Please or to access all these features

Add post

Watch this thread

Save thread

Start a new thread

Flip thread

Hide thread

My feed

Active Unanswered threads

Getting started FAQ's

Unanswered threads Acronyms Talk guidelines

Hide shortcut buttons

Talk

Education

Join the discussion on our Education forum.

Flip

1 2

Original poster

Please tell me this is scaremongering

44 replies

soandsosmummy · 27/01/2012 11:40

We live in an 11+ area. DD is 6 and IMHO reasonably bright though this is no indication of whether she has a chance of grammar school later and I'm sure she'll be fine where ever she goes

We've just had a leaflet through the door which asks "Is your child going to be 7 in the next academic year - then its time to start tutoring for 11+". It goes on to explain that all is not lost if your child is older but 7 is the optimum age to start.

I think this is just an attempt to make money out of gullible parents. Should I refer it to trading standards as it strikes me as pretty nasty scare tactics. Or should I actually take it seriously?

Every instinct tells me its a pile of bull shit and that if she's got a chance in hell of passing it and then performing well at Grammar then a few months of tuition and paper familiarization at the end of year 5 / start of year 6 will be enough or am I just too laid back?

OP posts:

SingingSands · 27/01/2012 11:42

Trust your instincts!

If it smells like shit, and it looks like shit...

cornsilxsxy · 27/01/2012 11:43

yes it is scaremongering

meredeux · 27/01/2012 11:44

January in year 5 is the usual time to start,,,

QuintessentiallyShallow · 27/01/2012 11:46

My son just started seeing a tutor, he is in year 5. I think any tutor worth his or her salt would not drop leaflets through peoples door. They usually come heavily recommended through word of mouth....

IndigoBell · 27/01/2012 11:47

Is your 11+ NVR / VR or Maths and English?

Either way I think 7 is too young - but I'd start tutoring for maths and English earlier than for NVR / VR......

EdithWeston · 27/01/2012 11:48

Yes, they are preying on parental insecurities. No, it's not one for trading standards.

singinggirl · 27/01/2012 11:56

Scaremongering. We are in an 11+ area, DS1 passed with flying colours just practising at home with us from Year 5 - Bond ten minute tests. We didn't tutor. Tutoring will only work if they are doing well closer to the time anyway, for now the normal sort of support with reading, spellings, tables etc is what will help!

nickelhasababy · 27/01/2012 11:58

it is scaremongering a bit.
you can gt books that ease them up to the level needed from age 6, but they're only for those who are obsessed with that kind of thing.

Original poster

soandsosmummy · 27/01/2012 12:12

Thank you pretty well the response I was expecting. I can shove it in the recycling bin with a clear conscience

OP posts:

LittenTree · 27/01/2012 13:29

I am going to buck the trend here, just a bit, and say a only a qualified 'yes' to scaremongering'! No I wouldn't start 'tutoring' in Y2 but I might in Y3 ('juniors') IF I'd taken a reasonable look at the secondary provision, made an impartial assessment of DCs academic strength, knew how tough the competition to get a GS place was (super-selective?), whether it was VR/NVR or Maths/English that they were going to be examined on- and whether I was happy enough with the potential non-GS provision!

If you have a very bright DC you'd still need to familiarise them with the format of the 11+ (state schools rarely do this...), if you had a 'borderline' DC you might wish to wheel out the big guns and do whatever you could to try and get them in IF the alternative was very 'secondary modern', not 'comprehensive' (bearing in mind a secondary with a %age of its most academic potential intake skimmed off isn't really 'comprehensive'!).

MY 'advice' such as it is is to familiarise yourself with what 'the usual route' is around where you live (do you need to book a tutor years in advance?) and be prepared. You will, incidentally, always find people who will say 'if your DC needs tutoring, they're not GS material, to which I'd say you hear that from the parents of the super-bright, the 'secretly tutored' or from private preps who effectively 'tutor' anyway!

I would have liked my DSs to have gone to the GS I went to (though they'd've needed gender reassignment!); DS1 would have passed my 11+, DS2 wouldn't, BUT I would have liked them to be surrounded by that GS ethos where hard work, focus and achievement is celebrated, not pummelled behind the bike shed! We ended up spending ££ buying a house in the catchment of a very MC-valued (iyswim) Comprehensive to try and get that for both of them.

TalkinPeace2 · 27/01/2012 15:44

Don't bin it.
Send it to HMRC - who are having a mahoosive clampdown on unregistered tutors!

Original poster

soandsosmummy · 27/01/2012 16:01

Really talkinpeace? that's interesting. I just think their tactics are so unpleasant and going to panic so many people its almost worth doing something like that.

OP posts:

TalkinPeace2 · 27/01/2012 16:08

soandsomummy
www.hmrc.gov.uk/ris/tcup/index.htm
lots of people earning cash on the side who are borderline higher rate taxpayers - easy pickings for HMRC

GrimmaTheNome · 27/01/2012 16:10

Spot on. 7 is the optimum age to start from the POV of someone trying to make money out of it.

We're not in a GS area; DD got a residual place with no external tutoring, just doing papers over the summer between yr5 and yr6.

Unless its for one of those 'superselectives', if your DC need tutoring from age 7 either they're probably not going to thrive at GS or there's something wrong with their primary school.

LittenTree · 27/01/2012 22:09

Grimma- to be fair, what might be 'wrong' with the primary is the unwillingness or inability to direct focused learning towards the top percentage of their students towards a GS 11+ which many consider to be elitist and divisive.

Heswall · 27/01/2012 22:32

Start the term before at the earliest otherwise you loose the momentum, however some children do need tutoring at 7 to keep up with the other 7 year olds.

GrimmaTheNome · 27/01/2012 23:44

Grimma- to be fair, what might be 'wrong' with the primary is the unwillingness or inability to direct focused learning towards the top percentage of their students towards a GS 11+ which many consider to be elitist and divisive.

No, that shouldn't cause a need for tutoring from age 7. A child bright enough to pass 11+ just needs good 'normal' education plus familiarisation yr5/6.

GrimmaTheNome · 27/01/2012 23:48

however some children do need tutoring at 7 to keep up with the other 7 year olds.

That may be the case, but that would surely be different work to 'tutoring for 11+". which is what the OP's leaflet was touting.

seeker · 27/01/2012 23:55

Oh god- I don't know where to start. I'll come back having had enough sleep and sober if anyone's still here. I know soooo much about this stuff-and there is so much bullshit and scaremongering and vested interests....

Jux · 28/01/2012 00:32

Our GS does Maths/English papers. There is (apparently) a fair bit of algebra, which I know dd didn't do at bog-standard/rapidly-failing primary. Check things like that. You can get practice papers from Smith's. 7 is too young, but I understand that some people do start that early.

IMO the most important bit is NVR as children who have never seen anything like it won't know what to with it.

DD's primary did nothing to help them with 11+, but said that this was due to Government directive. The Tories may have changed this, of course, as they are keen on grammars

TalkinPeace2 · 28/01/2012 16:51

Grammar schools often come out with lower Value Added scores because the kids arrive tutored up to the eyeballs and then regress

if your child is not bright enough to get into a grammar school without tutoring, why force them
or do you plan to tutor them through university and help them with written assignments when they are 24 and working?

NiceViper · 28/01/2012 18:32

I thought the lower value added scores was because the children arrived at a stellar level, and continued pretty much on that trajectory. When you're top at 11, even top at 16 or 18 is zero added on. I really wouldn't expect a grammar to have high added value, unless its selection procedure was failing.

(Off to go and have a poke around the tables to see how many remain close to the baseline score).

Jux: "DD's primary did nothing to help them with 11+, but said that this was due to Government directive"; they're being economical with he truth. This is normally a decision for the school, or I can e an LA-wide guideline. It definitely isn't from central Government, and in some places, primaries do routinely do sow preparation.

seeker · 28/01/2012 18:38

Primary schools in Kent are specifically instructed not to provide more than one familiarisation test. Many do, of course ( one near us provides an hour after school every day) but they are risking sanctions- not sure what- if they are reported.

NiceViper · 29/01/2012 09:02

I have had a look at the tables, and only a small proportion of selective schools have value-added scores under 1000 (eg only 2 in Lincolnshire, a few in Kent) It seems to be overstating the case to say they are often low, or that among the low there are a lot of selectives.

Heswall · 29/01/2012 09:47

All of the selectives in our area have VA over 1000, same in Birmingham and in Devon, so complete rubbish.
As for the 11+ being any indication as to how smart a child actually is and what help they will need at GCSE, A Level, university or in the work place, again bollox, it's one day in their life.

Flip

1 2

Swipe left for the next trending thread