Both parents and students dread examination periods during the scholastic year due to the immense pressure that is placed on the children to do well in their exams.
According to the Health Behaviour in School-Aged Children study issued by the World Health Organisation (WHO) in 2002, 41.7 per cent of Maltese 11-year-olds, together with Lithuania (43.8 per cent) and Portugal (43.7 per cent), suffered the most stress from schoolwork and homework
Examination stress is well-known to occur, even at a young age, and parents and close friends are the ones who have to help the children pull through.
Many parents said that their children become restless and worried when it is time for exams.
And one mother said that she had to cancel a weekend in Gozo because her son was so worried about his exams and asked her to stay with him and study. “I could not refuse him – it is not easy for him and it is not easy for me either to see him like that. I want to help him as much as possible but there is too much pressure,” she said.
It was pointed out by many parents that the educational system should be changed, with more importance given to work done throughout the year instead of an examinations-based system.
“Homework should be given its due importance to the final result. Unfortunately, if a child is unwell, or mentally distracted, while he is doing his exams, there is nothing he can do about it – and the final mark does not reflect the work he has put in throughout the year,” said another parent.
Labour believes in holistic assessment system
MLP spokesman on
education Carmelo Abela says:
Labour wants to make assessments fairer and more just for students at all levels, starting from primary school. As a result, this issue has to be viewed in the wider context of the changes we want to bring about in the education system. These include the capping of class sizes at 25 pupils per class in primary school and the capping of school populations to not more than 400 students per primary school.
Along with this there is the introduction of the reception class between the second year of kindergarten and Year One in primary school. At least this will ensure that when students come to take their 11+ exam they will, in fact, really be 11 years old, and will be more mature and better prepared when they take this exam.
Beyond this, the Labour Party will insist that student progress is measured by means of continuous and
formative assessment methodologies as opposed to the present exam-based system. We will ensure that teachers are given appropriate continuous training in order to be able to start using these techniques.
Teachers will also be given the necessary technical support and resources to bring about this change. I want to stress that we want to ensure that continuous and formative assessments are to be used right up to the end of secondary school. In this way we hope to reduce the stress and anxiety associated with exams at all levels. We want to arrive at a situation where students are not labelled as successes or failures simply on the strength of an exam, which might be taken when the children are not physically or mentally fit.
In this regard, I also want to mention that we want to revisit the MATSEC exams regulations while keeping the needs and interests of students in mind. We also intend to give the MATSEC board full autonomy from the university and the necessary resources to carry out the function of an independent examinations authority that will be responsible for all examinations at secondary and post secondary level organised in Malta and Gozo.
Labour is, therefore, awaiting the outcome of the government’s report on assessment to see which direction the government is taking on assessment. When we met with the working group set up by Education Minister Louis Galea to draw up the report on this issue, we not only explained the party’s position but also made it clear that we are broadly in agreement with suggestions to improve assessment methodologies by introducing national benchmarking as indicated in the National Minimum Curriculum. We were also pleased to note that the representatives of the Church schools and independent private schools also share this view.
However, Labour’s priority is the need for fairer assessment – fairer and more just for all students at all levels. We want all Malta and Gozo’s young generation to leave school with basic literacy, numeracy and information and communication technology (ICT) competences and the life skills necessary to make a success of their lives.
That is why we believe that the issue of assessment has to be viewed in a holistic manner with the improvements we want to introduce to Malta’s education system – improvements that will not only ensure a fairer assessment throughout the students’ school life but also a more humane and holistic education that is of the best quality and that really and truly makes a success out of each and every one of Malta and Gozo’s children and young people.
Stress not caused only by exams – Education Minister
Education Minister Louis Galea says:
It is not true that exam stress is the result of an increasing number of subjects or of the bulk of material they have to study. One also needs to verify how many children are actually suffering from stress in the sense that the level of stress is having an adverse effect on them and what are the real reasons for such stress.
Many children undergo episodes of stress for reasons that are completely unrelated to their education experience. I also believe that doses of stress are inbuilt in our nature and life-styles and it is positive that, from an early age, children learn to cope with stress.
On the other hand, the ministry is conscious that examination papers should be student-friendly and should help students show what they know, and the development they have achieved. To this effect, the curriculum department has already made several changes to the examination papers and many agree that today’s papers are much more friendly than they were a few years ago.
The ministry has also commissioned the MATSEC and the 11+ Exam reviews. Both are meant to review the current examination system at key stages. Besides focusing on other issues, both reviews are intended to focus also on the current workload and its impact on the students.
Changes in syllabi are ongoing. I personally think that very few students actually need to go to private lessons and that, in the majority of cases, private lessons just add to the workload that students might have, with limited added value. If students followed their lessons at school and structured their work at home with proper time-management, most of them would do fine without the burden of private lessons and they could dedicate that time to more creative and sporting activities, thus lessening their stress.
The current 11+ review is focusing on the possibility of valuing continuous assessment at school in conjunction with final exams.
Great efforts are made by paper-setters to produce student-friendly examinations to reduce examination stress. One cannot deny that parents’ uninformed expectations very often inflict undue stress on their children. However, as I have already explained, we face stressful situations all the time and stress is an inevitable part of life. We get stressed when we have deadlines to reach at work, we get stressed when we need to cope with all the things that life brings with it, and there will be times when stress levels are high and times when it is low. The reality is that most students are not stressed at all and that examinations bring a certain amount of stress to everyone. The key is in managing that stress, and in all stakeholders – teachers, parents, and students – doing their part to make sure that, come exam time, students are well-prepared to show what they have learnt.
In Years 1 to 3, assessment is purely formative. Examinations start formally at the end of Year 4. I do not agree that exams should only start in secondary schools, as they are meant to find out what children have learnt, their level of development and where they need more help, so that teachers can take appropriate action to push forward teaching and learning. Waiting till the secondary level would be too late. I believe that exams are an essential tool which, if used well, should help and not hinder students.
Children who sit for Junior Lyceum exams suffer higher levels of stress
According to a study, children who sit for Junior Lyceum exams suffer higher levels of stress than those who do not, as they “may perceive that the demands posed on them to pass exceed their resources”.
The study was carried out by Chantelle Falzon for her dissertation to complete her B. Psychology course, entitled The Nightmare Year: Anxiety and the Junior Lyceum Examinations in Year 6 Primary.
There are two types of state schools for children aged 11 to 16: Area Secondary Schools and the Junior Lyceum Schools. Admission to the Junior Lyceum Schools is on the basis of the qualifying exam in five subjects: religion, Maltese, English, mathematics and social studies. Students need to obtain a Grade C in all subjects and all students attending Year 6 in primary school are eligible to sit for the exam.
Ms Falzon interviewed a total of 150 boys and 164 girls in her study.
According to the study, examination stress in Britain is so pronounced that the National Institute for Clinical Excellence proposed to issue guidelines for doctors to guide them on whether to prescribe counselling, psychotherapy or antidepressants to children.
She pointed out that exposure to stress may “bring about changes in behaviour such as impulsive behaviour, excitability, restlessness, emotional outburst, excessive eating or loss of appetite”.
Furthermore, she added, students who reported high stress exams, demonstrated depressed immunological function and thus developed more respiratory infections in the six months following exams.
Ms Falzon explained that while facilitative stress is healthy and helps children to perform better, excessive anxiety “impairs them even during their study work and does not let them rest”.
Parents also tend to put excessive pressure on children to perform well in exams, she said. “When adults feel anxious about a child’s future, these emotions are communicated to the child and may lower a child’s self-confidence and thus bring out fearful consequences,” she added.
The study said that boys and girls vary in their behaviour when under stress. “Boys tend to be more rebellious and fear prevails among girls. Unfortunately guardians worry more when their children are aggressive and troublesome than when they are quiet and fearful.”
Ms Falzon quoted a local study which showed that “Maltese girls manifest their superiority over Maltese boys, from as early as when they are eight years old. However, sex difference in attainment becomes more evident as the children grow older.”
In her study, Ms Falzon found out that children who do not sit for Junior Lyceum Exams, but still sat for an annual exam, were found
to have “evidently lower levels of anxiety”.
She pointed out that for children who sit for the Junior Lyceum Examination “it is their first time sitting for such a formal examination and thus they are faced with a relatively new situation.”
Furthermore, these students are under even more pressure because there will be negative consequences if they fail them.
“Children will be either transferred to an Area Secondary School, and since in the Maltese context these schools are perceived as degrading, it may influence a child’s self-esteem, or they have the option to repeat the Year 6 in primary school, which in turn might also affect their level of self-esteem,” the study said.
To make matters worse, children who sit for these exams “may also be fearful of losing their friends”.
However, it said, children who do not sit for the Junior Lyceum exams “will continue to attend the same school they attended since they were young, and thus a pass or a fail in the yearly examinations will not result in a threat of losing their friends”.
The study found that children are also afraid of their parents’ reactions if they fail the Junior Lyceum exams and that they believe that “their parents will blame them or punish them if they fail”.
They are also afraid of losing their teacher’s esteem and their own self-esteem. “Children who fail the Junior Lyceum exam might be perceived as inferior to others who pass the exam.”
Another source of anxiety is related to a sense of guilt “related to not studying and working enough, even though they would have suspended all other activities they enjoyed doing”.
Ms Falzon pointed out that exam stress causes a vicious circle.
“Since the syllabus for Year 6 primary is large and intense, absenting school due to illnesses will put more burden on the children in order to make up for the lost lessons, thus causing them more stress and hence they will be more prone to illnesses.”
She added that schools that had Junior Lyceum exams had the largest number of absentees.