams are too easy. You can't be a very good Teacher since you can't set good differentiating exams.
It didn't take long for some teachers to begin sliding into the exams that they devised, questions meant for later levels, in order to ensure that not too many students in the tested level can score 100%.
Now, enter the initially teeny weeny percentage of those wealthy parents who had been enriching their children since egg and sperm. THEIR kids had been taught stuff from later levels. These little kiddy biddies had been taught the stuff that Teachers did not teach. This small population of students became the A* students on these exams that tested material from later levels.
These A* students (who had been pre-taught) went to the top class.
In view of the many benefits inherent in being streamed into the A class, parents (like me) of other intelligent children began to analyze exam papers to figure out why our own intelligent children were scoring poorly in school (despite being conscientious and intelligent). Once we realized that the exams contained questions that Teachers had not taught, but that other children had learnt in enrichment, we began to ask...
"Hey... my child can score too if he had been given the same enrichment. The only reason why my child is not in the top class is that I denied him enrichment in order to grow his self-reliance. It's MY fault for failing to enrich him."
Stage 4: Less Wealthy Parents Jump On the Bandwagon
These less wealthy parents (like me) have now a Hobson's Choice -
(1) Save money on enrichment and watch their children languish (whilst they learn self-reliance)
(2) Spend money on enrichment to give their children a fair chance in the system (even though they never develop self-reliance thereby)
Of course, there are the few parents, like me, who know how to help their children study beyond what Teachers have taught, without resorting to enrichment. Thank God Little Boy learnt self-reliance (by self-studying material his Teacher didn't teach but did test) and didn't suffer too much academically at all.
Less wealthy people exist in far greater numbers than wealthy people.
Once the less wealthy people understand that wealthy people's children do well (and can get into the best funded top schools... and get into the best classes) because they learn (at enrichment) what the schools don't teach (but do test), it means hordes of people will sign their children up for enrichment in order to give their children a fighting chance. I mean HORDES.
A Mastercard survey done in April shows that 50% of households pay for enrichment. The Asian Development Bank reports that 90% of students have enrichment/tuition of some sort. These figures come from Chua Mui Hoong's article in The Straits Times, 22nd September 2013. I have reproduced part of it
HERE.
The Limitations of Tuition
Of course, children differ in motivation levels and attitude.
In Dr Pet's English Enrichment, I have intelligent children who perform poorly for whatever the reason may be.
Little J is one of them.
Little C is another one. I am now collaborating with Little A's mommy to see if we can turn Little A's attitude around. All these children can perform at higher levels if not for their poor attitudes. Getting tuition is not enough to get good results.
This is no different than in the past, when Teachers taught 100% of what they tested. Going to school was not enough. The children needed to work hard too.
That which is different now, is this. A hardworking and intelligent child who goes to school (but has no enrichment) will do as badly or worse than a lazy and intelligent child (whose days are filled with enrichment).
Explaining MOE's Delusions
There are people at MOE who have spent their whole lives working there. To acknowledge the Tuition Craze as a real phenomenon whose roots lie in key MOE practices, is to shake their sense of professional self-worth to its very core. This is very very painful emotionally. Have you ever met people who refuse to believe that their spouse has died? For these people, to believe the reality of a spouse's death is just too emotionally painful. They delude themselves otherwise.
This happens to the most intelligent of people. The human capacity for self-delusion is not to be underestimated. It is a powerful psychological force. Even in the last days of his Arab Spring, Mubarak gave press interviews asserting that his countrymen loved him very much. He was not lying. He really believed what he was saying.
Either MOE is lying through its teeth when it says that schools are run on the basis that tuition is not needed... or it really is self-deluded. I am more inclined to believe that MOE is delusional instead of lacking in integrity. The first is understandable. The second is unlikely because the people who run the civil service do usually demonstrate high levels of integrity (barring the rare Ng Boon Gays and the Peter Lims, the Lee Lip Hongs with a fetish for underaged prostitutes and that CPIB Director who embezzled money).
Whether delusional or lacking in integrity, MOE's response to parent feedback for the past decade has been as Chua Mui Hoong writes (in her 22nd September Straits Times article
Tuition Too Prevalent To Ignore)
"... this rather ostrich-like way of tackling the issue: not needed, not an issue, go away."
No matter what parents raise to MOE (bad textbooks, too large classes, testing beyond what is taught) the response is
"not needed, not an issue, go away." It really shouldn't be called Ministry of Education. It should be called
Ministry of the Ostrich Endside, instead. See picture below.
The least Indranee Rajah could have done was to give what MOE told her some critical thought, before making a pronouncement that sounds a bit like "The world is flat" to the ears of Singaporean parents. Every time politicians make such ridiculous pronouncements, they destroy trust with the populace.
Tackling the Root
Stop chasing student differentiation. Instead, set a reasonably high bar of performance at every level and strive to bring as many of the children up to that bar as possible. Ensure that Teachers are capable of and have the resources to teach up to that bar. In this scenario, only the very weak will need tuition help. The bright ones (like my son) can learn all they need from Teachers.
The wealthy parents who want to hot house their kids to enter university at age 12, can do so on their own money and their own time. Their kiasu behaviors should not be rewarded by having their kids gain entrance into top classes and top schools. Other parents whose kids wanna be stretched can stretch them on their own time and own money for no other gains but the sheer joy of learning and getting good at something. Those who are gifted at something thus practise their giftings for passion alone... not in order to get into top schools and gain top scholarships.