Disappointment of 11+ exams

[worriedmom1981]

Hi, this thread is just more to vent and for some moral support. My DD is in state primary, according to all her teachers and reports she is very bright, does above expectations. She has also been tutored for over 2 years or so.
We are doing 11+ exams now, and the results are coming in and it appears she does quite badly and she is not even getting to the second stage. I don't know what to think, either she is just as bright as I thought or something. But my disappointment level is so high and I am pretty much in depression now. I feel like all the money I spent on tutors and the hours I spent working with her have been completely useless and down the drain

I like this. I will tell my son this :)

Growth mindset has a negative impact on some children. I have been teaching for 23 years so seen every variation of multiple strategies. What growth mindset does, for some children, is give them a sense of failure. For example they have a day learning all about it and revision skills before their mocks. It basically tells them that hard work guarantees success. They work hard, complete exams and come out with all Grade 2s, which for them is brilliant, yet they feel like they have failed.

because you dont have any scientific qualifications what so ever, what a surprise. People (outside education) hear the phrase "research" and expect it to mean some sort of standard of academic rigour and scientific integrity, which is an offense against the trade descriptions act! People inside education hear the phrase "educational research" and depending on the context, feel total despair, or just have a good laugh.

"educational research" is never research, it is at best a survey, and even then normally a very poorly designed and executed one

OP - Your daughter has done amazing for 2 years of tutoring and sticking by it! I couldn't get any of my children to have a tutor so she has done incredible.

It's so competitive - it's sad for the children 😭

Did you try for a less selective school as a backup? Are all the results in?

I agree with a pp that the resilience to stick with the tutoring for 2 years will pay off later.
Not getting a pass at 11+ doesn’t mean that she’s not bright. My dd went to a comp her GCSEs are all grades 7-9 and she has A star, A, B at A-level

@Araminta1003 yes there is although it is to an extent. There is no secrecy surrounding reading levels or test results but equally they do not rank children. We get told average result and top marks for all school tests. School regularly award progress and achievement. External exam results such as music, LAMDA, dance are announced and celebrated. Children are strongly encouraged to always celebrate their peers' achievements.

DC are both very aware of who is the best at different subjects in their class, who excels in sport, music etc. and they are both competitive. Whilst my DC are not consistently top of their year, they are comfortably in the top 20%. I may feel differently and consider elsewhere if they were in the bottom 20%

@worriedmom1981 ignore any mean comments- people on mn can be rather thoughtless
of course you are worried about your dd and would like her to pass 11+ …this is normal! Just because ‘most people don’t get into grammar’ doesn’t necessarily make it an easier process.
11+ is a silly business as it is so one size fits all and about knowing how to do the specific type of questions/test they use. Your dd might have different strengths or mature later.
I would focus on making other options other than grammar not seem like ‘failure’ to your dd.
I failed 11+, felt like a failure but still managed to get good grades and go to oxbridge from a comprehensive. I know realise I sat the test with no experience of answering that type of exam question and and I didn’t really mature and get interested in doing well til about yr8/9.
good luck

Maybe all these comments aren't enough to dismiss the disappointment. May I ask you what value you see education give to a child?

We all want the best for our children, I believe that's why you invested in her tutoring and exam preparation. But is the result the only thing that matters? How do you define "the best" for her?

I want the best for my child too. But I know there are infinite factors out side of our control. I'm also aware not everyone has the same definition as to what brings happiness to life. Is that success in career? Is that status? Is that a glorious title with abundant materials at their disposal? Or, maybe, happiness is simply to feel comfortable with oneself and being able to use their talents to earn a decent living while being respected for what they do? The latter is my goal for my child.

Therefore, even though the school matters, but their attitude towards learning and passions for knowing more and being a better self matter ten folds more. If you give a child the message that the result is all and everything ends there, they will find themselves so fragile as life is full of surprises and what they can control is the process and the efforts of keep trying.

If you love her, please give a better thought what kind of person you want her be and what gives her happiness in the long term. And please please don't hint "she failed". No, she didn't. That's only one part of the many stories to tell... It doesn't define who she is.

That is a lovely post @Return2thebasic

When we did 11 plus, we always read the Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupery together in the summer before the exams. It is a simple fable with exactly that kind of message. It is the journey and the love and effort you put in that matters. And children tend to understand that very well. It is us adults that confuse matters.
We have this in our house all the time because my DC play music at a competitive level and it can be very harsh and sometimes the DC who put in the most passion/effort do not get the same result as another DC who is just very talented/less stage fright. So if you have several children like I do this message is so important.

Your and your girl's efforts are not wasted. She will have advantage in the secondary school (possibly in the top set) as she has worked hard. Life is a marathon, not a sprint

You mentioned second stage, so it is likely she was targeting super selective grammar. I guess HBS, Sutton alike. The exams are very challenging

I know this is an old thread but I've found it helpful to read and thanks to the OP for sharing here. My DS didn't make the cut for QE, although he scored above the minimum score for consideration for a place. It's very disappointing when we have tutored for 2 years, at enormous expense, and did everything by the book - he had loads of exam practice, lots of past papers, promising scores in mocks. He was scoring over 90% in everything regularly in the few weeks right before the exam, so the score was a shock. We had spent lots of time working on exam technique and also how to cope with exam stress. His tutor was confident and had told us she felt he was really well prepared. It's really galling that this has happened and we feel very sad and wish we could understand what we did wrong.

@KermitTheF you and your son didn’t do anything wrong. At that one moment there were a number of students that did better which is unfortunate, most likely due to a high number of children taking the test.

Thanks. Very hard to swallow right now - he did more work/tutoring than any child we know and I just feel very foolish right now. All the signs pointed to a positive outcome, but others who did far less prep did no worse in the exam. Very tough. DS is very down about it because he knew how hard he worked. All scores right before the exam were over 90% in papers - no idea what happened, but it seems that he crumbled under the pressure although there was zero sign of this happening previously or in mocks. Our whole lives for past 2 years have been focussed on this prep, with the whole family making sacrifices to facilitate it (and making sure he has rest and fun time too). Very difficult for everyone right now - to hear parents who started prep a year after us say their kids got the same mark. It’s hard.

Bloody hell, poor child! I hope you’re only expressing all this here and not to his face

I have one that passed and one that failed. They both got virtually identical results at GCSE and A level.

Dd2 and her best friend at primary school
, both very bright and able . Dd2 was successful in the 11+ and attended a grammar school . Her best friend was unsuccessful and attended a girls Catholic school
Both are now attending the same university and doing the same course after achieving top A level grades .

Bright is one ingredient for 11+ success, but by far not the only one.
Ability to perform under pressure, exam technique and resilience are the others.
My oldest is extremely bright, but due to being ND he wasn’t able to perform under pressure age 10 - we didn’t try 11+.
Luckily performing under pressure is something you can develop with maturity, so gcse should be ok (fingers crossed)

Bloody hell-just read this. God, I hate the 11+ system. You really need to reset your brain and stop making it the end of the world. Start really selling the school he’s going to.

Lots of children that are classed as bright do terrible on tests, the nerves and atmosphere in big test halls aren’t giving them the best opportunity to excel. Maybe this is a blessing is disguise it’s better not to put a child in a high pressure school that isn’t going to enjoy that type of education. Your DD might be better off with less pressure

I’m so sorry to hear this, it sounds like he worked extremely hard with a lot of input from you too. It’s hard to see it now but perhaps this may be the making of him as well as an important lesson in life that sometimes you can just be really unlucky (or lucky). The real prize he has won is he knows that he can put the work in and his understanding of all the things he has learnt will help him no end. His time will come!

I am very sorry for the disappointment you are feeling today but you are actually revealing what is wrong with the 11+ exam. Grammar schools schools are for the most academically able children and should not take two years of intensive study to prepare for them. It is right that a child should have coaching in exam technique and what to expect but it should never be the sole focus for two years beforehand. I am sure your son will thrive at a good comprehensive in top streams and it will make no difference to him in the long run. Grammar school places are highly and competitively sought after and there is often a ratio of around ten childten competing for each place. I would actually say this to your son, pointing out that for every boy who were given a place, there were nine disappointed boys. As long as you are able to swallow your own disappointment, this will be a small blip in a successful life.

The places are even more
competitive now due to Labour destroying the affordability of private schools for so many families

That’s not what’s wrong with the grammar school system. What’s wrong with the grammar school system is that they are not for the cleverest children. They are for privileged children. You only have to look at the number of children in grammar schools on FSM to see that. It is a completely rubbish system.

The tutoring WILL benefit her in later years, even though she didn't get a grammar place, she'll be in a better position to perform to her best ability because she's more developed and ahead because of the tutoring. Education, in any form, is never a waste.

With our son, our aim was always to keep him "ahead of the curve" with his education, so that he never struggled and got behind. It served him very well! When a child gets behind, it's double struggle to get back to where they should be as they're learning new stuff at the same time as trying to catch up with the older stuff they didn't really grasp.

Both myself and DH "fell behind" at school and we never caught up despite our best efforts, and both left state schools with beggar all in the way of qualifications. It took us both a hell of a lot of time, effort, and money to claw our way back and eventually we both got professional qualifications. It's probably what attracted us to each other, i.e. the resilience to do that, as we didn't know each other until our mid 20's and it was amazing that we both shared the same crap comprehensive education experience! We vowed never to let it happen to any children of ours!