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Paper2 = has a good range of tested items. Easy: vocabulary, proverbs. Medium: MCQ comprehension, suffixes and prefixes, graphic stimulus. Difficult: OE comprehension.

There are 3 types of comprehension questions; literal, inferential and evaluative. Most students will be able to attempt the literal questions, and a handful will be able to complete the inferential ones as well. Thus usually, students are able to do this component quite well even though it is meant to be a difficult component.

Equal emphasis given on oratorical and reading skills that enable all students to strive to achieve good grades.

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1. a greater demand for higher order skills despite lack of a practical paper.
N Sci (Chem): AOA 45%; AOB 45%; AOC 10%
IGCSE: AOA 63%; AOB 37%

2. a greater use of command words used in question stems compared to IGCSE.

Both IGCSE and N Sci Chem do not offer choices in their theory papers.

N Sci Chem is conducted in a single seating while IGCSE is conducted in three seatings. N Sci Chem does have a longer duration for its theory papers (for the same amount of marks) compared to IGCSE
N Sci Chem
P3 MCQ (20m) + P4 Structured (30m) - 75 min
IGCSE
P1/2 MCQ (40m) - 45 min
P3/4 Structured (80m) - 75 min
P5 Practical (40m) - 75 min

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Comparing the common topics in both syllabi,

IGCSE covers a wider breadth of concepts and includes a practical component.

N Sci (Chem) covers greater depth in but has no practical component.

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Control on Choice- in IGCSE, no options were given and candidates are required to complete all questions.
Communication in Assessment - Pictures and Diagrams used in IGCSE are large and clear with no redundant words or pictures included. Tables used to represent information for DBQ used are well-organised with little redundant words. A variety of command words were used to instruct candidates to perform different skills and demand to answering the questions.

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Higher demand in exam standards.

P1 - there are mcqs with high reading load and novel context that makes both the context and content challenging. Forces students to digest the novel content, followed by choosing the right ans. There are usually 2-3 of these questions. The MCQs in Int A lv tends to be shorter and more direct.

P2 - It is like a combination of both p2 and p4 of the int A lv assessment. A mixture of recall qns with novel context, heavy reading load + data based questions + essay. Given the limited number of marks, the qns tends to be more synoptic compared to the Int A lv paper, increasing the demand of the paper.

Curriculum wise:
Int A lv has more environmental focus, which tends to be less demanding compared to molecular stuffs

Int A lv also has vascular transport in plants and circulatory system which are both in the O lv syllabus

But there are H2 content in int A lv that are not in H1
- infectious diseases
- immunity

These can be challenging for H1 students.

However, being a H1 subject, there is a much narrower breadth of topics compared to int A lv. H1 is also missing the practical aspect of the subject.

Accessibility: If i'm not wrong, there are no requirements for taking H1 Bio, as such, there tends to be students with no chemistry background taking H1 bio, which would disadvantage them.

Choice: Both syllabi has choice in essay. However, from past year papers, the 'demand' for both essays are not always similar - but i think this is due to the inherent nature of the topics, some topics are harder to grasp compared to others - e.g. evolution.

Control: both are equivalent in items presented and instructions of responses

Bias: For Int A lv, as it has 5 papers, the spread of difficulty appears to be more well spread, as compared to H1, where there are only 2 papers and that may make it seem like there is a larger proportion of difficult items.

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Test accessibility:
Paper 1
Exam duration is longer (1hr35mins) for Cam O Accounting but requires lesser number of marks (35 marks) while NA POA exam duration for paper 1 is only 1hr but marks allocated is more (40 marks). NA POA Paper 1 seems more demanding in terms of duration as compare to Cam O Accounting.
Paper 2: Cam O Accounting allocated 100 marks for a 1hr 45mins paper while NA POA allocated only 60marks for a 2hours paper. Cam O Accounting P2 seems more demanding in terms of duration as compared to NA POA P2.

Control on choice: Both papers are comparable since they both do not have question choices.

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Greater control on choice. The Cambridge international paper has individual essay and team project components where they can explore a topic of their choice in greater depth. This can give students too much choice which could hamper their performance.

Less possibility of bias as the Cambridge paper requires students to record themselves as part of their assessment. This could be biased towards high ses students.

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Easier

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IGSE Reading & Written: 5 Exercises with a higher and more specific word count. The questions are more fluid.
CLB Written: only 1 task, very explicitly framed (either email or diary entry).

IGSE Listening: 4 tasks, with short answers, information correction etc.
CLB Listening: 10 MCQs

IGSE Oral: Oral presentation, short discussion and general topic.
CLB Oral: Oral presentation, followed by conversation with OE (video stimulus).

Choice: Local paper has fewer choices (eg. Paper 1 has only 2 questions), whereas IGSE has writing components for functional and prose.

Course Objectives: IGSE's first aim is about practical communication, yet the reading and written components add up to 60%. Local paper's aim is similar to IGSE, and the oral and listening components add up to 50%.

Test accessibility: IGSE's paper does not allow the use of e-dictionary, whereas the local paper allows it. Hence, less scaffolding is given to IGSE students.

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Easier

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having more weightage on written paper. While the FML focus more on oratorical skills.

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3 papers (paper2, oral and LC)
15 marks for paper 2 (consists of 12 marks for 6 MCQ, and 4 marks for 2 FIB)
70 for oral
30 for listening compre

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4 papers (paper1, paper2, oral and LC)
40 marks for paper 1
90 marks for paper 2
50 for oral
20 for listening compre

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Paper 2 = a range of questions pitch at 3 levels; easy, medium and difficult. Easy: proverbs, complete the phrases. Medium: prefixes and suffixes, mcq comprehension and graphic stimulus. Difficult: subjective comprehension (24 marks)