The Hindu : Karnataka / Bangalore News : Panel suggests changes in SSLC exam pattern

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Monday, Jun 16, 2008
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Panel suggests changes in SSLC exam pattern

Special Correspondent

Bangalore: Students appearing for the Secondary School Leaving Certificate (SSLC) examination will be answering fewer objective-type questions from next year if the recommendations made by an expert committee are accepted by the Government.

The expert committee, set up by the Government to review the examination pattern of SSLC under the chairmanship of S. Srikantha Swamy, has submitted its report suggesting major changes in the pattern.

The salient recommendations of the report, besides cutting down on objective type questions, are introduction of a separate section (Section C) on grammar for the first language, a day’s gap between mathematics, science and social studies examinations and providing three hours to answer second and third language papers on a par with other subjects. It has said that students should not be given more than five chances to clear the examination.

“These are the recommendations and they will have to be further discussed before implementation,” said Commissioner for Public Instruction Kumar G. Naik.

The present system, which lays emphasis on multiple-choice and short-answer questions, was introduced in 2006.

The question papers were divided into Section A and Section B, with Section A dedicated to multiple choice questions.

However, this pattern had come in for criticism on the ground that it encourages students to indulge in rote learning rather than reasoning, making them incapable of writing essays and analytical answers.

It was argued that it led to a situation where students who pass out of school and join college ended up not being able to cope up because they are not trained for analytical thinking.

This was cited as even one of the reasons for bad performance by students in PU examination this year.

It may be mentioned here that this year academic the Central Board of Secondary Education introduced a system where 20 per cent of the questions are dedicated to testing the student’s critical thinking skills rather than rote learning.

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