Tutoring for 11+ - this Guardian article must surely be exaggerated?

[KittyCorncrake]

here

What London grammars??

At the very selective boys grammar open evening last night (queuing round the block to get in, absolute bun fight) there were children clutching verbal reasoning papers and DOING them as they queued. Their parents had sanctinonious looks on their faces "look how much work WE'RE doing to get a place here" looks. Dh felt like decking them.
Absolute bloody nightmare.
Janinlondon- grammars in SW London.

ie: Sutton? (TIA)

What this is telling me is that there are too few grammar schools. There is obviously a demand for them so why not create more and then people wouldn't need to subject their children to all this cramming.

my sister knew she was born to be a scientist. from as soon as she knew what science was - and she got there.

i thought i was born to be a millionaire. i was wrong.

Agree with abra1d. We are in an area with no grammars but within travelling distance of a couple of very good ones. To get in from out of catchment you have to do extraordinarily well. The local schools aren't that great and a ridiculous proportion are CofE or RC.

DD is at a private school - they did do quite a lot of practice in the first 3 weeks of term ahead of the 11+ as quite a few were trying it. The kids who got places seem to have also been tutored or else dropped all extra-curricular activities so their parents could do additional coaching. It is probably significant that most of these are from ethnic minority families, so their choice of local state schools is severely restricted.

DD (without a tutor) is first on reserve list. If she'd been in catchment she'd have walked it.

God, I hate year 6!

tiffin in kingston jan

BUT if you create loads more grammar schools- don't you defeat the point? The idea is that they ARE academically selective so if one grammar takes let's just say the top 10% of a given area; then you build 5 more grammars in that area, you will the have the 'top' 60% in the area getting a grammar school place- therefore, can it truly still be considered an academically elite school?

'Demand' for them is one thing, the ability to benefit is another.

And, abra1d, could it be that your local schools 'aren't that great' BECAUSE the top tier has been creamed off by the grammars?

We like the idea of a grammar because of its disciplined, focused atmosphere. A good comprehensive also has that, but can deliver that motivated focus ACROSS the academic board, not just favour those who'd probably have done well academically in whichever school they went to.

I don't have grammar schools in my area, ampere... I pay for my two to go to private schools so that they can have the education my brother and I had for free, at grammars.

The trouble with schools like Tiffin is that it can now take pupils from literally anywhere in a 50-miles (yes) radius. This seriously curtails the number of local children who can go there. They may not be one-in-300 bright, but are bright enough to be at a grammar.

If only the left wing did hate grammar schools,ampere. They're more than willing to use them for their own children when it suits.

I had to laugh when one of our local councillors picketed the Labour regional conference a couple of years back to the effect that all grammar schools should be abolished, bastions of the privileged, elitist unfairness etc. etc.

He seemed to have quite forgotten that his own children had just left grammar schools

One rule for him. One rule for us....

kent parents tutor from pre junior level usually

Seriously, Angry? DH went to Skinners in Tunbridge Wells and would love to see our boys go there - but tutors? How utterly depressing.

The main problem with grammar schools is that they create secondary moderns. And they leave 77% of children feeling as if they aren't good enough at the age of 11. Nightmare.

oh my senitments exactly seeker

this is the whole culture I HATE

Loads of selective schools in London janin I'm in NL there are stacks. And the tutoring starts at age 8 or 9

Mine are not primary school yet but I am not going to do it. Not. Absolutely not.

Not least because the nearby selective school which apparently is v nice had 1200 applications for 200 places last year. The other nearby selectve schools are just as bad and/or worse and/or religious. I'm just not sure that putting that much pressure on is worth it when the chances of them getting in are (in places like near me) so slim.

and it starts from as early sd SATS. People wanting their children to go into the right peer groups at junior school through sats, encouraging selective friendships etc etc

the whole thign makes me sick

The article clearly is showing an extreme example of the amount of tutoring which goes on. Dd is at one of the super-selective grammars in Essex that these children are aiming for and she had one hour of tutoring a week and a few papers a week to do in preparation. I haven't heard of any of her friends having done this much either.

any tutoring to get into these schools is wrong imo, the whole system is geared to those who can afford it - which is surely what they weren't invented for.

scrap the lot and let's have fair decent education for all

Am sure this is not an exageration. I was talking to one excellent teacher at a really top league table Prep school recently and she said that she knew half her class were going home to do extra tutoring in order tp pass 11+.

In the South East it is very common. One woman asked us who we were using as a tutor for our DS1 had got a scholarship at the new schol we sent him to - she was shocked when we said none. We just explained it was not that competitive a school and we did not agree with the insane competition and tutoring that goes on. Sure if a DC needs help because they are struggling but not for a kid who is doing very well already.

We moved away from the South East a few years ago and deliberately sent DSs to a much lower league table school to give them a chance to breathe and not be constantly competing with children who were being coached to death in order to pass 11+.

I have heard teachers leaving the profession at 50 having taught in top end Prep school, going into tutoring and basically making a fortune.

Parents are panic stricken in some parts of the South East so desperate are they to get into grammar school to avoid having to pay school fees. It has got a lot worse since the recession started.

People tutor because state primaries are not allowed to teach to the 11 plus.
And also because there aren't many left and those that are tend to be super oversubsribed and super selective.

In our area we have grammar schools, the rest of the secondary schools we are in catchment for are awful. Not just in terms of results.

Dd has 1 hr per fortnight with a tutor and we do the odd practise paper as well.
Her tutor said that as a rule of thumb your child should be in the top sets in Yr 5/6 for it to be worth bothering but that she gets a lot of enquiries from parents wanting her to tutor from Yr 2 for the 11 plus.

actually make that 1200 applicants for 75 places

do you not think that the secondaries would improve if the grammars weren't there?

Improve all the schools. Stop having selective ones.

The league tables have buggered it for primaries as well.

Having said that certain people will always find a way of getting the "best" for their children, and we will always have private schools. So I guess in an unfair society.... maybe the best bet is to work to improve all schools.

One of my friends has a child who has recently started seconary school at local comp, we were talking about it, the standard of the stuff the have to learn is so low - where's the chance for aspiration? Sad. All children should be given the chance to achieve the top of their capavility, not be pinned back by society expectations/monetary issues.

So ... what does everyone think about tutoring, at comprehensives, all the way through, for GCSEs and A levels?

Because that 46% being tutored that the article airily refers to is actually way more than kids in London being tutored for the 11+ - it's tutoring to subsidise state education, on an individual basis.

Seriously, the problem, really is not the 11+. That is the tip of an iceberg. And the iceberg is that there is awful disparity in the education system.

And just sharing out the children randomly amongst the schools isn't going to solve it. (For example - refer to tutoring, as mentioned above.)