From 2021 onwards, the PSLE will be scored with wider bands and the scores will reflect the student’s individual performance and not his performance relative to his peers.
Children who were in Primary 1 in 2016 will be the first batch to experience this new scoring system.
Wider Scoring Band to Reduce Fine Differentiation
The T-score will be replaced by wider scoring bands.
Each subject will be scored using 8 bands known as Achievement Levels (AL), with AL1 being the best score and AL8 being the lowest score. The ALs reflect the student’s level of achievement in the subject.
The student’s total PSLE Score will be the sum of the four subject scores.
The PSLE Score will range from 4 (best) to 32. There are 29 possible PSLE Scores, compared to around 200 different T-scores today. This will reduce excessively fine differentiation of students at a young age.
Scores to Reflect Student’s Own Performance
Once a student shows a level of achievement that meets the learning objectives of the curriculum expected at a certain AL, he will receive the AL regardless of how his peers perform. The emphasis is on how well the student has learnt, and not how well he has done compared to others.
We want our children to focus on their own learning instead of trying to outdo others.
Streaming Criteria
Students will continue to be assigned to Express, Normal (Academic) and Normal (Technical) courses. This enables us to better customise our teaching to support the needs of the children, so they can learn at a pace comfortable to them and make good progress.