Solve This P6 Maths Question Within 5 Minutes...

[Vulcann]

  On 9/7/2011 at 12:42 AM, Bavarian said:

Why the hell do they need so many chairs for?

 

Haha in a different context, say in a job interview, what you have just said could get you full marks!

 

Read somewhere supposedly about a real incident and IIRC it was something like that:

 

A US college was holding an essay test and the topic was "What is courage?".

 

A male student scribbled something on the test paper and handed it up within 30s.

 

He got full marks from the professor.

 

So how exactly did he earn it?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

He wrote: This is courage!

[Watwheels]

  On 9/7/2011 at 12:50 AM, Vulcann said:

Haha in a different context, say in a job interview, what you have just said could get you full marks!

 

Read somewhere supposedly about a real incident and IIRC it was something like that:

 

A US college was holding an essay test and the topic was "What is courage?".

 

A male student scribbled something on the test paper and handed it up within 30s.

 

He got full marks from the professor.

 

So how exactly did he earn it?

 

 

 

He wrote: This is courage!

I would have failed him and call it stupidity.

[Identiti]

  On 9/6/2011 at 11:18 PM, Nightsky said:

Working backwards method, can be solved with fraction/ratio.

 

To be honest, this isn't considered a 'difficult' 5 mark question, in some schools its only worth 3 or 4 marks

 

In any case Identiti, calculators are allowed for PSLE Paper 2

 

are you kidding me?????? I'm quite sure I read PSLE paper 2 and not O level paper 2.

[Joseph22]

  On 9/7/2011 at 12:47 AM, Watwheels said:

I think there's no need to call the parent stupid. It's just that the parent had a different format of education in the past. And not being able to help his/her kid is frustrating.

 

Apologise for my use of langauge.

 

to clarify, my stupid is not at their lack of ability to solve the question, rather at what they mention.

 

should use the word ignorant instead.

[The_Bear]

  On 9/7/2011 at 12:47 AM, Watwheels said:

I think there's no need to call the parent stupid. It's just that the parent had a different format of education in the past. And not being able to help his/her kid is frustrating.

 

actually stupid is relative.

 

 

 

most of mine are anyway....

[Joseph22]

you know what i call this??

 

Urban legend..

 

heard alot in school last time, everytime near PSLE and O-level, got ppl say last year this student do this for composition...

 

so its in singapore, USA, PSLE or O-level

 

  On 9/7/2011 at 12:50 AM, Vulcann said:

Haha in a different context, say in a job interview, what you have just said could get you full marks!

 

Read somewhere supposedly about a real incident and IIRC it was something like that:

 

A US college was holding an essay test and the topic was "What is courage?".

 

A male student scribbled something on the test paper and handed it up within 30s.

 

He got full marks from the professor.

 

So how exactly did he earn it?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

He wrote: This is courage!

 

[Watwheels]

  On 9/7/2011 at 12:53 AM, Joseph22 said:

Apologise for my use of langauge.

 

to clarify, my stupid is not at their lack of ability to solve the question, rather at what they mention.

 

should use the word ignorant instead.

I guess the parent have had enough and finally wrote in. i think he/she is aware cos like you mentioned such questions have been around for quite a while. For some parents perhaps they are so used to what was taught to them they find it difficult to adjust to the changes of the new format.

[Nightsky]

  On 9/7/2011 at 12:51 AM, Identiti said:

are you kidding me?????? I'm quite sure I read PSLE paper 2 and not O level paper 2.

 

Err, quite a few years liao leh...

 

Kids use calculators from P5 onwards. Scientific type, can bring forward to their sec sch, until JC where they may need to 'upgrade' to graphical calculator.

[Ender]

Didn't know event organiser need to be able to solve such complex math questions..

[Evillusion]

the only thing my female class mates wrote in her O levels maths paper I HATE MATHS. but she din forget to write her index number!

[Jtay]

Actually the question is not too bad. In fact, bar graphs (which pri 6 students are trained to do) will be more useful in this case than algebra.

 

In any case, I believe in a prelim exam, the questions should have a range of difficulty to differentiate students of different ability. So i don't think all the questions are like that.

 

 

 

 

[Tigerwoods]

  On 9/6/2011 at 10:58 PM, Vulcann said:

Frankly reading and trying to understand the maths problem stated in the ST Forum letter already took me 1 1/2 minutes and to solve within another 3 1/2 minutes without using simultaneous equation is beyond my capability.

 

Are you able to solve it within 5 minutes?

 

Just glad that I was born many moons back and not have to face this type of maths question nowadays...

 

Can understand this dad's frustration and hope that I will not pose a similar question to the authorities when my children faces such a situation in the future...

 

From ST Forum:

 

http://www.straitstimes.com/STForum/Online...ory_710009.html

 

Don't hurt pupils' self-esteem with tough questions

 

Published on Sep 7, 2011

 

AS A PARENT, I wonder whether some teachers who set exam papers are really interested in gauging the ability of pupils. Sometimes it seems as though they are simply intent on making life miserable for them.

 

Take a look at this maths question in a recently concluded Primary 6 preliminary exam:

 

'Three halls contained 9,876 chairs altogether. One-fifth of the chairs were transferred from the first hall to the second hall. Then, one-third of the chairs were transferred from the second hall to the third hall and the number of chairs in the third hall doubled. In the end, the number of chairs in the three halls became the same. How many chairs were in the second hall at first?'

 

I challenge readers to solve this problem in five minutes, which is all the time a Primary 6 pupil has to do it.

 

I challenge school principals to do it, without the help of equations, which Primary 6 pupils aren't equipped with yet.

 

Setting such difficult questions serves no educational purpose - it only undermines the pupils' self-esteem.

 

Stephen Lin

Once again I proved that the Maths question in our primary school is not about maths but about the English language.

 

[Ah_cow]

sorry TS, realli simple question.. solve it within a min without using calculator or algebra.... my psle was taken more than 15 yrs ago and result only a B....

[Watwheels]

Not just the language but also visualisation. But I wonder can a 12 year old understand, visualise and work out a solution within 5 mins? It's tough.

[Lingmu]

i would answer ZERO chair is in Hall 2 at first

[Dirtbike]

come on la...this is a very simple question.....there are worse out there...

i guess his son belongs to the lower tier ba...

 

[Ah_cow]

i believe it quite a standard question in their homework... only difference is the numbers changed only, question more or less the same. its only parents and adult wise like us too long nv do their sets of questions daily and tts y cause us to have problems understanding the question or find it ridiculously hard. i believe if u try to work through their homeworks for a month, all shld able to familiarise the type of questions asked and all will wonder what is so difficult in the 1st place.....

 

now u throw any question on my sec 2 trigo i will also say wah... how come so hard nowadays....

[Passion]

  On 9/7/2011 at 12:50 AM, Vulcann said:

Haha in a different context, say in a job interview, what you have just said could get you full marks!

 

Read somewhere supposedly about a real incident and IIRC it was something like that:

 

A US college was holding an essay test and the topic was "What is courage?".

 

A male student scribbled something on the test paper and handed it up within 30s.

 

He got full marks from the professor.

 

So how exactly did he earn it?

 

 

He wrote: This is courage!

I also did the same for my chinese 造句.question is pls form a sentence with words like say " 班门弄斧". I wrote : "老师教我们班门弄斧这个成语." End up the rest is history. Kena fcuk by my chinese teacher. I see nothing wrong, I expressed it the way how she wants me to form a question, but teacher think I didn't use it correctly and didn't know the reason. This is how fcuk up the school is.