Singapore shifts education focus from grades to learning in move to reduce stress on students

The Ministry of Education or MOE in Singapore announced a raft of changes at the primary and secondary levels, including reducing school-based tests by nearly a quarter- as part of a new phase of education for the 21st century they called ‘Learn for Life,’ reports The Straits Times.

The decision will lessen the stress for younger pupils, whose first two primary school years will be without exams or weighted tests, the daily reported.

“To meet the challenges of an increasingly complex world, our students need to be lifelong learners,” the MOE said in a media statement adding that to nurture lifelong learners, it needs to help the students discover more joy and develop stronger intrinsic motivation in learning.

By 2021, there will be no more mid-year examinations for ‘transition years’- primary 3, primary 5, secondary 1 and secondary 3 – to enable the students a chance to adapt to the new subjects.

With the freed time- estimated at three weeks every two years- teachers are expected to explore more meaningful learning.

From 2019, the report book will no longer present certain academic indicators such as class and level positions of the students enabling each student to focus on their learning progress, and discourage excessive peer comparisons. Marks will also be rounded off to whole numbers.

As the weighted assessment will be removed for P1 and P2, the MOE will guide schools to use qualitative descriptors to report students’ learning at these levels.   

The moves to make assessments less high-stake and reduce excessive competition resulted from an evolution of almost 20 years’ worth of work, not something that happened suddenly, Wong Siew Hoong, director general of education at MOE told The Straits Times.

The other two aspects beside assessments in the ‘triangle’ of teaching and learning are curriculum and pedagogy, said Hoong. Over the years, MOE has made key shifts in the areas including reducing subject content to removing school rankings, he added.