1. Difficulty Level: 7/10
The 2022 PSLE English examination was not the easiest of papers but definitely manageable. Unlike previous years, there were not as many surprising or novel questions. However, as we have come to expect of the PSLE, there were a handful of tricky and challenging questions. These questions ultimately differentiated students who scored AL 1 and AL 2 from the rest.
Let’s go through some of the more-talked-about questions from 2022.
2. 2022 PSLE English Paper 2 (Booklet A): Grammar MCQ
| Q10: Special plural nouns & tenses “Where ___________ the scissors I left on the table just now?” asked the art teacher. 1.is 2.are 3.was 4.were Answer : 2 |
Q1 — Q9 of the Grammar MCQ were pretty standard questions. Students who were familiar with question tags, collective nouns, uncountable nouns, 5‑senses rule, gerunds, tenses and prepositions should not have had a problem.
Q10, however, is a little trickier. It tested whether students knew that “scissors” is plural and not singular. It also tested whether students were aware that the question is asking where the scissors are right now and not just now.
First, “scissors” is a special noun that only exists in plural form. Second, as the art teacher was asking where the scissors are right now and not just now, the correct tense is present tense. Thus, the answer is “are”.
*This is not the first time special nouns have been tested in exams. To understand further what special nouns are and to see examples of past exam questions featuring special nouns, please refer to our blogpost or video about it:
3. 2022 PSLE English Paper 2 (Booklet A): Vocabulary Cloze
| Q16. I was on the trip of a lifetime, feasting my eyes on the wilderness of Alaska on a cruise. 1. relishing 2. capturing 3. observing 4. discovering Answer : 1 |
This is perhaps the trickiest vocabulary cloze question in the 2022 PSLE English paper. Options 2, 3 and 4 technically make sense in the sentence because the sentence is about the writer seeing, capturing, observing or discovering the wilderness. However, the reason why option 1 is the only possible answer is because of the word “feasting”. “Feasting” suggests eating in an enjoyable manner and out of the four options, only “relishing” captures that meaning.
4. 2022 PSLE English Paper 2 (Booklet B): Editing
Q39: He felt a sense of exzilerashion as the boat cruised along, with the wind on his face. Q40: Omar was stranded at sea, so he had to survive on a mizerebel amount of food and water. Q44: Even the gentlest touch of his skin made him grimerse in pain. Q45: What was more worrying was that he was drifting in and out of conshousness. Q46: The police launched a search for him but to no ervale. Q47: As time ticked away, everyone became pesimistiq about finding him alive. |
We know that the Editing section has a total of 12 questions. 6 questions will be grammar mistakes while the other 6 will be spelling mistakes. Most students had no issues with the grammar mistakes. The spelling mistakes in 2022, however, were pretty challenging. Students were tested on commonly misspelt words like “exhilaration”, “miserable”, “consciousness” and “pessimistic”. They were also challenged to spell some ‘higher level’ words like “grimace” and “avail”. What 2022 has shown yet again is that reading widely is key. Students should also keep a spelling list of commonly misspelt words. Time and time again, they should practise spelling these words from their spelling list.
5. 2022 PSLE English Paper 2 (Booklet B): Comprehension Cloze
Para 1: Where can you buy fresh produce without increasing your grocery bill? Ask any Singaporean and they are likely to (51)___direct/point___ you to a wet market. *Clues for Q51 highlighted in yellow Para 2: You may think the air-conditioned supermarkets with their conducive environment will eventually (56)___replace___ wet markets. However, there are a few reasons why people have a (57)___preference____ for wet markets over supermarkets even though the latter are cleaner and more comfortable. For a (58)_____start______, freshness is guaranteed with vegetables and meats delivered straight from farms. Secondly, (59)__if/once___ you have built a rapport with the stallholders, they may give you (60)____more____ vegetables or meats when you buy from them. *Clues for Q58 highlighted in light blue |
A lot of parents are worried about the comprehension cloze section. This is the section that fazes many students. To the relief of many, the comprehension cloze passage in the 2022 PSLE English paper was not difficult at all. There were perhaps only two questions which we thought were a little more challenging — Q51 and Q58.
For Q51, the majority of students wrote the answer to be “bring” because it sounds right in the sentence. Unfortunately, it does not make sense. If we were to ask a random Singaporean on the street to suggest a place to buy cheap groceries, that person is not going to “bring” us with him to a wet market. Instead, the person would direct or point us to one.
Q58 is also quite challenging. Many students, including the recommended answer in the PSLE book, wrote for a “change” to be their answer. But once again, this does not make sense at all. Paragraph 2 talks about “a few reasons why people have a preference for wet markets”. The first reason is that wet markets have fresh vegetables and the second reason is that we can get more vegetables if we build a close relationship with stallholders. Since Q58 talks about the first reason, it does not make sense for the answer to be for a “change”. The answer should be for a “start”.
How can you prepare your child for Comprehension Cloze?
From our experience, most students approach comprehension cloze wrongly. They do so by writing in words in the banks that sound right. They do not really check whether the words they write actually make sense. It is important for students to understand the passage and look for clues in the passage to get the answers. Comprehension Cloze passages are designed to contain many obvious clues for students to pick out and rely on so that they can get the right answers.
6. 2022 PSLE English Paper 2 (Booklet B): Synthesis & Transformation (S&T)
| Q68: Vasanti lost her mobile phone. She reported it to the police. Vasanthi reported the ________________________________________________. A: Vasanthi reported the loss of her mobile phone to the police. Q69: The diver adjusted his goggles slightly before entering the water. The diver made _____________________________________________________. A: The driver made slight adjustments to his goggles before entering the water. Q70: The meeting concluded only in the evening. The meeting came ___________________________________________________. A: The meeting came to a conclusion only in the evening. |
The 2022 PSLE English paper reaffirmed one thing: Word Transformation questions are the most important and most commonly tested type of questions in S&T. And yes, they are even more important than Reported Speech. In 2020 and 2021, two out of the S&T questions tested Word Transformation. In 2022, there were three!
Q68 tested whether students knew how to change the verb, “lost”, to its noun form, “loss”. Q69 tested whether students knew how to change “adjusted” and “slightly’ to “slight adjustments”. This question was particularly tricky because “adjustments” had to be in plural form due to the word “slight”, which tells us there were more than one adjustments. Finally, Q70 tested whether students knew how to change “The meeting concluded” to ”The meeting came to a conclusion”. For students unfamiliar with the phrase “came to a conclusion”, this would have been a question they would not be able to get right.
How can you prepare your child for Word Transformation questions?
Children who read widely and are exposed to a wide variety of words and their different forms (nouns, adjectives, and verbs etc.) have a clear advantage. However, practice can also help. What we do at Think Teach is to compile every single word tested for Word Transformation. We then set practices for students to do so as to give them greater exposure. Every year we trawl through past year exam questions. We compile an ever growing list of words and word transformation questions. Using this list, we set practices for our students to do. What we do here is not rocket science but it is extremely tedious. If you can spare the time, we recommend compiling a similar list for your child. It will definitely be very helpful to them!
| 89. | Trickiness | Trick | Tricky | 2020 P6 Prelims Ai Tong School The science question was tricky. It confused many students. ____________ of the science question ____________. |
| 90. | Assumption | Assume | Assumed | 2020 P6 Prelims CHIJ St Nicholas’ Girls School I assumed things were going well for him as he was always smiling. I made _____________________. |
| 91. | Admiration | Admire | Admirable | 2020 P6 Prelims CHIJ St Nicholas’ Girls School Many people know that she admires the poet’s work. Many people know of her ____________________. |
| 92. | Behaviour Misbehaviour | Behave Misbehave | Well-Behaved Badly-Behaved | 2020 P6 Prelims Henry Park Primary School Lily misbehaved during the holiday trip. It caused her to be punished by her mother. Liliy’s _____________________. |
| 93. | Alarming | Alarm | Alarmed | 2020 P6 Prelims Maris Stella Primary School The noise was loud. Sue did not find it alarming. Sue was not _____________________. |
| 94. | Loyalty | - | Loyal | 2020 P6 Prelims Methodist Girls Primary School The team was loyal to their coach. It inspired the spectators. _______ the team’s ________________________ |
7. 2022 PSLE English Paper 2 (Booklet B): Comprehension Open-Ended (OE)
| Although my mother was thrifty, she was not one to shy away from helping others. As a mother now, I want to nurture this value to my children, Xinli and Yongli, who, unlike me, seldom watch their spending. As such, I got them together to brainstorm ideas for a little family project to show kindness to others. Q72(a): What does “this value” refer to? |
To us, the difficulty of a Comprehension OE section is based on the number of inference questions tested. The 2019 PSLE is a good example of a challenging Comprehension OE because almost every question required students to make inferences from clues in the passage. Looking at the 2022 PSLE Comprehension OE, there were only a few inference based questions. As such, our verdict is that the Comprehension OE section in 2022 was very manageable.
There really is not much to talk about for the Comprehension OE section except for Q72(a). This was a very uncharacteristic question for the PSLE because, in our opinion, we felt that it was very poorly set. The recommended answer suggested that “this value” refers to being thrifty. We can see why that was the recommended answer because the sentence reads “I want to nurture this value to my children, Xinli and Yongli, who, unlike me, seldom watch their spending”. Reading this sentence on its own, “this value” should refer to being thrifty. However, the next sentence after that follows with “As such, I got them together to brainstorm ideas for a little family project to show kindness to others”. This proceeding sentence contradicts the earlier sentence. It now suggests that “this value” should refer to helping others and not being thrifty. To be honest, we are not quite sure how the Singapore Examination and Assessment Board decided to mark Q72(a) in the end. Given how unclear and poorly set the question is, we would have accepted this value to refer to being thrifty and helping others.
8. 2022 PSLE English Paper 1: Continuous Writing
As compared to 2018’s topic on Teamwork and 2020’s topic on Something that was lost, 2022’s topic, a long wait, is straightforward and should not have dumbfounded students. For TTA students, using our signature One Storyline Approach would have comfortably gotten them past the line. Out of the stories we have taught, most of our students used either our Prank story or our Snailboy story. For the Prank story, our students wrote that they had planned the perfect prank. They intended to pull the prank on their best friend during his birthday party. They waited a long time and counted down the days to their best friend’s birthday party. For the Snailboy story, our students wrote that they were teased at school for being a slow runner. They wanted to end the ridicule by winning the following year’s cross-country competition organised by their school. They trained very hard for the competition and counted down the days to the race. After a long wait, it was time to amaze the school.
Year after year, we see the power of our One Storyline Approach. Indeed, the best strategy to tackle continuous writing is to arm students with a number of flexible storylines. Teach them how to adapt those stories and regardless of what gets tested in the PSLE, students should breeze through the paper.
9. Concluding Remarks
After 3 years of being ravaged by COVID, 2023 heralds a change back to pre-COVID normal. With students no longer considered to be disrupted by the pandemic, we are expecting PSLE to return to its full force — something not seen since 2019.
What does full force mean? First, there will be no reduction of topics tested. Second, PSLE papers will be marked according to usual standards. In this regard, we heard from the grapevine that PSLE markers were asked to be more lenient in their marking, particularly for English Continuous Writing, so as to show mercy to COVID-impacted students. Finally, PSLE papers will revert to their usual difficulty level. We found the PSLE papers (not just English but Science, Math and Chinese too!) from 2020–2022 to be significantly easier than their predecessors.
With 2023 being a year that gets us back to what life was like before COVID, could this also mean that we can expect PSLE to be more challenging than 2022? We’ll find out together really soon!
This article was proudly written for you by TTA’s English Team. Every year, we impact over a thousand students and empower them with our smart techniques to achieve exam excellence in their school exams as well as their PSLE. We want your child to be our next success story! Together with us, your child can strengthen his/her mastery of paper 2 content by joining our Full English Programme (FEP). Additionally, your child can hone his/her composition writing skills by partaking in our Junior Writing Classes (JWC) and Master Writing Classes (MWC).
