The Discrapencies of Examination Systems
well well.during maths class just now and on the bus ride home i had an ultra long thought process about evaluation systems and their flaws, and it all boils down to this.
i strongly believe that the mark allocated to a student should be according to the amount of effort he or she has put in, regardless of how well they performed, as long as they have done their best.
of cos this is really impossible and only God can do that.
hence the phrase 'life is unfair', cos it really is.
sometimes i really think the methods of evaluation for the subject of music which im taking now isnt really a good measure of what people are really capable of. the aims of the course is to 'develop' student's skills. so shouldn't the examinations be something like..
1) a first piece of work is submitted
2) a 2nd draft of the work is submitted later, and the marks allocated are based on how much the work has improved and how much effort has been put in (which in reality is impossible)
or
a piece of work is marked on the potential it has (which is impossible, cos unrealised potential is useless).
the message im getting from the assessments of music now is that u have to be good at everything from day 1. and if u arent u suffer. shouldnt the system allow for greater flexibility, after all its a 2 year course. but the way its going, the first piece needs to be recorded, and its gonna be one of the official recordings for IBO submission? i just feel its too soon. i feel that my technical ability will be higher nxt year, and i think im capable of recording my entire repertoire at one go. and also the 2nd piece is assessed for final year.
but of cos i cant really blame the teachers, they do want to see gradual progress. not everyone practices their instrument on their own accord for at least 5 hours a week until their fingertips burn off.
but then again, im singaporean, and sometimes marks somehow mean everything to me, even tho i often say marks dont matter, examinations arent a good representation of ur playing ability etc.
what i feel like doing now is just to change my pieces as and when a performances is required. theres a time for everything in my journey with the guitar. but sometimes the times and demands of others dun meet with my plans. right now, i just want to drill my ATCL pieces in these 1 or 2 wks to a higher standard b4 the final year exams kick in. but what the 2nd recording assessment does not allow me to do is to carry out my plans. practice for a performance and practice simply to improve a piece are two whole different realms. and i know that any other piece on my performance repertoire proposal wont be ready for performance in less than a wk.
so in order to get mere marks, which often speak the loudest, i can just change one of my pieces to a piece that i've drilled and performed a number of time before. but that goes against my intentions of always wanting to play new pieces and try out performing new repertoire.
sure i guess i'll do ok if i changed my piece, but when people ask me how i did it my answer would be like.. "oh, i played this piece since sec 4 then when exam come just recycle lor". doesnt sound very good. dint take a lot of effort to recycle the piece anyway.
well then. if you've read through this entire post perhaps u can have a thought about the flaws in the examination systems around us.
cya.
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home