KOTA KINABALU: Form Three Assessment (PT3) candidates claimed that the wholly subjective questions for the Bahasa Melayu and Mathematics papers yesterday were putting a lot of stress on them.
It was learnt that many of them were ill prepared to handle the Mathematics problems in the question papers.
“Many of the candidates didn’t attempt any of the questions, which was quite sad,” said a student who asked for anonymity.
Most of the parents whose children sat for the examination also requested anonymity and said in order to do well in the PT3, they felt that students required the support from both parents and teachers.
“There were no examinations for the History and Geography papers, but there were courseworks that required the students to source for materials. Without the support from parents, and guidance from their teachers, it is very difficult for students to complete the work. And I heard that there were instances whereby students had difficulties,” said a parent.
He added that he took some time off to bring his Form Three son to source for the materials at the State Archive Department, the library, and even went to take photos that were used as supporting materials for his son’s coursework.
“The courseworks were good because it required all three parties — the student, the parent and the teacher to work together. It promoted communication and I enjoyed helping my child out. However, while we worked together to compile the materials, my son had to write the report himself with guidance from his teachers,” said the father.
Unfortunately, not all parents had the time or want to be troubled with their children’s homework and that has resulted in some students being unable to complete their work, he said.
Teachers who were involved in the examination said that PT3 required students to think in a higher order.
“It teaches students to adopt high order thinking because the questions are more complicated. There are also more than one answer to a question,” he said.
He pitied the students involved in the examination which was introduced for the first time this year for all Form Three students.
A teacher said that the examination was quite heavy for most of the Form Three students because they only had two hours for each examination paper.
“They have to write a lot. One of the skills they have to know for the English paper is how to summarize. Summarization is a skill usually taught to students who are in Form Four and above,” the teacher said.