KiasuParents - Parenting in Singapore

Hi everyone, im hoping to get admitted to RJC after my Os next year and so far I have A1s for everything except for English, and my current combination is triple science. I know the very basic for someone like me without HMT to even have a chance for RJC is to get 8 A1s. I'm rather struggling with my English grade, a constant C5 student for English but i managed to pull off a B3 for my end of year exams, hence the overall B4 grade. Does anyone know of a reliable way to jump my grade to A1? Does reading the news help? I've found the news rather ok to read except for the politics part, ive only little idea of what's happening in the euro economy since I've only started newspaper reading this November. Do I have to read politics news? I find it rather tedious to read something which I don't understand extensively. But if it's anything related to my English grade I'll will work hard towards it. Now what i need are ideas that can help me improve my English. I'm very determined to enter RJC for it's h3 physics and more. Please help

bandmate wrote:Hi everyone, im hoping to get admitted to RJC after my Os next year and so far I have A1s for everything except for English, and my current combination is triple science. I know the very basic for someone like me without HMT to even have a chance for RJC is to get 8 A1s. I'm rather struggling with my English grade, a constant C5 student for English but i managed to pull off a B3 for my end of year exams, hence the overall B4 grade. Does anyone know of a reliable way to jump my grade to A1? Does reading the news help? I've found the news rather ok to read except for the politics part, ive only little idea of what's happening in the euro economy since I've only started newspaper reading this November. Do I have to read politics news? I find it rather tedious to read something which I don't understand extensively. But if it's anything related to my English grade I'll will work hard towards it. Now what i need are ideas that can help me improve my English. I'm very determined to enter RJC for it's h3 physics and more. Please help

For starts, grammer/vocab can be improved by reading any good material (does not have to be news). It can even be story books.

To improve your content, reading news is important. It does not have to be political news. Read anything that interests you. O level English will not test you on the economic situation in the world, so read whatever that interests you.

Hope this helps for now.

Thanks victorian! That made me more relieved for now, I'll work on it from tomorrow onwards

In sec 3, I didn't really put in much effort for English. I believed that language papers cannot be prepared. So I got B3 in MYE, A2 in EYE, but still B3 overall. Wanting an A1 for O levels, my B3 grade was less than satisfactory. So I decided that I had to at least put in some effort in preparing English. I attended tuition at British Council and attended extra lessons (4 hours a week) in school. So that's kind of 6 hours of additional English class outside of curriculum hours. In class, we do all the usual stuff. On my own, I write one essay every week. So I'll be writing at least 2 essays a week. That pulled my grade to A1 for prelim 1. Continued doing the same thing for prelim 2 and got an A1 as well. However, I was still worried, as English is usually the elusive A1 in my school. After prelim 2, I decided to up my efforts. I subscribed to New York Times (you don't have to do that; you can just read straits time) and read the opinion section. Personally, I think that section is the one which teaches how to form an opinion based on an issue. As I prefer expository or argumentative, it was just the right thing I needed. In addition, I started writing essays everyday. I alternated between free writing one day, then situational writing the other day. I also alternated between comprehension a day and summary the other. Basically, I worked on English every single day. I handed in some of my essays to my teachers to grade, and tried to improve based on the feedback I was given. Two weeks before O levels, I began memorising vocabulary (if you need any recommendation, I used the vocabulary book for O levels or something like that by Longman). It certainly proved to be helpful, as 3 out of the 5 vocabulary questions were words I had learned from the book.

At the end, I got an A1 for English for O levels.

twilight wrote:In sec 3, I didn't really put in much effort for English. I believed that language papers cannot be prepared. So I got B3 in MYE, A2 in EYE, but still B3 overall. Wanting an A1 for O levels, my B3 grade was less than satisfactory. So I decided that I had to at least put in some effort in preparing English. I attended tuition at British Council and attended extra lessons (4 hours a week) in school. So that's kind of 6 hours of additional English class outside of curriculum hours. In class, we do all the usual stuff. On my own, I write one essay every week. So I'll be writing at least 2 essays a week. That pulled my grade to A1 for prelim 1. Continued doing the same thing for prelim 2 and got an A1 as well. However, I was still worried, as English is usually the elusive A1 in my school. After prelim 2, I decided to up my efforts. I subscribed to New York Times (you don't have to do that; you can just read straits time) and read the opinion section. Personally, I think that section is the one which teaches how to form an opinion based on an issue. As I prefer expository or argumentative, it was just the right thing I needed. In addition, I started writing essays everyday. I alternated between free writing one day, then situational writing the other day. I also alternated between comprehension a day and summary the other. Basically, I worked on English every single day. I handed in some of my essays to my teachers to grade, and tried to improve based on the feedback I was given. Two weeks before O levels, I began memorising vocabulary (if you need any recommendation, I used the vocabulary book for O levels or something like that by Longman). It certainly proved to be helpful, as 3 out of the 5 vocabulary questions were words I had learned from the book.

At the end, I got an A1 for English for O levels.

Wonderful effort and a well-deserved A1!

twilight wrote:In sec 3, I didn't really put in much effort for English. I believed that language papers cannot be prepared. So I got B3 in MYE, A2 in EYE, but still B3 overall. Wanting an A1 for O levels, my B3 grade was less than satisfactory. So I decided that I had to at least put in some effort in preparing English. I attended tuition at British Council and attended extra lessons (4 hours a week) in school. So that's kind of 6 hours of additional English class outside of curriculum hours. In class, we do all the usual stuff. On my own, I write one essay every week. So I'll be writing at least 2 essays a week. That pulled my grade to A1 for prelim 1. Continued doing the same thing for prelim 2 and got an A1 as well. However, I was still worried, as English is usually the elusive A1 in my school. After prelim 2, I decided to up my efforts. I subscribed to New York Times (you don't have to do that; you can just read straits time) and read the opinion section. Personally, I think that section is the one which teaches how to form an opinion based on an issue. As I prefer expository or argumentative, it was just the right thing I needed. In addition, I started writing essays everyday. I alternated between free writing one day, then situational writing the other day. I also alternated between comprehension a day and summary the other. Basically, I worked on English every single day. I handed in some of my essays to my teachers to grade, and tried to improve based on the feedback I was given. Two weeks before O levels, I began memorising vocabulary (if you need any recommendation, I used the vocabulary book for O levels or something like that by Longman). It certainly proved to be helpful, as 3 out of the 5 vocabulary questions were words I had learned from the book.

At the end, I got an A1 for English for O levels.

Congratulations Twilight for getting your well-deserved A1 for English!
And thank you so much for sharing your study tips. Yes, in languages, it is really hard work that counts. No short cuts.

Thanks everyone.

Another thing I find highly beneficial is to read examiners' report. Some teachers will flash it to their students (students are not allowed to retain a copy of it as it's supposed to be confidential) but others might not.
http://younisfarid.wordpress.com/
This site does have a lot of examiners' report. However, it is for the UK O levels. Though it's different, I highly believe examiners marking the UK paper and Singapore paper are either the same ones, or they have gone through similar training (speculation from similarities spotted in both Singapore and UK O levels examiners' report). Whatever that's pointed out there pertains to our local O levels as well.

My son usualy score B3 for English, any tips on how to score A in English for GCE O Level? All advice appreciated.

I used Wren and Martin. It's an old book, and teaches English the old style. E.g., What's an adverb?; How to use it?; How not to use it?; Drill questions.

The cover page can be seen at http://ascklee.org/English.html.

Other English books are also featured on the page.


Sincerely,
ascklee
Founder,
OpenlySolved.org