Education in Singapore-Is it really that bad???

Greetings to all. I am Wang Ri Xin a Secondary 2 student from Hwa Chong Institution. After reading the letter by Janelle, thoughts and questions about our education system began flourishing in our mind. There are certain things she mentioned that were really true however also I do agree with some of her ideas about our education system.

Singapore has a high literacy rate and almost all of us here have at least received primary and secondary secondary education. However, Singapore's education system have always been a highly debatable issue. People always say that students in Singapore study not for knowledge but for exams. Assignments and tasks when not graded would not be done properly while those being graded and affect our academic grades, we would do them within the best of our abilities. For example, this blog post that I am currently writing, I am writing it because I want my marks.

Janelle stated that the beauty of education is to ask "why" and that "why" has became a taboo word in schools. I do agree curiosity and an inquisitive mind in important for learning to take place. However, when we are really curios with something, we will go out and venture and find out for ourselves, that's when real learning takes place. Look at Albert Einstein, Thomas Edison, Isaac Newton, they asked "why" for many things but the reason why they are so successful is that in order to satisfy their curiosity and desire for more knowledge, they venture out and search for the answers to their questions. If you want to ask the question "Why?", then you must also ask yourself the question of "Why?". If you expect things to be spoon-fed to you, then what is the point of writing this article in the first place? The reason why the new generation are known as the strawberry generation because when things are not being spoon-fed to them, they would start ranting and complaining, but not take action and find out for themselves.

I personally do not find memorizing a problem but the most important part is whether you understand what you memorized. Memorizing plainly and memorizing with with understanding are greatly different. When you memorize with understanding that is when your knowledge taken in by your brain and that you how to apply what the facts you memorized. Furthermore, when you memorize with understanding thats when memorizing becomes something much easier. I do feel that Janelle's scope of our education is rather small. For example she only managed to look at primary school and secondary school education but what about JC and University education, what about GP in the A levels.

I think her letter to the Minister of Education is quite a well-crafted letter. Her tone and attitude clearly depicts that she is genuinely a student under the local education system. I think she used quite a number of good examples however ,thereare also some examples (why carbon is not a non-metal) that she used which I think are not good enough to question the local education system. Furthermore her tone and attitude gives me a feeling that she is not questioning the local education system but instead complaining about how hard her examinations are. Thus I think these are areas that she can probably improve on.

I personally thinkthat improvements to be made to our education would be adding in more skill-based questions, one of which would be inference and analytical skills. In terms of science, I think more applicational question can be added so as totest whether the student really understood the concept or not. Lastly, nowadays we students care too much about marks. Thus I would also like the Ministry of Education to take note of this and try to emphasize the study not for exams butfor knowledge and wisdom. Lastly, I also hope that our education system can turn us into someone not only intellugent but also courteous. The government should put greater emphasis on moral education. Lastly I would like to end off this post with a quote by Helen Keller, “One can never consent to creep when one feels the compulsion to soar” .