11plus tutors in Watford

[user1463051446]

Hi, my dd is in year 4 and I'm looking for a private tutor for her to prepare her for the SW consortium and independent schools, can any recommend a good private tutor, or even good group tutoring? Any advice much appreciated, thanks

[TheSecondOfHerName]

My eldest two scored high in the S W Herts consortium test but I prepared them myself, so can't help with recommendations.

Have you tried asking on the S W Herts board in the EPEF?

When you do find a tutor, make sure they familiarise your daughter with the CEM style verbal reasoning, as that's what S W Herts are using now.

[user1463051446]

Thanks very much for that, I'll look into it. I was thinking I might have to tutor her myself if we couldn't find a good tutor but was worried about how I could get hold of past papers to familiarise her with the exam format and style of questions. Do you mind me asking how you did it and what books etc you used? Thanks in advance ! 😀

[TheSecondOfHerName]

Maths: Bond do a book on how to do 11+ Maths. I used this to find out where the weaker areas were, and then the rest of the preparation was practice to increase accuracy. The mean score in the Maths test the S W Herts consortium are currently using is very high, and several children get full marks. DS2 did, as did at least two other boys in his Maths set. To increase DS1's accuracy, I made him sit down with me after every Maths paper and go through his mistakes. He hated that part and quickly learned to work more carefully.

I don't feel qualified to give advice on the verbal reasoning paper; the format has changed since my children sat it in 2010 and 2012. But for any verbal reasoning, vocabulary work is always useful. The vocabulary in these tests can seem quite archaic to today's ten year old. I gave them some classic children's literature to read and they looked up the meaning of any unfamiliar words. DS2 especially enjoyed The Secret Garden, Tarka the Otter, Swallows & Amazons and The Water Babies.

One last point: if your daughter has any sense of pitch, it's worth applying to do the music aptitude test.

[user1463051446]

Thank you very much. That's really helpful 👍🏽