Pre Australia trip II

Flying off
Tomorrow
Mood
Isn’t there
Feeling sleepy
Sick
Coughing
Hopeful
Fast recovery
Australia
Hot and dry
Anticipating
Plane ride
Upon arriving
Awaiting departure
ORD
Lying ahead…

PSLE Maths Paper

PSLE Mathematics seemed to be much harder as the years go by. There weren’t any calls by parents screaming that the papers were too hard during 1999. For all I remembered, the highest aggregate score that year was only 285 as compared to the usual 288. So the paper could arguably be harder that year? Perhaps it is because parents are getting more protective over their child and when they see their child so distraught over the papers, they call up the MOE board.

In all papers, there will be more tricky questions hidden inside the papers to differentiate pupils who score A and pupils who score A*. If not, Mark moderators will have a hard job to do and 1 point difference may mean thousands of pupils missing out on the A* grade. I admit that for 3 out of the 4 papers I sat for in PSLE, I probably didn’t do well in those tricky questions and ended up not scoring the distinctions.

With that being said, Straits Times today printed out 3 PSLE Maths questions.

Please do go and buy a copy of the STRAITS Times as I find it a hassle to take a photo, resize and put them up on the blog.

Question 1 consist of 3 marks. As I’m pretty rusty with my Maths, I took 6 minutes before I managed to solve it using Simultaneous Equations and solving it with Algebra.

Question 2, I do not know if I’m right or wrong. I took more than 5 minutes thinking through the phrasing of the question. I personally find that for a Maths question, it is important that tricky questions are tricky in the way solutions work out instead of tricky in a way that the question is being phrased. If I was doing this question in an examination condition, I would probably skip it and go back to it at the end of the paper. If the solution is a one step answer, it would mean I’ve understood it correctly eventually. If it isn’t, I wouldn’t fault any kids who failed to solve that question.

Question 3. I personally could only solve it after using guess and check method. Since we know that the water needed to be transfered whould be more than half of what it is carrying, it would not be too tedious. For this question, For 4 marks, it probably is worth it. (My bother managed to come up with a more logical answer though) However, under examination condition, I would probably be too stressed to try the guess and check method and use it only as a last resort.

Thank goodness I took my PSLE in 1999. If I were to take it this year, I might have gotten a B instead!

It’s wrong!

It’s happening again!

There will be some days in a month whereby I feel easily irritable and today happened to be just one of those days.

Am I too lenient? But what’s the point of being strict on people? There’s not going to be much use if the way of life is to instill fear into others. I don’t believe on being strict. It made me mad with myself that I failed to control my temper and start lecturing people when I myself is not always right.
Why must people exploit kindness? In being kind to you, I still expect you to take my words seriously. I talk to you nicely, you never listen to me. When I “shout” at you, you complain. I really can’t do anything can I?

Why are rules not followed? Rules are there for a reason. It is because there have been too many cases of unruly behaviour that causes the rules to be there. The saying that “do what you want, just don’t get caught” is wrong. There are eyes everywhere. You will get caught.

Why when I give some people leeway others take advantage of it? I give people certain privelleges depending on the situation. I am not unnegotiable. However it doesn’t apply for all the remaining time. I thought it was clear, but it seems like I’ve made a terrible mistake. So if the trust is broken, there is no need for any privelleges any more.

Why are people complaining about colleagues working in the same office? We work together. We are suppossed to work as a team. Help out each other even when no words were said. There will only be an issue when some people complain about others. If everyone were more tolerant of each other, none of this issue will take place.

Why do people not listen to me even though I’ve been telling them the same thing day in day out? I don’t deserve your respect right, that’s why my words fell on deaf ears ya?

Why can’t people be a good follower? Before one can be a leader, he needs to be able to follow basic rules and not try to recreate new ones. Please know when to joke around and when to be serious. This line coming out from my mouth is really ironic.
Why must one compare oneself with others all the time? That he can do this why I cannot, even though we all know that it is wrong to do so. Since it is wrong to do so, why not tell the person directly that it is not right for this kind of behaviour instead of joining him and doing the same wrong things?
Why am I putting in so much effort and getting all this crap?

My mood is all wrong today. I’ve been feeling lousy and very demoralised.

Uncle?

I’m yet to be 20 years old.

Last heard, my friend said that I look like a Sec 4/5 student thereby proclaiming that I am 16/17 years old.

And today, a shopper came into the shop with her young son.

He was holding onto the card which required registration. Therefore, I looked at him and then at his mother, hinting that I need to register the card. She told her child, “come, give Uncle first.”

Haha. What did I do? I looked down and muttered, “wah, uncle.”

I supposed I said it kinda loud, at least loud enough for the little boy to hear and he in turn said, “Mummy, he not uncle la.”

Haha! Heng I had my back facing them, otherwise the mother would have seen the smile on my face.

Why she cannot say let korkor have it first? More appropriate ma!

Erm, right?