I REFER to last Friday's articles on the PSLE top scorers.

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Only that our miw and the Mandarins at the MOE can’t see and don’t realize the kind of unimpressive narrow and under-developed personalities we are producing.

Our appraisal and reward system rewards handsomely only those who do well in exams. In Singapore though, those who do best in the exams tend also to be the best amongst us because we all go through the same tread-mill and so there are no other yardstick to measure us.

That is not exactly a bad thing because we will continue to churn out good numbers of robotic engineers, doctors, lawyers, accountants, etc. Only don’t expect us to be world beaters in anything else other than in the narrowly taught subjects.

I have the privilege of being able to compare our citizens with those of another country, Spain. My impression is that their ordinary high-school grads generally are more eloquent than many of our top scholars on any general topic.

In life, whether they are shop sales persons, waiters, bus drivers or cleaners, you find they are able to display the right sense of thought in whatever they do. And just about any man-in-the street can argue with the kind of rationality which we often do not find even amongst our well schooled.

please read as ... robotic lawyers, doctors, engineers, etc, not 'robotic engineers'.

If that's the way to make children excel, and give them a track record good enough to win scholarships, it will continue.

The Singapore education system mainly aims to produce booksmarts who are obedient and find those who potentially can become the next scholars. Streetsmarts and general knowledge ? Sorry no time for those. I cannot imagine my children going through this kind of a system.

And these obedients scholars are now running the country.....Hahaha.....No wonder mini-bonds are low risk, Town councils lost money, and mee siam mui hum......etc etc.....OMG, we still need to compete with the mafias in other countries....

OK, singapore's unfortunate kids pass all the exams with flying colours. But what have we manaaged to produce, dull, lassy eyed students unable to understand the workings of the subjects gthey have spent years studying.

Also you see the poor little under developed kids on busess, and MRTs, and even food courts cramming just that little bit more information. You attempt to talk to them, no reply lust a glassy expression, and no social graces. So let them spent their young years studying and turn out misfits.

And tragically, even parents admit their kids do not even talk to them.

And when they do talk the stilted conversation is either a mish mash of singlish, mandarin and malay, because they have not managed to learn one language correctly, or they just sms to each other.

Some children want to do well in exams and push themselves hard. This is laudable, for they know the value of hard work. Learning is hard work. You can tell your children that results doesn't matter and that education is about having fun, but don't expect others to slack together with your children.

7 ess ~ Of all the kids I've occasionally helped - most press taps aren't kiddie-reachable/friendly - the only one who thanked me wasn't local!!! And she had the gumption/savvy to ask for a stranger's help unlike chary locals who couldn't utter 'thanks' even with much prompting! Were they raised by humans?

Yesterday, I witnessed a local race for a vacated train seat. An oldish local woman won but offered the seat to the runner-up : an aggressive young woman whose presumed younger son - without thanking/being coached to thank - relished sitting to admire his toy figurine. The moment another seat was spotted, the mother frantically tried to get her older boy seated - unabashed kiasu!!!

An oldish man standing then opined that it would be decent to decline the offer as older people aren't as fit/painless as the young. The mother retorted with, 'Children should always come first'. The guy's comeback was : 'How to raise citizen-soldiers like that?' and 'Shouldn't older folk deserve consideration too?'

A child raised without questioning his claim to comfort/benefit ABOVE ALL OTHERS becomes a brat whose ageing only REINFORCES that 'inalienable right' - he/she would fight tooth and claw to JUSTIFY. Brats should learn that selfishness isn't defendible nor negotiable - however 'clever' the arguments!

#9

Jousterr,

As a professed agnostic/atheist, within what moral paradigm would you propose the 'unselfishness' be practiced? If you say 'Brats should learn that selfishness isn't defendible nor negotiable...", under what paradigm of morality would that fall under, since as far as agnostic/atheists are concerned, its a dog eat dog world of evolutionary survival for the fittest?

Would like to hear your comments. cheers.