Questions about Chinese essay and picture conversation

Consulted Yu's P3 Chinese teacher 傅老师 on the followings and her replies were in blue:

(1)作文字数：
请问作文最少需要写多少个字？

考试的指示是不少于80字。但是，不要太在意字数，浪费时间去数。写1至1.5页，内容完整较重要。

(2) 看图说话：
请问图里的男士是否用“叔叔”或“男士”来称呼？若有超过一个男士，是否都用“叔叔“来称呼？学生是否可以用手指着不同的人物来叙述？

人称依场合来定，“叔叔”、“男士”都可以。不要用手指指着图。

P3 English spelling lists

Spelling 2: Feelings – excitement/happiness tossed his bag totally exhilarated really enthusiastic held her breath face lit up hummed her favourite tune flashed a toothless grin smiled shyly roared with laughter broke into a wide smile squealed in delight in high spirits	Spelling 4: Actions – See scanned among searched my face gazed longingly shot him an angry look caught a glimpse peered intently took a peek strained his eyes from the corner of her eye out of sight wide-eyed winked at
Spelling 6: Actions – Jump/run skipped merrily sprang up leapt out with a start barge into scrambled to her feet scurried around took to his heels pounced on took off fled into in hot pursuit	Spelling 8: Feelings – Anger/Annoyance turned red with anger stormed off heated by the minute clenched his fist in his fury bulging eyes glared at me face fell waited glumly arms crossed dark look temper was rising
Spelling 10: Actions - walk Shuffled grudingly marched down caught up retreated warily made a beeline tag along groped around in the dark struggled on strolled leisurely hobbled on	Spelling 12: weather shone brilliantly blazed unforgivingly swayed to the gentle breeze caressed their cheeks waltzed across the vast blue sky baked the ground wither in the scorching heat elongated shadows lending shade hot sun beat down
Spelling 14: throw/walk pelted stones at chucked my bag aside dumped carelessly by flung a pillow at me tossed a coin quickened my steps sashayed into the ballroom marched into strode confidently on the stage wandered aimlessly

Unit 1: A kitten for the king parade and circus clowns the doctors warned musicians tried to cheer quite contagious young king's day very special kitten laughed with glee in the day time Your Majesty to entertain began to sing no one could agree	Unit 2: Fearless Phil rumbled and grumbled under his jacket mountain track flexed his muscles opened his pack as fast as a deer as fierce as a lion as timid as a mouse as hungry as a bear trembling like a leaf felt like silk like a bullet
Unit 3: The sunflower that went flop sunflower growing by the wall don't get in a tizz fix-it bag hammer and nails needle and string as yellow as the sun as blue as the sky as white as snow as gentle as a dove nothing was found stick-on labels should be planted	Unit 4: The Wolf's Story minding his business house of straw one little puff pile of sticks slammed the door playing tricks house of bricks climbed down their chimney put out the fire cooking pot chased me out locked away
Unit 5: What's this? as flat as a pancake millions of years ago glides through the water as round as a marble catch and eat swallowing its victim makes funny faces and noises like sticky matchsticks chemicals can go through dared not move a muscle	Unit 6: The mystery of missing big wig superior spy boss of spies disguised himself uses spyglass to study the planets and the stars friendly bus captain prodded about solved the mystery like smoke in the wind in the dessert ferret out the truth
Unit 7: The gruffalo took a stroll treetop house underground house local favourite food long pointed sharp tusks unsightly and terrible teeth knobbly knees poisonous wart as brave as a lion go like the wind

2014 Primary-3 Science Syllabus

Pink-highlighted topics are new addition to the syllabus. Strikethrough topics are those removed from the current syllabus.

Themes/Topics	Updated/Removed learning outcomes
Diversity of living and non-things	Recognise some broad groups of living things – animals, amphibians, birds, fish, insects, mammals, reptiles
Diversity of Materials	Compare physical properties of materials based on hardness, strength, flexibility, ability to float/sink in water, waterproof, transparency.
Cycle of plants and animals	Observe and compare the life cycles of animals over a period of time (beetle, butterfly, chicken, cockroach, frog, grasshopper, mosquito)
Electrical system	Recognize that good conductors of electricity are generally conductors of heat
Energy forms and uses	Show an understanding that food produced by plants becomes the source of energy for animals.

P3 Science Exam - Year 2014

SA1 - 15 MCQ, 7 open-ended Questions
Duration - 1 hour
50 marks

SA2 - 24 MCQ, 11 open-ended questions
Duration - 1 hour 30 min
80 marks

2 Science practical tests
10% of overall SA2 marks
Term 1 - 5%
Term 2 - 5%

P3 holistic asessment

• 2 performance-based task (on observation and classification skill), 1 per semester, not graded in report book

• Concept cartoons

New format for English composition

A new format is used.

• No longer based on 4 pictures. Instead, 3 pictures will be given. Student must choose 1 of the pictures to write on. What follows is up to child's creativity.

• Student can base the writing on 2 or all of the pictures, in any order. But the student must adhere to the topic given. For example, if the topic is "An unpleasant incident", student must write on unpleasant incident instead of a pleasant incident.

• At least 120 words.

• Can be 1st person (I) or third person (Tom and his friend). 

• Writing can be narrative, a personal recount, a report, etc.

Teacher Ang said that it is fine to just cancel the words instead of using correction tape.

How I would help Yu to improve his essay writing?

Though I have sent Yu to Mind Stretcher class for one-and-a-half-month, I did not see much improvement in his essay writing.  But from teacher's marking of his written essays, I gathered the root problems and this allowed me to think of actions to resolve the problems.

I observed that Yu is very poor in his grammar. There are a number of mistakes.

(a) Joining many sentences using commas.

(b) Use present tense instead of past tense.

(c) Did not start a sentence with capital letter.

So, my immediate task is to train him to write simple essays with no grammar mistakes. It will comprise short sentences, with simple vocabulary, but must be grammatically correct.

After that, I will need to improve on his vocabulary. He tends to use plain languages like said, told. I would have to search and compile a list of words for him to use.

Below is a summary of my strategies:

1. Combine good phrases 

I have learned that by searching good phrases on the Internet and modifying them for my use, I can come up with pretty good paragraphs. This gives me a clue. I can train Yu to combine good phrases from Internet to come up with his own paragraphs in essay writing.

2. Inject feeling into the essay.
   Writing essay is about how you feel about an incident and not just a description of what happen.  Yu tends to just describe what happens and there is no mention of how the character feels. So, I will need to train him in this aspect.
   
3. Correct Yu's grammar
   • Encourage him to write in short sentences. He tends to write long sentences with a lot of commas.
   • Use past tenses only. He tends to use present tense and marks are deducted for grammar.
    
   
4. Replace 'said', 'told' by richer vocabularies.

"的,得,地"的用法

的: 白色的花朵。（白色和花朵都是名词。）

得: 跑得很快。 （跑是动作，快是形容词。）

地: 她害怕地哭了。(前面是形容词（adj),后面是动词（verb))

1）果然：是事情的结果与之前想的、说的或者看的一样。例如：老师告诉了大家这道题目的答案，果然和我之前做出来的一样。
2）竟然：是事情的结果与之前想的、说的或者看的不一样。例如：早上的天气晴空万里，中午的时候竟然下起了雨。
3）到底：在小学现阶段的意思主要是：最后的结果。例如：这道题目你到底明白了没有？

抓 catch (action: grab, grip, hold tight) 抓紧一奌 <grib tighter>
捉 catch (action: run after something to grab) 捉迷藏 <play hide and seek>

忽然 time passed fast, that one feels like its just like a blink of eyes (unawares)
突然 all of a sudden (unexpectedly)

Source: Forum thread "小学生作文常犯错误分析" at www.kiasuparent.com, contributed by Injason888