Tiffin Girls' Stage One test in a few days

[Onlygrammarisgoodenough]

Bless DD for wanting to sit this test when she has 'self-tutored' and has a snowball's chance in hell of getting through to Stage Two, let alone gaining a place at the school.
Wish I could say she is like other MN offspring who are all level 6 by the end of Year 4, do hours of tutoring and practise, have an exemplary work ethic and outshine their peers in every aspect of their lives, but I can't.
Am going to commend her effort (last weekend, she actually opened one of the 11+ books I bought when she said she wanted to sit the test!) and then continue fretting about where she will eventually end up when grammar school doesn't materialise... She is not worried or stressed in the slightest as she doesn't comprehend the level of preparation those who are successful in applying have done.
Am I being realistic or pessimistic?
Does anyone actually feel confident their DD is going to do well??

Doesn't seem so, OP

I can't imagine anyone could send a DC into the Tiffin tests with any confidence of how they'll do! The competition is so fierce and the standards so high that even those who've done a lot of prep need an element of luck/good day.

I think DD won't panic and will be OK but the difference between getting through and not getting through will be one question - so how could anyone be confident?

Surely if your DD is achieving high levels by the end of year 5 and has been putting in the scary hours and effort into tutoring for years there are some grounds for confidence.
Have unearthed various threads from previous years where people have boasted how their DDs always get well over 95% in all their practise tests etc etc - that must give people some sense of having a hope of a place!
Hoping mine and DDS 'relaxed' approach will not be the reason she has no chance at TGS. I would absolutely love her to go to a grammar school because she is actually a creative, active thinker and seems to have been getting regularly good levels in her core subjects and would probably thrive on the challenge of a fast paced academic environment but I think I have been naive that natural intelligence should be enough to get in to this particular grammar school.
Don't live in an area where there are lots of grammars either. TGS is only option.

High levels in year 5 won't get you through stage 1 of the TGS test but they will come in handy if you get through to stage 2.

I'm not confident about stage 1 at all even though DD gets good scores on practice tests. If she gets to stage 2 though I think she'll be in with a fair chance.

BTW we haven't done years of tutoring - an hour a week for 9 months.

Frankly, you want your daughter to go to an extremely selective school, but don't want her or yourself to do ANY extra work.

The people who win Olympic medals aren't the ones with just "natural ability", it's the ones who put the effort in and train endlessly.

Doctors don't qualify on "natural ability". They have to work really hard as well as being clever.

There's nothing wrong with just having a go if she wants to, but if you really want something you need to put a bit of effort into it.

And good afternoon to you GoodArvo. I am clearly naive in thinking that access to a good grammar school for intelligent children should not involve similar preparations as those for an internationally elite sporting competition!

I don't believe that pushy parenting is helpful for our relationship and I do believe that children should be self-motivated. I completely agree that the level of effort she has put in will translate in the results she gets (thus my concerns that she is not going to fail and those doubts that maybe we should have remortgaged the house to afford a tutor and instead of being her parent I should have been a drill sergeant instead) She clearly doesn't particularly want to go or she would have actually done some preparation but sadly the notion that hard work=good results hasn't really been learnt by her as much of what she actually does do successfully does come quite naturally to her and without any apparent effort.

I am just not feeling confident that it will be enough (she isn't achieving level 6s) , but maybe when she ends up at the local dire comp instead she may find that inner motivation and it will actually be a good thing she 'fails' the TGS test.

now removing self from the insane and ridiculous anxiety surrounding London school selection and going out to enjoy the sunshine before it is gone for another six months

I don't think NC levels have anything to do with whether you will pass the first stage of the Tiffin tests. From what I've seen of them they consist of knowing the meanings of obscure words which no 11 year old would naturally know, krypton factor type puzzles and being able to do them accurately at an astonishing speed that only comes with having been familiarised with them beforehand. Most of the dcs taking the tests would have been tutored for years for them poor things. A dc would have to be genius level to walk into them cold and be able to get the pass mark which is now around 95%.

That is not the way the tests work, yes it appears that tiffin do not invest in keeping the tests properly maintained so that they have become predictable and therefore tutorable and so some children appear to improve their scores via hard work. However the reason they were developed and are used for all sorts of purposes, recruitment, testing for specific learning difficulties, as well as Grammar School entry, is to test raw ability. The principle that originally dictated their use before the development of the scandalous tutoring factories was to identify the brightest pupils regardless of educational background and attainment. So a pupil who has a high level of raw ability will do well on those tests after a minimal number of practise tests, regardless of not being tutored.

Even the headteacher at Tiffin (boys) said at last year's open evening to do 8 to 10 weeks of practice papers to get used to the format and doing exam papers. No one expects a child to go in totally cold.

The gold standard for properly maintained tests such as those used by Ed Psychs, businesses and private schools is that scores cannot be improved beyond practising with 10 papers. It is expensive to keep developing them though so presumably the Head acknowledges that they are not of that standard but the fact remains the questions are designed to test raw ability and if you have that raw ability you will be able to answer them quickly and accurately without the years and months of practise inflicted on some poor children. If they are testing for children who score above eg the 98th percentile (these tests are scored according to the marks gained by a wider population of pupils so that means matches the scores achieved by the top 2% of the population) then extensive practising might enable a child whose VR /NVR ability is actually at the 95th percentile to achieve the score and a child whose ability puts them on the borderline at the 98th might just slip beneath the radar if not practised enough but a child whose VR and NVR ability is at the 99th percentile is going to score that anyway with minimal preparation. Clearly neither Tiffin is actually getting the children whose ability is actually genuinely in the top 3% (which is what they were claiming when my DD sat the test) because they ought to be getting better exam results if they do.......

Or indeed the pupils imbued with a cast iron work ethic.........

Poison..in a way your post reassures me because I had always thought the tests were supposed to be 'non tutorable' (so I haven't failed her by not tutoring!) but you are right that if the intake is indeed the top 1-2% of candidates, their exam results should be even better.
Anyway, DD came out and thought the NVR was 'easy' and the VR 'OK' but she didn't answer 5 of the questions. So at least she seems happy with how she went, although no doubt it won't be enough given that 1 question can make the difference between being invited back for Stage 2 or not.
Only a few weeks to get the results and I hope she is not too disappointed.
That said, it was a pain to get there in peak hour traffic! Wouldn't be that keen on her doing that journey each and every day (and we are in one of the closer postcodes in the designated area.)