Answering SPM Literature Component (Sing to the Dawn)

The question given in the slide above requires students to relate an event and how the event has affected the way they look at life. The question may seem to be difficult but if students have good understanding of the story it would be very easy to link one of the events and how it has changed their perspective towards life. 

Students can always start with a brief introduction but they should always keep in the mind that they should answer; in this case the event and their view on life. 

It is essential for students to always make things very clear in the beginning of their answers. In this case, they should make it very clear which event they are to narrate. They should also know what is an event so that they do not deviate from hitting the nail right. In many cases, students do not understand events and end up narrating the entire story as event which may not fetch them a high score. 

Sustainability is also important while answering a 'literature question'. Many a time, I have noticed that students would start off well but get carried away and write answers which are irrelevant to the question. It is important for students to stay relevant at all times. To stay relevant one should always stop and read their answers and think how it is related to the question. The elaboration in the slide above has linked to the event very well. In this answer, the student has chosen to write about Dawan's encounter with Bao in the marketplace and has related to her own life on how things are better for her but not everyone has a good life, therefore she has learnt to appreciate what she has. 

The student has also further elaborated how her perspective on things around her has changed based on that one event. To answer well it is important for a student to think and plan the answer well. There may be many events in a story but selecting an event that we can elaborate better is important as we will have more ideas to link, but always remember do not try to dump everything in one idea, that may make your composition messy. 

In this slide, her elaboration leads to the ending note. It is important to notice that, from the beginning till the end the student has linked her perspective towards life based on only an event as required by the instruction. The utmost important thing is we should not only read the story but  understand  the content well and try to link the ideas. I notice that the questions for the literature component has changed and they are most likely to be HOTS.