Please tell me this is scaremongering

[soandsosmummy]

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?

I did not say low, I said lower.
You'd have thought that with only bright kids and motivated parents the selectives would be in the top scores of the county for VA - and I'm mainly talking about the three counties where the whole school system is grammar / secondary modern
as the "island" grammars have such huge catchment areas

but they do not
and for a selective to have a VA under 1000 is absolutely shocking TBH

You have to look at your local competiton . It is academic private preps a year ahead of the state schools or more with a top small scholarship set? Is it chidlren from much the same primary who are not being tutored at the other extreme?

As for value added I wouldn't be too bothered with that. If most children don't really get many GCSEs then many will follow the herd and do badly. If you get them into schools where everyone has an IQ of 120 and goes to the best univesrities and A levels are in the top 30 if not 5 in the country (which was our aim) that is going to rub off on teenagers pretty well and probably does them better than any "value added score".

Xenia
your point would be entirely valid if I had not met SO MANY people from top schools at my retake crammer
and at my DCs comp, all children do 9GCSEs and the top kids do 14.
Value added is about raising expectations. It is the ONLY valid measure for less academic children.

I was assuming that if the child concerned here was going tog et into a grammar it woudl be one of the few with the 120 IQ grammar threshold. 100 is the average. If you have a child who is not very bright, may be even below the 100 average IQ then how they can be encouraged is of more importance.

I tbhink it is state schools which put children in for too many GCSEs actually and that actually can look not quite so good for employers. I would just want to see the core subjects of English lit and lang, maths, a language or two , 2 or 3 sciences, geog, history which most children at private schools do perhaps also with music or art and RE as one extra.

In general children at the very top academic schools in both sectors do not retake and the results which are available on line speak for themselves. Obviously some parts of the country and this always puzzles me have much worse exam results in all sectors than the SE which is pretty weird.

Xenia,
you are right, the top schools do not "do" retakes
they push the kids out after - as was done in my day
or at Christmas before - as is the norm now ;
so that those who will not pass never appear on their results

I was at top London Crammer with kids from
Eton, Harrow, Haileybury, Charterhouse, Oundle, Roedean, Westminster, St Pauls, City of London, Radley, Winchester, Frances Holland etc etc - there were hundreds of us and the cost (including VAT) excluded all but the highest earning parents

PS your core list is ten subjects ....

My core list is not necessarily 10. You do 2 or 3 sciences, sometimes two. You might do two languages which I did or possibly just one.

Just about everyone does well at the most academic schools which is why parents pay for them. Eton is high up from your list and St Paul's. Winchester , Westminster too. The others are not as far as I remember academically as high up as we would have considered. The top ones tend to find as they do not let in children who aren't very bright very few leave or so we found at Habs and NLCS anyway. They are great schools. We have some of the best on the planet in the private sector and we are very lucky to have them.

I really disagree with the 'kids who are bright enough for grammar school don't need tutoring' line which is trotted out regularly on MN.

In a scenario where 1000 kids apply for 120 places, there's going to be a top tranche who sail in (high IQ, good at exams, good under pressure), there'll be a bottom tranche who will never make it (with or without tutoring) and then there will be a big bulge of the average and maybe a bit above average fighting it out for 70-80% of the places. If you have 750 kids vying for 100 places, then tutoring can be critical if it allows your child to score just a few points more than they would have done without tutoring.

Not arguing in favour of intensive tutoring from age 7, but I really think tutoring has it's place and those claiming the tutored cannot keep up once at GS are slightly missing the point when 700+ kids are chasing a small number of spots.

It might be a bit like closet gay MPs voting against homosexuality - parents who tutor but don't want anyone else to say - don't do it, no one does.

No an age 7 child does not need tutoring unless they have specific special educational needs.

IME a child who is 1 yr head in reading age and maths by the time they are actually age 7 will do well by teh time they reach 11+ exams. Some gentle tutoring practice is required in Yr 5 for a year before exams to make sure they have covered the material and familiar with the 11+ exam style.

We got practice 11+ papers and some Yr 6 maths books to work through with DS1. Nothing heavy. Just keeping him up to speed in holidays, a few practice tests and some general hints and tips on how to approach an exam and he did very well.

If you have a bright child and the time and inclination you can do it yourself. You really can.

What's more, often the "tutoring is useless, your child will just end up struggling" crew are not even in grammar school areas, so it's no more than an interesting rhetorical question for them. They have true comprehensives, where the top tier can be stretched.

Unfortunately, the nature of grammar schools is that they skew the rest of the schools, so you get fewer high achieving state schools (often called comps, but atually secondary moderns as the top tier has been creamed off.)

If faced with a rather ropey "comp" / secondary modern where there is not the emphasis you would wish on academics, Russell Group uni entrance or serious subjects, then suddenly, a couple of years coaching even if it's a longshot does not seem so bad.

If you have a wonderful local real comp with orchestra, Latin, superb teaching of music, languages and science as well as core subjects, excellent differentiation and flexible streaming, then it's easy to condemn those who go for tutoring.

Round here good tutors have a two year waiting list. Anyone leafleting is new or not worth the money.

Can someone tell what's the difference between a "grammar" and a "super selective grammar" ?

A grammar school is one where if you pass the 11+and live in the catchment, you get a place. A super selective is one where you have to pass the test with top marks- just passing isn't enough!

Can someone tell what's the difference between a "grammar" and a "super selective grammar" ?

a normal grammar might have 2 or 3 x entrants per number of places - 'super selectives' it might be 10x

A normal grammar usually has a catchment, anyone within that who passes the 11+ gets a place. This leaves a variable number of 'residual places' available to the out-of-area kids who get the best scores (sometimes with a distance weighting). As I understand it superselectives don't really have a catchment in the same way. But I think there's lots of variations.

Oh it's very confusing. I live in a grammar area (Birmingham). And have seen friends under massive stress due to 11+. Have just held the hand of a friend who has one DD in and DD2 has had her 11+ this November.

She is very worried about having one "in" and one out. I have everything crossed for DD2.

And thank you for the answer. (no manners).

I think there are arguments in favour of doing extra 'stuff' with a 7 year old - but not with a tutor. I mean giving them good books to read, playing board games, cards, chess, take them to museums and galleries, do lateral thinking/IQ/logical/sudoku etc puzzles with them, test them on times tables etc. General brain food.