To think the 11+ is the work of the devil?

[LynetteScavo]

And if you don't agree with me, you're wrong.

Agree. My ds is in year 5 and will have to take it if he wants to go to a halfway decent school. In this area there are grammar schools, church schools (we don't go to church so these aren't an option) or shitholes fully of Jeremy Kile's future guests!!!

Oh I'm with you there.
you too are obviously going through the joy that is vr/nonvr, comprehension and maths.
Why is the comprehension some nineteenth century piece of crap, in language no one speaks ?
Welcome to the world of heaving open nights, eyeing up the competition, manic parents who put their social life on hold till December and can talk of nothing else at the school gate. (not me obviously)
Hate it, hate it, hate it.

DS has to take the test in a achool he's never been to (out of catchment, and I don't want him to go to), but we'll now have to go to open evening so he's familiar with it on test day.

I can't do this. DS only practices once a week with a tutor, and DH is taking the day off work to take him. I can't involve myself or I'll become ill, I tell you!

And I'm pretending to all in RL (Apart from DH) that I'm perfectly relaxed about it.

my dd did the tests yesterday and today and it eats shit.
LOL

She is doing another on saturday

were are you all from?

we've got rid of it this year in norn iron, so ive just had to fork out £35 for an entrance test for ds1 to take to get to a grammar school next sept

he doesnt want to sit it because half his class arent doing it and im pretty sure he's now going to fail the thing on purpose to get to go to school with his friends

[tearing my hair out]

think yourselves lucky 11+ and grammar schools are available in your areas

We're out of borough which means DS1 has to sit an entrance exam for each of the 2 grammar schools in the neighbouring borough, an entrance exam for our local comprehensive because of their shite and unfair admissions criteria which mean he may not get in on distance and then 1 each for 2 private schools because they are the only other options.

Kent

Yes Pranma I know what you mean, but a Brighton friends comps are about a zillion times more sucessful than ours, so it kind of makes our comps not so good
I know what I mean, dunno if it makes sense to you!

you're kiddng me...a separate exam for each school?

DD did the Maths paper today -
Me - "How did it go?"
Her - "I didn't understand any of the questions"
Me "What - NONE of them??"
Her "Not really..."

Mmm, that was worth doing then

(Also Kent)

agree

pranma....you are wrong...back away from this thread.

YANBU
this is why we need a proper comprehensive system for all

My DD decided she wanted to try for grammar school a while back so we started 11+ tuition (you have to round here-there is fierce competition and 3/4 of the girls who get in are from independent schools who do 11+ work from kindergarten!)

She can do the work but struggles with the pace. SHe has come out of her tuition today very stressed saying she had to do an english paper where the text was "Tess of the D'urbervilles!" She had absolutely no idea what it was about- even the tutor said she had to think about it!

there were tears and tantrums in my house(and that was just me!) over one of the mock papers tonite

YABU - either the kid has the ability or it doesn't.

YABU I agree with pranma
I did 11+ myself and it was fine, I don't really see the big deal and why people get so stressed about it. I may be a geek but I actually enjoyed the test @ the time, I like those logic and verbal reasoning kind of questions.
No-one is forcing anyone to put their kids forward for those schools if not comfortable with it. I know sometimes there are no other good schools, but still you make the choice to go for the test rather than use the comprehensive schools

i just wish they had kept it as it was here until next year...

'think yourselves lucky 11+ and grammar schools are available in your areas

WHY? I deliberately moved out of an 11+ area. Selecting children at that age is wrong IMO. I wouldn't mind so much if they all went in cold and had a go, but some of them have been practising and/or tutored for the last 4 years!! OP is right.

The problem with the 11+ or any other selective school is that it works against poor people who cannot afford tutors. It also divides children on academic ablity in a way that does not allow for ablity in different subjects. Also children mature at different rates. The high academic achiever at 11 is not necessariily the high academic achiever at 13 or even 18.

In a good comprehensive children can move between sets. It is not easy to transfer a low ablity grammar school child to a secondary school modern.

In a grammar school area there are no comprehensives. It is a choice between grammar or secondary modern. There are campaigns to save grammar schools, but no campaign to save the secondary modern.

Thankfully my son does not have to sit the 11 plus.

YANBU. I am glad that I live in an area with comprehensive schools only. I think it is disgusting that children should be labelled and sorted at age 11 on the basis of exam performance, and that grammar schools should cream off the ablest pupils. And what about children who are strong in some subjects, but not others?

At the comprehensive I attended, pupils were streamed separately for each subject and one of my friends was in the top set (out of 4 sets) for English but the bottom set for maths. The system meant that pupils could be grouped with those of similar ability for each subject, and there was flexibility to move pupils up or down if their performance changed.

The test is unfair.

The system is crap.

There are, by definition, no comprehensive schools in an 11+ area.

It perpetuates the social divide.

It is ghastly.

It's the not knowing, Firawla.

DS does really well on practice papers, gets 100% a lot of the time, but who knows what he will do in the real thing?

He sufferes from Generalised Anxiety Disorder so Iv'e totally had to play down the 11+.

The thing is I don't want him to go to the grammar school - we prefere the selective comp (bialteral) school, so he still ahs to do the 11+ to get in.

No one is forcing me, no....except I know he will be bored stupid in the local secondary modern, which is where he could end up if he fucks up during the test.

He won't actually end up in the local secondary modern (nice at it is; I would send DS2 there) as I will bus him to the comprehensive in the next town.

It's the not knowing...the lack of control..the smugness of parents who's children do end up being offered a place at the grammar school....