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Secondary education

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Bucks 11+

53 replies

insomniac1 · 22/03/2023 19:51

Hi everyone

I just wanted to get some opinions on the TSTT bucks 11+. I have a June born son who is quite immature for his age. He is in year 3 at a very selective and academic independent through school and the feedback we get is that academically he's doing ok (pretty average) but he is quite lazy, not very competitive, very disorganised. He is excellent at reading and comprehension when it's a multiple choice type thing but is a slow writer. He's average at maths. He likes things like VR and NVR.

We are considering moving to Amersham purely to get him into dr challoners. We like his current school but financially are starting to wonder whether we want to commit to senior school fees.

I know that no one can answer this but what are your experiences with the 11+? Is it really as hard as everyone says? For an averagely academic child (although his strong points are multiple choice type questions/verbal reasoning etc as opposed to creative writing) if we tutor him from the middle of year 4 does he have a chance of passing? Or does he have to be super super smart to pass?

I'm asking as if we do go down this route it involves moving house!!

Thank you so much.

OP posts:
insomniac1 · 22/03/2023 21:08

Thanks for your response. We are quite limited in where we can move to as we need to be close to elderly parents. We love where we currently are but nervous about fees going up significantly. Amersham/little Chalfont could work as an area but if he doesn't pass the 11+ I'm not sure which other good schools are around there?

OP posts:
redskylight · 22/03/2023 21:06

If he's "average" at a very selective and academic school he's likely to be Bucks 11+ material I would have thought.

However, if you're not sure, and you don't want to pay private school fees, wouldn't you be better off moving to a non-grammar area?

SamPoodle123 · 22/03/2023 20:21

You could try getting him assessed to see how well he does on mock tests? This will help give you an idea. Although, he is still quite young, so you might need to wait until year 5 for the mocks. I think if a dc is bright it is possible. They do not need to be super super bright.