Every Singaporean parent wants to see their child excel in academics, especially in key subjects like English comprehension skills that can be particularly challenging. Even if your child reads well, they may struggle with answering comprehension questions effectively. The good news? Success in comprehension isn’t just about reading, it’s about strategy.
Imagine your child sitting in an exam room, staring at the passage. They’ve read it, but now they’re overwhelmed by the questions in front of them. Their confidence and knowledge starts to wane as they struggle to figure out where to begin.
“What if they choose the wrong approach?”
“What if they misinterpret the question?”
It’s a familiar feeling for many parents watching their child grapple with exams, knowing they’ve worked hard, but still be unsure of themselves.
At Keynote Learning, we believe in technique-based practice, ensuring that students not only practise but also apply critical thinking skills and use the right methods to achieve tangible improvement. Here’s how to boost your child’s skills for Paper 2 comprehension:
Tip 1: Understand the Different Types of Questions
In English comprehension exams, not all questions are created equal. Understanding the different types of questions is key to answering them effectively and better understanding them. There are eight types of questions in total. Here are some examples:
By understanding these categories, your child will approach each question with the right mindset, preventing common mistakes such as missing the point of the question and giving an opinion instead of a factual statement.
Tip 2: Read the Passage Carefully Before Answering
If a student rushes through the passage, eager to get to the questions, they’ll often find themselves confused by small details and misinterpretations. It’s worth slowing down and reading the passage carefully, avoiding this common pitfall that hasty students fall into.
Encourage your child to actively engage with the passage by:
This strategy prevents them from rushing through the text and missing crucial details, which is a common reason for losing marks in English comprehension exams.
Tip 3: Use Evidence from the Text in Your Answers
A common mistake students make is providing answers without backing them up with evidence from the passage. Strong answers are always backed up by evidence from the text. Teach your child how to extract relevant information from the passage and integrate it into their answers seamlessly.
When your child faces a question “Why did the character feel anxious?”, they need more than just a generic response. Simply saying, “They were worried,” won’t earn high marks because it lacks depth and meaning.
Instead, they need to reference the text directly: “The character felt anxious because, as the text states, ‘his hands trembled uncontrollably.”
Teach your child to use the PEE Method (Point, Evidence, Explanation):
This structured approach ensures their answers are clear, well-supported, and meet the exam criteria.
For example, if the question asks why a story character is feeling anxious, a structured answer might be:
This formula ensures that answers are well-supported, coherent information relevant, and meet the marking criteria.
Tip 4: Manage Your Time Effectively
Time management is often one of the biggest challenges in exams.
Picture this: your child spends too long on one difficult question, leaving them with only a few minutes to complete the rest of the exam. As a result, they rush through the remaining questions and make multiple careless mistakes, losing out on easy marks.
Help your child break down their exam time:
This time allocation ensures they answer all questions without getting stuck on one for too long.
Tip 5: Avoid Common Pitfalls
Even the brightest students can lose marks if they aren’t conscientious. Here are a few pitfalls and how your child can avoid them:
Tip 6: Practise Regularly and Review Your Work with a Mentor
As with any skill, regular practice is essential for mastering English comprehension.
Here are some ways your child can improve:
Repetitive Practice is Not the Right Approach
Many students fall into the trap of blindly practising comprehension questions without fully understanding the techniques behind them. Repetitive practice of comprehension passage may seem like the right approach, but it often leads to frustration when results don’t improve.
Typical school practice involves repeatedly answering random comprehension questions, reviewing answers without understanding, and doing corrections in green ink. While this may get the homework done, it doesn’t help students internalise key comprehension strategies or address their weaknesses.
What truly drives improvement is technique-based practice. Rather than completing endless stacks of questions, Keynote Learning teaches our students how to approach different question types systematically.
For example: Inferential questions often trip up students because they require deeper thinking.
At Keynote, our students don’t just practise—they learn the techniques that help them understand the intrinsic value behind these questions. Unlike many schools, we make use of thematic vocabulary coaching to enhance retention and memory. Students take part in weekly quizzes to keep up with their vocabulary practise, and are able to apply it in class to answer questions.
This often results in increased confidence, well-structured answers, and ultimately, higher scores.
Scoring High in Paper 2
Achieving a top score in Paper 2 requires more than just practice and familiarisation. One often overlooked technique is visual mapping, where students draw diagrams or mind maps of the passage’s structure, themes, and key points. This helps in organising thoughts and quickly referring back to important details while answering questions. Combining this with regular timed practice and self-review will dramatically improve retention and clarity.
Help Your Child Reach Their Full Potential
At Keynote Learning, we offer personalised tuition for primary school students, that focus on enhancing their comprehension and analytical skills. Our technique-based practice includes guidance on time management, structured answering techniques such as PEE (Point, Evidence, Explanation), and regular assessments to track progress.
Our tutors prepare for exams annually, so they can bring the latest insights to each lesson. This ensures your child is prepared for the actual examination. We also offer:
Unlock your child’s potential today by exploring our English language tuition programmes.