Mother Tongue Exemption VS School Results. The Borderline Child.

Parents generally don't attempt to obtain MTL exemption unless their child is not doing well in MTL.  That goes without saying.  Then there are cases where the child may be passing but needs to spend over an hour a day for seven days learning a list of 10 spelling words only to get 7 correct.  It may then take an additional 2 hours to complete a set of 10 sentences where the child has to fill in the correct missing words.  There is literally no time to do anything else let alone have some play time.  Welcome to my world.

If after the professional assessment the child has very clear and severe learning disabilities (ADHD, dyslexia, ASD), the chance of exemption is high.  I'm 99.9% sure exemption will be granted in these cases.

BUT, BUT, BUT….what about those borderline cases?  The professional assessment may show up some issues with language and literacy but they aren't severe.  What if the child actually falls within the AVERAGE category for their age?  This could mean the child is weak at reading because they don't like books or perhaps the child was born towards the end of the year and he or she is actually progressing normally but the level of academic study at school is set higher to cater to the majority of kids who may have attended advanced tuition.  In these cases, the child will probably grasp the syllabus when they are mentally ready but unfortunately in the current Singapore school system, at every advancing academic level, the work gets exponentially harder.  P1 & P2 are like an extension of kindergarten.  After these two years the level of difficulty jumps significantly and continues to do so to P5.   For a borderline child (scoring 50s, 60s and 70s in P1 and P2), catching up in P3 and beyond will be difficult.  At P3, you can  expect your child's grades to drop about 10 points.

So it makes sense that some parents would prefer to opt for MTL exemption before the workload gets too onerous in P3 and science is added to increase the subject load to four examinable subjects.

Just as an aside, I have a friend whose child went through psychological assessment and was recommend exemption from MTL.  However, my friend has chosen to continue as they feel MTL is part of their heritage and culture which I fully respect.

At this point, I need to mention that  MOE does not "like" to give MTL exemption in P1 and P2.  I was told (by a very reliable source) that they feel that some kids take a while to develop and these early stage results may not be a good indicator of their future grasp of the language.

Nevertheless, as a parent who has struggled though 2 or more years of MTL and spent hours and hours coaching your child through the tears and pain of spelling and comprehension and spending thousands of dollars on tuition only to get minimal results you may not want to add another year of MTL to increasing academic workloads and watch other subjects suffer as a result.

So if your child is a borderline case and you want to go for MTL exemption, there are some things you can do to help your case.

1. Stop all MTL tuition.  Let your child learn at their natural pace.
2. Do not spend hours on MTL.  Concentrate on other subjects
3. Let your child's test scores reflect his/her true understanding of MTL

To put it bluntly, if your child consistently fails MTL, your chance of getting exempted will be higher.

First of all, low PSLE scores pull down the school's overall results thus affecting their ranking, particularly if there are a number of poor students in the school.  They could probably buffer one or two poor performing students but they would want to minimise this where possible. This is just my OPINION!  However, I do know that some top schools ask students to find "a better suited school" if the student does not perform to the school's academic standard.  This happened to my friend's P5 child last year.  This year, that girl and her sister are both in another school.

So having said that, the school would likely support your application.

With your school's full support, your professional medical report, special therapies and a consistently poor MTL result, you have maximised your chances of MTL exemption at MOE level for your borderline child.

MTL Exemption - The Psychological / Professional Report

Page 3 of Form 2-EXPT under the heading INFORMATION FOR PARENTS AND GUARDIANS point 2 states the following:

Applications for exemption from offering Mother Tongue Language based on medical/psychological reasons must be accompanied by a psychological/professional report that:

• states clearly the specific learning disability as diagnosed by qualified professionals*
• is current i.e. the evaluation of learning needs arising from the disability should be completed within 3 years prior to the date of application;
• provides relevant information pertaining to medical, developmental and educational history;
• describes the comprehensive testing and techniques use to arrive at the diagnosis, including evaluation dates and test results with subtest scores from measures such as cognitive ability academic achievement, and information processing;
• describes the functional limitations supported by test results; and
• provides a rationale for the student's need for Mother Tongue Language exemption.

* Note:  Professionals qualified to make the evaluation include educational psychologists, child/clinical psychologists, psychiatrists, occupational therapists and speech and language therapists.

Many parents think they can simply write a letter or ask their family doctor to write one for them to submit to MOE.  Unfortunately, MOE doesn't accept this.  

You will have to get your child tested by a qualified professional.  

The cost can vary.  I had my child tested for Dyslexia at DAS (Dyslexia Association of Singapore) and the cost is subsidised.  It is probably the cheapest professional assessment you can get.  It is around SGD 700.  Unfortunately/fortunately, although my child had the symptoms of dyslexia the diagnosis came back as "not dyslexic"but with "possible underlying language issues".

Now, it needs to be said that whilst the DAS test is quite comprehensive (5 pages long and takes 3 hours) it (the test) only tests for dyslexia. So if your child has tested negative for dyslexia but you still feel that your child has a learning disability, you need to get him/her further assessed by a private psychologist.

Assessment by a private psychologist costs around SGD 1,300 to SGD 1,900 depending on what tests the psychologist needs to do.  Generally, it it costs about SGD 500 per test and your child may need 2 or 3 or more tests!

*Tip 1*  DAS are very strict in their assessment.   Unless you are very sure your child displays signs of dyslexia skip DAS and go straight to a private psychologist.

*Tip 2*  When you are having your initial consultation with the psychologist do not mince your words or beat around the bush.  Just tell them directly that you are looking for MTL Exemption.  

TEST RESULTS

Psychologists use standard tests which may include the following:

•  Test of Auditory Processing Skills
• Analysis of Reading Ability
• Comprehensive Test of Phonological Processing
• Attention Tests
• Visual and Auditory Continuous Performance Tests

My child's tests cost SGD 1,300 and the report was 10 pages long.  

Whilst you can likely expect a recommendation to EXEMPT MTL, you can also expect other recommendations such as a change of seating position in the classroom, extra time for tests, some eye exercises or extra reading at home.  

HOWEVER, the one thing you should be very sure to expect is THERAPY.  I suppose it makes sense.  If they do find your child has disability then you need to fix it.  

Therapy could be in the form of Speech & Language Therapy or Literacy Therapy or special lessons in reading and writing.  It could be anything really but you can't leave it to anyone to do it for you or enrol your child in an ordinary enrichment or tuition class.  You need to engage a qualified Educational Therapist.  These people are usually qualified teachers and have a degree in child psychology or educational psychology with a specialisation in early childhood development or a related discipline.  They usually work one to one with your child and they cost approximately SGD 150 an hour.  You may need to see one therapist once a week or one therapist twice a week.  Or like me, you might need to see two therapists once a week each or twice a week each as exam time approaches.

I spend about SGD 1,000 a month on therapy.  Needless to say, it is wonderful.  My child loves going for therapy and it has definitely improved my child's performance in school and in exams.  Well it better…cos it costs a bomb.  

Sometimes, therapy needs to continue for years and sometimes its just for a few weeks/months until your child gets to a level where they develop the skills required to complete their required schoolwork effectively.

Once more, I want to bring your attention to Form 2-EXPT.  Page 5, Question A2 requires the Teacher to state Interventions undertaken within and outside the school to help the child cope with their work.  This is where you can inform your teacher about  the INTENSIVE THERAPY your child is having to help address your child's learning disability.

Getting That MTL Exemption - 3 Easy Steps (Well not really….)

Unless your child has been away from Singapore for 2 years or more and out of the local school system, the only other way to get an exemption from MTL is if your child has a medical condition that would adversely affect their ability to cope with MTL.

As mention in my post here, http://mtlexemption.blogspot.sg/2014/10/mother-tongue-exemption-in-singapore.html, the 3 most common medical conditions that allow for exemption are:
                     
Dyslexia
Autism Spectrum Disorder
Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD)                                                    

There are other conditions that allow for exemption too.  These include:

Early childhood speech delay
Dyspraxia
Auditory processing difficulties
Disabilities in processing language
Attention Deficit Disorder (without Hyperactive Disorder)
Anxiety Disorder
Severe Depression

The list is not exhaustive and MOE evaluates each submission on its own merits.

However, if your child has no medical issues and simply does not like MTL or doesn't put in any effort to learn the language then your chances for exemption though NOT IMPOSSIBLE, will be more difficult.

STEP 1
Once you've realised your child has a medical issue preventing them from learning MTL, you will need to start to gather the evidence required by MOE to get your exemption.

STEP 2
According to MOE, you will need to submit the following certified copies of:
1) Birth Certificate (easy)
2) Student Pass (foreign student)
3) School Results (last 2 years) including K1 & K2 results if student is in P1 (see separate post)
4) Psychological/Professional Report (see separate post)

You will also need to submit Form 2-EXPT.  It does not matter which school your child goes to, the form is the same.  You can find it here:

www.fuhuapri.moe.edu.sg/wbn/slot/.../Form%202%20-%20EXPT.pdf
or here:
http://www.acspri.moe.edu.sg/qql/slot/u532/School%20Information/Admin%20Matters/Forms/mt_exempt.pdf

STEP 3
You will need to discuss your intention to exempt your child from MTL with your child's form teacher and MTL teacher as they will need to:

1.  Fill out the "Teachers" section of the form.
2.  Advise the Learning Abilities Counsellor in the school about your intention as they need to open a case file for your child and handle the submission.

You will need to make sure your child's case manager is on the ball or they could end up leaving your form in their "in tray" for months.

All of this can be done only once you have received your Psychological/Professional Report.  This is the part that costs A LOT of money.  More on this in a separate post.

Once your child's case manager has submitted your documents to MOE, you need to wait for their response.  It could take up to 3 months.

How is the PSLE T-score calculated without MTL?

Before you go and get your exemption for Mother Tongue, you may want to ask the following questions:

How will the PSLE Aggregate score be calculated without mother tongue language?

Will my child be advantaged or disadvantaged by not having MTL as a subject?


First of all, you need to know what the PSLE Aggregate score actually is.  Here's a simple explanation:

The PSLE Aggregate score is the sum of a student's T-scores across 4 subjects.

What is a T-score?

The Transformed Score or T-score is the mark a student receives AFTER the raw score (what the student got in their exam) it is "transformed"or "standardised" to show the relative position of a students’s performance as compared to the performance of all the other students in that subject.

So how is the T-score calculated for each subject?

T= 50+10(X-Y)
                      Z
             
X: student’s mark for the subject
Y: average mark (mean) scored by all students
Z: standard deviation

Here are some examples with different raw scores:

Example:
• Pupil’s mark (X) in exam
• Average mark (Y) scored by all students
• Standard deviation (Z)

Example A

T = 50 + 10 (50 – 63.5)
                             9.4
   = 35.64

Example B

T = 50 + 10 (100 – 63.5)
                              9.4
   = 88.83

Poor student.  Scored 100%, but look at his T-score.

Example C

T = 50 + 10 (63.5 – 63.5)
                              9.4
   = 50

Note that in any T-score calculation the forced average is always 50.  If a pupil scores the cohort average, no matter how high or high low that number is, the T-score will always be 50.  Thus the average PSLE score will always be 200).

A note on Standard Deviation.  The SD refers to the score within 68% of the average (using a normal distribution).  So if the SD is 10 that means 68% of the cohort scored within 10 marks of the average.  If the SD is 5 it means that 68% of the cohort scored within 5 marks of the average and so on.

The higher the standard deviation (spread of marks within 68% of the mean), the higher the score.

PSLE AGGREGATE SCORE WITHOUT MTL

MOE doesn't actually give a clear explanation as to how the PSLE Aggregate Score is derived for a student who is exempted from MTL.  They just say the student will neither be advantaged nor disadvantaged.

However, after checking around, popular belief is that the average of the student's other 3 subjects will be used to calculate their T-score for MTL.  So, if your child scores well for Maths, English and Science, then your child will be at an advantage.  Assuming that the T-scores for the 3 subjects are simply averaged.  However, if the raw scores are averaged and applied to the formula, then it still depends on how well the cohort does for MTL.  A low cohort MTL average would mean a MTL exempt student with 3 good subject average scores will score higher and be at an advantage.  Conversely, a high cohort average for MTL would mean a lower score, and thus no advantage.

So ideally, the average score of the 3 subjects used to calculate the MTL score should ideally be above the raw average of the MTL cohort and the SD should be as large as possible (which is unlikely as SDs do not tend to vary from year to year).

The Pros and Cons of Mother Tongue Exemption

Mother Tongue Language, particularly Mandarin is not an easy subject to master.  For kids who speak only English at home, this can be a nightmare.  The characters have to be memorized as they cannot be sounded out phonetically.  Intonations are challenging when pronouncing words and then there’s spelling to do as well as compositions which require use of idioms and such. 

I’m speaking from my own experience here, yours might be different.  My child spent hours and hours on Mandarin.  The results were just not commensurate with the time taken to learn the language.  There was less time for other subjects (not mention play time) and as a result it was difficult to do well over all.

Some kids are very good at languages and I’m not saying Mandarin is not a lovely and useful language when used correctly – as is English.  However, there are not many people in Singapore that are really proficient in either Mandarin or English and butcher both languages on a regular basis.

Pros

·         Only 3 examinable subjects at PSLE

·         More time to concentrate on learning those 3 subjects

·         At this point in time, there does not seem to be any penalty for only having 3 subjects at PSLE

Cons

·         Without MTL, your child will likely be excluded from top SAP schools

·          Higher Mother Tongue gets extra points at PSLE (Distinction 3 pts, Merit 2pts, Pass 1pt)

   v  List of SAP Secondary Schools

From 1979:

1.       Anglican High School

2.       Catholic High School

3.       CHIJ St. Nicholas Girls’ School

4.       Chung Cheng High School (Main)

5.       Dunman High School

6.       Hwa Chong Institution (High School Section)

7.       Maris Stella High School

8.       Nanyang Girls’ High School

9.       River Valley High School

From 2000:

10.   Nan Hua High School

You can view this for yourself here:

http://www.moe.gov.sg/media/press/2008/02/enhanced-programmes-by-special.php

Most parents, like myself, who seek out MTL exemption are not really concerned about their child not being able to get into a Special Assistance Program (SAP) school after PSLE.  In my case, my child was really struggling with Mandarin.  It was taking up ridiculous amounts of time to learn and having a negative effect on other subjects as well as my child’s emotional well-being.  No parent wants to see their kid cry day in day out because they struggle with Mandarin, or any subject really.  So when you’re at that point when studying is like pulling teeth and you are crossing your fingers that your child can just pass their subjects, then who cares about getting into an SAP school!

Here’s a list:

Edupoll Rankings of Top 10 Secondary Schools in Singapore 2013/ 2014 ( in ranking order of academic excellence )

1. Nanyang Girls' High School (Lee Kuan Yew is the patron) - PSLE cut-off point 265

2. Raffles Institution (alma mater of Lee Kuan Yew and Goh Chok Tong) - PSLE cut-off point 263

3. Raffles Girls Secondary School - PSLE cut-off point 263

4. Hwa Chong Institution - PSLE cut-off point 261

5. NUS High School - admission by DSA

6. Dunman High School - PSLE cut-off point 256

7. Anglo-Chinese School ( Independent ) - PSLE cut-off point : 249 Express / 256 IP

8. River Valley High School - PSLE cut-off point 256

9. Victoria Junior College - ( IP Program from Secondary 3)

10. National Junior College (IP) (alma mater of Lee Hsien Loong) - PSLE cut-off point 259

NOTE

The above Top 10 academic excellence schools in Singapore have high PSLE cut-off points, rigorous academic curriculum and strong scholastic culture.

For Nanyang Girls' High, Dunman High and River Valley High, students must be effectively bilingual in English and Chinese.

DPM Tharman's daughter studies Chinese as a Second Language at Nanyang Girls' High whilst his sons attended Hwa Chong Institution.

Former PM Lee Kuan Yew's daughter Lee Wei Ling studied at Nanyang Girls' High School.

Both Lee Kuan Yew and Goh Chok Tong attended Raffles Institution.

Singapore's only female Cabinet minister Grace Fu is an alumnus of Nanyang Girls High School.

You can read about it yourself here:

http://www.edupoll.org/content/view/558/94/

Personally, this list is of no concern to me.  I’m just putting it in for your reading pleasure.

Just as an aside, there was quite some talk recently about a P5 boy at NYPS who attempted suicide at the school due to STRESS (apparently his parents were separating and he was under a lot of “study” pressure).  So to all those parents out there who keep saying “we are Chinese, so we have to learn Chinese” AND to those parents out there who send their kids to tuition to try and improve their kid’s 95% grade to 100% to top the co-hort – maybe you better think about your kid’s mental well-being as well.  You don’t want to push too hard and end up with a suicide on your hands.

Mother Tongue Exemption in Singapore

This blog details the steps to obtaining Mother Tongue Exemption in Singapore.

Here are the facts:

1.     Every student who attends Singapore local school has to take a Mother Tongue Language.

2.     There are only two valid reasons for exemption.  These are as follows:

(i)             The student has joined or re-joined the school system mid-stream without any prior learning of Mother Tongue Language (MTL).  Generally, the student has to be away from Singapore for 2 years or more.

(ii)      Students with a medical condition that would adversely affect their ability to cope with MTL.

                        The top 3 conditions for MTL exemption are:

• Dyslexia
• Autism Spectrum Disorder
• Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD)                                                       

3.     Currently, approximately 3.5% of school going students are exempted from MTL.

The above information can be found here: http://www.moe.gov.sg/media/parliamentary-replies/2014/05/statistics-and-criteria-for-mother-tongue-language-exemption.php

I applied for MTL exemption under point (ii) and my child has none of the top 3 conditions.