11+ books/papers

[pinkpip100]

Hi, my ds is in Y5 and we live in an area with 2 grammar schools (and plenty of good non-selective schools too). I'm not actually that keen on the idea of grammar schools but dh feels we should give ds the chance to try for one, and ds says he's happy to give the 11+ a go. So, I've registered him and they sent through a few sample questions (he got 8/10 first try). I'm not going to tutor him or hothouse over the summer, but I also don't want him to walk into the exam totally unprepared as I think that would be horrible for him. I'm looking for recommendations for one or two books we could get for him to help familiarise him with the test and practice some more questions. Really can't afford to spend much and when I've looked on Amazon the choice is a bit overwhelming. Any advice much appreciated. Apologies for the long post for a fairly simple request!

The market leader by quite a long way is Bond.

Otherwise, go to your local Waterstones or Smiths and just get an armful when they have the 3 for 2 offers (most of the time, it seems)

I do a lot of tutoring for the 11+ and would recommend the ISEB 11+ materials - take a look on the Galore Park website, they have books of questions as well as past papers etc. The Bond books for V/NV reasoning are useful too but I find the maths/English Bond books can be a bit easy and have a more limited range of questions.

I think there are some sample test papers on Amazon too it helps to get them used to using a separate answer sheet and to mark the paper in the right way. They are just called 11+ practice papers but v useful

Thanks all. Does the test change much from year to year? I just wondered whether I could get away with buying older books (hopefully cheaper, especially if I can get them second hand).

have a look at elevenplus website, tells you tests relevant to your area