Scoring SPM Bahasa Melayu – Kertas 2

Written by Chong:

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

It 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. 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 have read in form four and five.