What Is The Ujian Aptitude UPSR For Std 6

Some of the parents in my FB group has been asking this question "What Is The Ujian Aptitud UPSR or the UPSR Aptitude Test for Std 6 pupils? I remember the very same question was asked last year as well. This is because most parents do not know or are not informed about this test. The first time they hear about this test is when they see the Ujian Aptitud in the UPSR timetable on the afternoon session of the last day of the test. My child's teacher has not mentioned it to her as well before we saw the timetable.

One member pointed us to this archived news from the Star newspaper from this article dated Aug 2, 2009 titled "Pupils To Sit For Aptitude Test On The Last Day Of UPSR". This was to have taken effect in  2009 so it is certainly not a new thing at all. According to the article "The Aptitude Test grade will be listed in the UPSR slip but will not count towards the final result." It also mentioned that "pupils in national schools would sit for the test in Bahasa Malaysia while those in vernacular schools would have theirs in Chinese and Tamil respectively."

The 1 11/2 hour paper consists of 60 objective questions and will test students in the area of thinking skills, problem solving and decision making and interests. It has some IQ style tests as well as asks students to list out their areas of interests and what motivates them.

If you are interested to find out more about this paper, you can visit this teacher's blog. He has uploaded some sample papers for the Ujian Aptitud UPSR Tahun 6.

This link leads you to the UPSR 2014 examination timetable. If your child is sitting for the UPSR in subsequent years, you can still view the timetable to have an idea of the schedule.

What Is LINUS

Many parents who have children entering Std One for the first time are confused about What Is LINUS so I decided to write a short post about it.

Basically LINUS stands for Literacy And Numeracy Screening. The keyword here is "Screening".

What is LINUS?

- It is merely a screening test to find and give aid to students who are weak
- It is an assessment to measure a child's knowledge to see if a child requires extra help
- It is aimed to provide remedial help for children weak in reading, writing and arithmetic (meaning the assessment is both oral and written)

What it is not....

LINUS is a screening test. It is not a streaming test to put better children into best classes.

Before you read on, here are a few articles you can read to find out more about LINUS. You can also watch the video below to get a better idea. I won't go into the details. I will just tell it like it is from a parent's point of view.

1. LINUS Programme For Early Learning published by Star on Sept 5, 2012
2. Primary Schools To Get LINUS 2 Next Year published by NST on Nov 24, 2012
3. Perbandingan LINUS dan LINUS 2 from a blog called Teaching In Malaysia

If you are saying "LINUS 2? I don't even know what is LINUS 1." If you don't have time to sieve through all that information, don't worry. I will try to give you a short summary from a parent's point of view. However, I suggest you read some of the newspaper clippings from the links I gave above. They will help you to understand What Is LINUS better.

Now, from a parent's point of view. Firstly, you may want to know.....

What Are The Subjects Being Screened? They are..

1. Mathematics
2. Bahasa Malaysa
3. English ( added in LINUS 2)

Many of us do not know what LINUS is all about until the moment we step into the school to confirm a place for our child in the registered school for Std 1. At this point of time, you may be given a booklet or printed sheets of paper on the basic words that your child must know for the LINUS assessment. Then we go into a panic mode.

This is because, in our time, when we start Std 1, we go in with little or no basic knowledge. We go to school to learn our ABCs. It is not like this anymore. These days, most children have attended at least 2 years of kindergarten, some even more before starting school. If your child has been doing this, then you should not have any worries at all. In kindergarten, he or she would already have been assessed and learned their basics. Remember, the LINUS programme is basically a remedial programme. It is to provide early intervention for those who need help. So, don't panic.

Just let your child learn whatever is given in a relaxed fun way. There is no need to study for it as though it is a very important test. By the time the test period rolls along, you will usually be given a notice by the school to inform you that the LINUS assessment will be conducted within a certain time frame. (LINUS is usually conducted twice a year). Since the written notice states a time frame, if your child does not inform you, you may not even know that he or she has already completed the test on the actual date. So don't stress yourself or your child over it.

These days, some publishers publish books for this purpose. You can check out this publisher's blog which features some of the books. There may be later versions so you can visit bookstores or online bookstores for the latest books. However, I suggest you have a look at the link I provided below because they included a preview of the book. You can flip to see the content.

This blog post Buku Kerja Untuk Program LINUS from Sasmurni includes an ebook preview so you can take a look inside the book to see the contents. This will give you a rough idea of what sort of basic knowledge is required during assessment. The books featured on the page include "Literasi Menulis", "Numerasi Bertulis", "Lembaran Literasi Menulis Bahasa Malaysia Tahun 1" and "Lembaran Literasi Bertulis Matematik Tahun 1".

I hope this blog post on What Is LINUS is useful for those searching for this information. Good Luck, parents. I wish your child will have a good start in Std One and enjoy their early schooling years.

For those of you who have not decided on your school choice, you can check out my ebook here.
"Banana Mom's Guide To Preparing For Chinese School"

You are also welcome to join and network with other parents on my FB Group Malaysian Primary And Secondary Parents On Facebook.

You can get your LINUS workbooks online from here.

Countdown To UPSR 2014

CountdownClockCodes.com
In 3 weeks time, my daughter will be sitting for her UPSR examinations. Her school is pushing her very hard indeed with plenty of homework, seminars, motivational talk etc. There is almost nothing I as a parent can do to help her do her revision. I can only help by giving suggestions and try to steer her in the right direction, for example if I think too much emphasis is given to a subject and not enough on the areas where she is weak.

I am also trying my best to reduce her stress levels. Not much I can do in terms of homework. I have spoken to the teacher to explain that she is trying her very best and yet she cannot complete them. So if she keeps on getting scolded for incomplete work that she is doing her best to work on, it can only increase her stress level and this will have negative impact, not positive ones.

Besides, this I am also trying to make sure that she gets enough sleep and good food and nutrition. In addition, I constantly remind her that getting 7As is not the most important thing. The most important thing is the effort. Unfortunately, getting 7As is the most important thing in her school or class and this message has been constantly passed on to the kids. I am really worried that she will be terribly disappointed if she doesn't.

As parents, we always have to watch our kids closely and be mindful of their feelings and needs and do our best to support them. My boy is more playful so we push him harder in his studies so he can feel the joy of performing at his best potential. The girl is serious and diligent so we have to remind her to relax and learn to let go, be happy with her efforts as well as how to handle disappointments. Different strokes for different folks and every child is different even if they come from the same parents and same growing up environment.

How To Improve On BM Penulisan Part A

The BM Penulisan Paper for UPSR at this point of writing is made up of Part A, Part B and Part C. This post is all about Part A. In Part A, kids are required to make five sentences (Bina Ayat) based on a given picture. Each sentence carries 2 marks and you should spend about 15 minutes on this part.

Firstly, I would like to mention that this post is not only useful for students who are taking the UPSR examinations. It is useful for all primary school children who have to learn how to make BM sentences. This usually starts from Standard 3 onwards.

So, how do you do well in making sentences (Bina Ayat) for Part A of the BM Penulisan UPSR Paper? The first thing, a child has to learn are verbs (Kata Kerja).

Step 1. Advice your child to circle 5 parts of the picture that contain verbs.
Step 2. Make sentences (Bina Ayat) based on those verbs (Kata Kerja) using the "Siapa/Buat Apa/Huraian"             Formula
Step 3. Use conjunctions (Kata Hubung) to lengthen the sentences.

Here are some great resources to help you answer BM Penulisan Part A

1. BM Penulisan UPSR Bahagian A (Slides)
First, you need to circle out the keywords. This slide has very good examples of how you can circle the verbs in the picture and the difference between a good sentence and a poor one.

2. BM Penulisan Bahagian A (Blog Post)
Don't know enough verbs? This teacher has put together 9 blog posts listing out the all the possible scenarios and the various verbs (Kata Kerja)  that can be used to make sentences (Bina Ayat). The above links to the first scenario. You can find the other links on the left side bar of her page.

3. Bahasa Melayu Penulisan Bahagian A (Blog Post)
What about the format for sentences? This blog post lists out how to arrange the sentences in the "Siapa/Buat Apa/Keterangan or Huraian" (Who/Doing What/Explanation) Format. This is really useful too in addition to knowing the verbs (Kata Kerja)

4. Teknik menjawab UPSR Bahagian A Bahasa Malaysia (Video) Click the link to watch on YouTube or watch below.
This video has it all. Finally, if your child is a visual person, he can watch this video on how to improve or the technic to answer BM Penulisan Part A which includes all of the rules mentioned above and including common mistakes that should be avoided.