Karangan

A reader asked how to score an A in SPM Bahasa Melayuat Malaysia Students Forum. Since I was able to score a 1A in my SPM Bahasa Melayu, I have the responsibility to help other SPM candidates to get an A in this subject too. ;-) For your information, you have to pass SPM Bahasa Melayu to be eligible to continue your studies in form six or local university. Those who dont pass Bahasa Mela yu will sit for SPM July Paper (SPM Kertas Julai) the year after they have had their Sijil Pelajaran Malaysia (SPM) examination. Firstly, I would like to share the effective tips to score well in Paper 1 (Kertas 1) with you. For section A (bahagian A), you will have to write an essay within 200 to 250 words based on the material (bahan rangsangan) given. You shouldensure that the length of your essay is within the suggested length and should not exceed it though I learned from my teacher that candidate can actually write to the maximum of 255 words. Lihat gambar di bawah dengan teliti. Huraikan pendapat anda tentang usaha-usaha yang perlu dilakukan untuk menangani gejala vandalisme. Panjang huraian anda hendaklah antara 200 hingga 250 patah perkataan. Source: SPM Bahasa Melayu Kertas 1 (1103/1) November 2005 Bahagian A One of the questions often asked by the candidates is should candidate write the whole essay on the material given or on the topic given. For instance, in SPM Bahasa Melayu 2005 paper 1, the question for section A is just four pictures showing public property being damaged as the result of vandalism and graffiti. There is a title in bold type read: GEJALA VANDALISME (Vandalism). Some candidates worry that they might lose the content marks if they do not write mainly about the material (images). Actually, candidates do not have to write about the pictures (the wanton damage of public property); instead they should write an essay on the topic Vandalism. They should write about the causes (faktor/punca), effects (kesan) and/or actions (langkah mengatasinya) taken to overcome problem depending on the question. So, for SPM 2005 (referring to the question), candidate should write on the actions (usaha) to be taken to overcome vandalism. However, to play safe, candidate can include a sentence or two describing the pictures given. (Sebagai contoh, telefon awam dirosakkan dan dinding bangunan diconteng dengan bahasa kesat. ) For SPM Bahasa Melayu 2004 paper 1, the question for section A is similar to SPM 2005 in the way the question being asked, in which show four pictures of various pollution as the result of development with the title PEMBANGUNAN DAN ALAM SEKITAR (The Development and the Environment) at the centre of the pictures. So, student should not write the whole essay about the pictures. Instead, student should write the essay focussing on the topic the Development and the Environment. Since section A of paper 1 tests mainly on the Malay language and not the content, your essay should be grammatically correct (ayat gramatis) besides showing wide vocabulary (kosa kata luas) and interesting phrases (fasa menarik). These tips work well for section B (bahagian B) too! Pilih satu daripada soalan di bawah dan tulis sebuah karangan yang panjangnya lebih daripada 350 patah perkataan. Source: SPM Bahasa Melayu Kertas 1 (1103/1) November 2005 Bahagian B In section B, you have to choose one out of five questions provided and write a continuous essay (esei) more than 350 words. Please note that if you prefer writing formatted essay (karangan berformat), you have to write it in correct format to avoid mark deduction. Here is a secret to score well in this section: write a lengthy essay! Why lengthy essay? This is because a piece of

lengthy writing gives the examiner an illusion impression that you can write very well. Personally, I usually wrote my SPM Malay continuous writing more than 700 words (about three pages depending on your handwriting). Of course, your essay should not have too many errors including but not limited to grammar, spelling and word choice errors. If however you tend to make a lot of mistakes in your writing, I would advise you to write an essay about 500 words. (more than two pages depending on your handwriting). The trick is to write your words in big text size and ensure that there are not more than ten words in each line. In addition, use some relevant idioms in your writing. Some of the common Malay idioms which you should have mastered include but not limited to bulat air kerana pembetung, bulat manusia kerana muafakat; melentur buluh biarlah dari rebungnya; biar mati anak, jangan mati adat and berat sama dipikul, ringan sama dijinjing. Some questions in section B are open questions which mean that you can write about the causes (faktor/punca), effects (kesan) and/or actions (langkah mengatasinya ) taken to overcome a particular problem. For instance in SPM 2005, some questions have the keywords ulas pernyataan di atas and berikan komen anda tentang pernyataan tersebut. Meanwhile, some other questions have limited the scope of your essay. You can easily identify this type of questions by looking for the keywords like berikan pendapat anda tentang peranan keluarga dalam pembentukan sahsiah anak-anak and tulis rencana tentang usaha-usaha yang perlu dilakukan oleh pihak berkenaan bagi meningkatkan mutu sukan negara. For your information, the fifth question is always a literature-type question (soalan berbentuk sastera). Most of the time, the question will ask the candidates to write a short stories (cerpen) based on a theme or idiom (peribahasa) given. Choose this type of question only if you have a sound mastery of Malay language. Generally, art stream students prefer this type of question more than science stream students. To increase the use of textbook in classroom, our government via Malaysian Examination Council (Majlis Peperiksaan Malaysia) has decided to limit the scope of some SPM essay questions to the SPM syllabus since 2004. Hence you can actually spot the essay questions by excluding the past years topics. Besides that, you can analyse the trial papers (kertas soalan percubaan) essay questions. Here I show you a real instance where the trial question was similar to the real SPM question. Last year, the fifth essay question (tulis cerpen berdasarkan peribahasa bulat air kerana pembetung, bulat manusia kerana muafakat) in the real SPM examination was identical with Terengganu second BM trial papers fifth question. Was it a question leak ( soalan bocor) or just a coincidence? There are a lot more real cases in other subjects too! Below, a recap of the main tips of this post: Essays should be grammatically correct (ayat gramatis) besides showing wide vocabulary (kosa kata luas) and interesting phrases (fasa menarik). Section A Ensure that the length of your essay is within the suggested length. Do not write about the pictures. Instead, write an essay on the topic given.

Section B Write lengthy essay about 700 words. Use some relevant idioms in your writing.

Analyse the topics covered in your form four and five textbooks, past years questions and trial papers.

In this post, I am going to guide you in answering SPM Bahasa Melayu Paper 2 (Kertas 2) effectively question by question. Before that, I think most of you will face one common problem running out of time when answering this paper. Why? This is because you may have spended too much time on

summary (rumusan) and/or reading comprehension (pemahaman). To overcome this problem, you should do your summary and write your answers for reading comprehension quickly. Go to the next question if you face difficulty in answering a particular question. Do not waste your time thinking for answer that you know you do not know.

Another thing to take note is that your answer for every question except summary and novel should be written in one paragraph only. For instance, answer for reading comprehension should be written as below: This is the first sentence of your answer. This is the second sentence of your answer. Please take note that you do not have to leave some space before you write your first sentence. This is the fourth sentence of your answer. Soalan 1: Rumusan Firstly, you should analyse the question carefully. Let say the question is Baca petikan di bawah dengan teliti, kemudian buat satu rumusan tentang kesan-kesan pencemaran air dan langkah mengatasinya. Panjang rumusan hendaklah tidak melebihi 120 patah perkataan. Source: Peperiksaan Percubaan SPM 2006 Sekolah Berasrama Penuh Punca Kesan LangkahIt is very clear that the summary you are going to write will have kesan-kesan pencemaran air as the isi tersurat while langkah mengatasinya as the isi tersirat. How to write the introductory paragraph (pendahuluan)? You should read the passage thoroughly and quickly to identify (by underlining) all the isi tersurat while looking for the main idea of the passage. Your introductory paragraph (sentence) should contain the main idea of the passage. In this case, the main idea of the passage is the kesan pencemaran air. However, you cannot use the keyword kesan because this keyword has been mentioned in the question. Instead, you should use the alternative word for kesan such as implikasi and akibat. Besides that, your introductory sentence should be more specific to get full marks (2 marks). A good introductory sentence in this case is: Petikan membincangkan implikasi pencemaran air kepada semua jenis hidupan di bumi.

For the second paragraph (isi tersurat), you should summarize the points related to akibat daripada pencemaran air in the passage. Do not add your own point of view in writing the isi tersurat. I suggest you to write about six to seven isi tersurat and two to three isi tersirat as long as your summary does not exceed the number of words permitted.Isi Tersurat dan Tersirat This combination of isi tersurat and isi tersirat works well for most of us because we can easily identify the isi tersurat in the passage. The reason I suggest two points for isi tersirat is that you will not get any mark if the point you have written is not included in the marking schema. You should write the isi tersirat in paragraph three. In writing the isi tersirat, you should write your own point of view not mentioned in the passage. In this example, you should write on usaha mengatasinya. Lastly, for the conclusion (kesimpulan), you should always write it in this format: Kesimpulannya, [semua pihak/pihak apa] harus/patut/perlu bekerjasama untuk mengatasi [masalah yang dibincangkan] supaya/demi [kesan baik].

For this particular example, the conclusion should be written like this:Kesimpulannya, semua pihak mestilah bekerjasama dalam menangani masalah pencemaran air supaya rakyat Malaysia mendapat bekalan air yang selamat.

Soalan 2: Pemahaman For questions asking the meaning of certain words (rangkai kata), you must not repeat the words being asked in the question in your answer. For instance, you answer to the question Berikan maksud rangkai kata rakus mengejar keuntungan must not contain the words rakus, mengejar and keuntungan. An excellent answer for this question would be Rangkai kata ini bermaksud gelojoh mencari faedah.

For questions asking for your opinion, you should write your own answer not referring to the passage. For this type of questions, the marks allocated for them indicate the number of points you should write in your answer. One mark indicates that your answer should contain one point; two marks indicate your answer should contain two points; the same goes to three marks for three points. However, four marks usually indicate that your answer should contain only two points with elaboration.

For questions referring to the excerpts of the literature text, you should answer what you have learned in form four and five literature. So, a sound mastery of the entire literature syllabus in form four and five will help you to answer question 2(b), 2(c) and 2(d) correctly and quickly. Most of the time, you can forecast the actual SPM questions by analyzing the literature texts in various states trial papers. Most of the time, there will be question like Huraikan dua perwatakan Daneng daripada petikan dan satu perwatakan daripada keseluruhan cerpen. Some of you might now know that if you can spot more than two perwatakan in the petikan, you can actually write the additional perwatakan for perwatakan daripada keseluruhan cerpen. So, you can actually get all the answers by referring to the text given even though the question asks for perwatakan daripada keseluruhan cerpen. Give one example for each perwatakan in your answer. Daneng seorang yang tetap pendiriannya. Sebagai contoh, dia tidak mahu meninggalkan kampung halamannya.

Soalan 3: Pengetahuan dan Kemahiran Bahasa For bina ayat, you should underline the words given in the questions for the ease of marking by the examiner. For questions 3(c) and 3(d), underline the words which you have changed or corrected in the answers. Question 3 tests your mastery of Malay language, whether you know it or you do not. So, I do not have any great tips to share with you on how to answer this question perfectly.

Soalan 4: Novel Make sure you have read the original novels before you step into the examination hall. You should have read these novels in your form four and five. In addition to that, you should read and memorize the notes about the literature aspects of the two novels since the question will

ask you to make comparison between both of the novels you have read. Give one example to support each point in your answer.

Below, a recap of the main tips of this post: - Answer the questions quickly or you will run out of time. - Answers except for summary and novel questions should be written in one paragraph. Soalan 1: Rumusan Do not repeat the keywords in the questions. Soalan 2: Pemahaman Tips on answering various types of questions. Soalan 3: Pengetahuan dan Kemahiran Bahasa Underline where necessary. Soalan 4: Novel Read and memorize the notes on the literature aspects of the novels you

Pemahaman