How many of you have used tutors to help get your child into a grammar school?

[Blossomhill]

Just wondering really how common it is? Ds has just started his and it is not cheap! Am I wasting my money or is it worth it for a year?
Thanks

But there are boys in DS1's class who do come from a similar background to my father (well, not quite the lack of hot running water, but certainly very low income), so obviously the system does still work.

And my point is that why do we work (middle and working classes) aim to better ourselves if we are then expected to behave as though we haven't for fear of having an advantage over others?

blossomhill i want to say good luck to your ds, if you go with tutoring i am sure you won't be wasting your money

Thanks everyone. Now fingers crossed we get a place after all this x

There's as much a political objection to tutoring as there is to marrying a bright girl because you want bright children, or talking to your children or reading to them or feeding them well. All those things help your children. Surely if you deliberaetly do something you could do to help them, feed them well, show them love, educate and talk to them at home, that the morally and politically objectionable thing, deliberately keeping them down so they have no advantage. I never saw any objections to helping them and tutoring if done properly is just another way to do it. Not that we ever much did it for our 5 except one who had exams at 7 for north London collegiate (a private school she went to) and then it was just an hour a week, just to practise papers.

I've never heard of a political objection to marrying a bright girl because you want bright children, it's just - well - not really normal human behaviour, is it?

Hallgerda - I think it's entirely natural human behaviour to mate with someone who has the characteristics you desire for your children

Doesn't ordinary lust come into it just a little bit though?

Ah, but behind that primeval urge of lust lie all those genetic characteristics you desire

Age weighting? How does that work then? I never heard of it!

Anna8888, that rather depends on what turns you on .

TigerFeet, extra points are added to the test scores of the younger candidates.

Really? I would have thought that by year 5/6 all things would be equal!

DD is a July child, we live in an 11+ area, so that's good for us I suppose.

The most erotic organ there is is the brain. Loads of women in effect choose men by IQ.

I don't think you can separate out the "brain" from the rest. People (men and women) are a whole. Your brain/mind works in interaction with the rest of your body, not as a separate entity.

Hallgerda - but don't you think that what you find appealing in a man is what you find appealing in general? And, therefore, the traits that attract you to a man will also be the traits you find attractive in your children?

Of course, children can also inherit all of their mother's weaker traits and all of their father's weaker traits and not be very genetically exciting human beings at all, so it's not a foolproof recipe

There's something in that, Anna8888, but I don't think we all go for the same things, and even our individual tastes can vary over time. And the attraction isn't always intelligence (or even money). You seem to assume there's such a thing as an all-round genetically superior individual - I disagree.

But don't you think you sometimes see children who won life's genetic lottery? Sometimes in a family there is one child who stands out among his/her sibling because he is beautiful, intelligent, sporty etc ie got all the gifts?

I beleive age weighting occurs with most grammar school systems. I worked in Birmingham where an August born child would have say 10 points added to her raw score, July 9 points etc. the idea was to conpensate for lack of maturity although as I said it seemed unfair as it was very rare for a Sept born child to appear at the school I worked in

I beleive age weighting occurs with most grammar school systems. I worked in Birmingham where an August born child would have say 10 points added to her raw score, July 9 points etc. the idea was to conpensate for lack of maturity although as I said it seemed unfair as it was very rare for a Sept born child to appear at the school I worked in

oops clearly I have had no tutoring in IT skills!!