to think most would not really want a secondary modern

[inkyfingers]

OK, tell me why the 'grammar school system' is good for the 85% who don't get a place? I love the pace and challenge etc the GS offers (as many MNers tell me), but how does the alternative serve the huge majority of pupils? (cos surely a 'system' has to benefit as many as possible??).

If it's a really good wheeze, then the GS supporters would surely be happy if their own DC don't get places?

11+ here is a verbal and non-verbal reasoning test, which is basically intelligence.So whilst familiarisation and practice will help a child speed up,I don't think tuition makes any difference ,they have either got it or they haven't!
I agree resourcefulness. being able to read people and situations and hard work are a lot more crucial to a happy, successful(and I don't necessarily mean in the financial sense) and fulfilling life.

ANd you most certainly can be taught how to do the verbal and non-verbal tests. They are not a test of innate academic ability.

Seeket My kids didn't need to be taught ,they 'got' it straight away as any reasonably bright person would-it's not exactly rocket science!
NFER who devise the tests are the United Kingdom's largest independent educational and children's services research organisation.They say the tests are devised to test academic potential and are only very minimally affected by coaching, but you know better seeker??

Your children are very lucky then, princessparty.

However, the experience of other children, particularly those from homes where there are few if any books, and who have parents who are unable or unwilling to support their education is very different.

I do find the "I"m all right, Jack" attitude of many supporters of selection at 11 profoundly depressing.

right anti-GS people -

here's what i find hard. I agree about some things you say about selective education and think comps are on the whole a good thing- HOWEVER don't you think it makes it impossible for a state school child to get close to the same standard of education as they would at a private school if all the state sector offers is comps of varying types?

how do you account for the fact so few of those who excel academically are from comps?

how do you account for the decline in social mobility?

Sorry - don't understand your point. I don't think I said that most GS children are heavily coached, did I? But certainly in our area most have some coaching. And that means that the scales are weighted against those that don't -
There are some naturally brilliant children who sail through uunaided (a ggroup that appears disporportionatly represented amopng the children of mumsnetters!), there are those that are coached a bit, and do a bit better than they would have without coaching. ANd there are a few who are heavioly coached to the test, and wouldn't have passed without the coaching.
Pushing up the score by coaching means that those children whose parents can't/won't coach but who might have got through on ability haven't a hope of getting in. There are a finite number of places, after all.

Um, how shall I put this, Princess? NFER is a commercial organisation that flogs tests and does some research. Most of the UK educational research takes place in universities, the vast majority of it funded by the Economic and Social Research Council. Most of the world's educational research takes place in the US. And yes, you can teach people to pass IQ tests - it happens all the time, and is why they are largely recognised as a blunt tool.

PS I have a massive IQ, as do most of my colleagues, and we certainly don't expect ourselves or all our students to be autodidacts. That's a myth. Bright kids benefit from good teaching as much as the next person if they don't know something.

I don't get all this anti-GS on this thread. My brother went to grammar school and it has revolutionised his life. We grew up in a very poor home yet he is exceedingly clever and was allowed to go to maximise and fulfill his potential. He went onto university and he's now a solicitor.
This would not have happened if he had gone to my school as he would have been held back and he would never have been able to meet his potential.

There was a stigma in failing 11+ and it makes me cross when LeQueen dismissively says

'if people failed the 11+ they just got on with life, and ended up on a different job path, doing something more artisan/practical. Most didn't expect to be academic and go to GS, back then.'

As if you were expected to sit back and say 'I'm not intelligent, I will know my place, put up with inferior teaching and go and do something with my hands'. Thousands of DCs were failed by the system-they did want and expect an academic education, they were fully capable of an academic education and they had to strive very hard to get it when others took a place and left school for work when they were 16yrs old.

Tests to take 11+ are nothing like learning to drive or use software-they should be able to look at a problem and solve it without having ever seen it before.

sorry caps.

My DH not only passed the 11+ but got a full scholarship to an independent school and he didn't do practise papers and he didn't have a tutor-(the first in his family to go to university) it was natural intelligence. It should be the same for everyone-I really wish there was a test that people couldn't use money to prepare their DC.

slurps port, the produce of hundreds of years of work by Great Minds, and magically learns how to make her own!!<

or not.

That's probably why my jam is crap, premature.

Or maybe we need more port. Maybe we just haven't imbibed enough knowledge yet.

God Boff do you get formal dinners?