Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. A phone that grows with your child.

Meet the Other Phone.
A phone that grows with your child.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
Secondary education

Connect with other parents whose children are starting secondary school on this forum.

Original poster

Has anybody successfully tutored for the 11+ completely by themselves(need reassurance)

261 replies

Blueskiesandbuttercups · 27/05/2013 16:39

DS year 4 desperately wants to go but we can't afford tutoring.He is bright,driven and I was a teacher so in theory it shouldn't be too hard.

His friend is also going for it but they're well off so tutoring and have already started.Ds is nagging me to get started.

Sooo went on the 11+ forum typed in the school to order books and I'm already in a pickle.They cost £££££ so need to get it right. We like CPG but loads are listed we haven't heard off. Would it be ok to just go with Bond and CPG or should we go with exactly those listed?

Is it possible to do this ourselves or am I deluding myself? If I screw this up I'll feel like shit- forever! Need lots of reassurance.

OP posts:
gazzalw · 03/06/2013 07:10

Yellowtip, we may well have been! Although DS got a 5b in English in his KS2 SATS it's never been his strong point, so we thought that if he did fail any of his 11+ exams (he actually passed all three so very lucky) it would have been down to the English 'shortfall.' Obviously won't be making that mistake for DD (although she's still only Year 2 so a way off...)

I think the essay writing does lend itself to a formulaic approach which isn't good. It would be interesting to see how well the 11+ English essay scores tally with the levels that the DCs were actually at when the arrived at grammar school.

Original poster
Blueskiesandbuttercups · 03/06/2013 07:20

Saintly the essay is worrying me and. Technically it will be fine- perfect spelling,punctuation etc but they don't seem to do any essay writing at school(not that I ever get to see work to know this or check for weaknesses). It's the content that worries me and the content doesn't seem as easy to tutor ie it's not so formulaic as VR etc less to draw from in terms of info as to how to work on it iykwim.

OP posts:
gazzalw · 03/06/2013 07:23

I seem to recall that DS implied that all his were letters or descriptions of his favourite thing type essays. I'm sure I've read somewhere that the boys' schools tend to favour a more 'factual' approach just because of the way that boys think/write, whereas essays for the girls might involve more use of the imagination.... Not sure what would happen for a mixed grammar school (of which there are a few are there not?) 11+ exam though....

Original poster
Blueskiesandbuttercups · 03/06/2013 07:31

Gazz are there any books re the essay writing you could recommend?Many thanks for your PM,we both really appreciated them.Smile

There was some writing books AE & Tutor Master on the forum under recommended material for our school but not sure as not heard of the publishers.

OP posts:
Original poster
Blueskiesandbuttercups · 03/06/2013 07:32

Oo you're up!Thought it was just me MNing at this time.Smile

OP posts:
Original poster
Blueskiesandbuttercups · 03/06/2013 07:33

Got to get the kids up,will return!

OP posts:
gazzalw · 03/06/2013 07:39

Have some that we loaned to friend but will get back - can't think off the titles off the top of my head (I think I parcelled up those memories and put them in a locked chest until they need to come out again for DD!) but will get them back this week and let you know.

I know that several have suggested caution when dealing with the 11+Forum, but this is the type of question that many posters on there would happily answer, methinks? Also to get an idea of the content of your County-specific English component to the 11+?

I would suggest just reading a wide range of books with your DS and discussing writing styles, expressive language etc.... Upping vocab and range....

Wink

Finishing off the B&Q DIY challenge which is why I'm here - can't quite face being up a ladder at 7.15 am (slacker that I am!)

Wishihadabs · 03/06/2013 10:10

I have thought long and hard about this and as others say I am sure it is possible. We have decided to pay a tutor, because Ds loves competition and having others preparing for the test will realy suit him. Also I work shifts so wouldn't be able to do it as regularly as I'd like.

seeker · 03/06/2013 10:15

With essay writing there is often a problem with just not writing enough. Boys in particular are inclined to say "well, I've said everything want to say- so I'll stop" even if that's after one paragraph. So aim for length as well as everything else!

saintlyjimjams · 03/06/2013 11:01

Blue - I found for ds2 just chatting through ideas helped. I also showed him how he could adapt an idea already used in one essay into another. For him the biggest problem was a complete freeze - which is why his first one was so rubbish. Chatting through possibilities, doing a couple and having a few easy to transfer paragraphs (eg a description of a person) helped. Even though the actual essay was something we hadn't remotely prepared for - he just had the confidence not to do a rabbit in the headlights freeze (which he would have without preparation). It was the last thing we did though - didn't look at it until the summer holidays (exam was in September)

saintlyjimjams · 03/06/2013 11:03

Do agree with seeker. His first attempt was too short. So I set a minimum number of paragraphs and we talked about what could go in paragraph 1, 2, 3 etc. It wasn't a very creative approach but worked with a boy who thinks in terms of right or wrong answers.

saintlyjimjams · 03/06/2013 11:19

S2's school did publish a mark scheme for an example essay. A lot of marks were for sentence construction (the more complicated the better) so we did some work on changing the cat sat on the mat into the feline, with sleeky fur as black as the dark of night, reclined on the sheepskin rug, proudly surveying the room while purring like a distant helicopter. I'm taking the piss but ds2 did start to methodically think about extending sentences (he's a lazy git when it comes to writing so his preference would always be for the shortest possible sentence).

poppydoppy · 03/06/2013 12:48

Ideally there should be no need to tutor children if schools taught properly in the first place. All schools should teach VR if entrance exams require it.

This whole tutoring thing is becoming a joke and the schools should not encourage it.

seeker · 03/06/2013 12:50

The argument is that schools should not spend time teaching something which will benefit only a tiny minority of the children.

prh47bridge · 03/06/2013 13:01

There is little point in teaching VR and NVR. The evidence is that properly constructed tests are largely immune to tutoring effects. It obviously helps the child to have done one or two tests to become familiar with the kind of thing required but after that tutoring should have no effect.

A child's raw score in VR/NVR tests goes up rapidly at this age even if there is no tutoring. It is easy to think a child is making rapid progress through tutoring when in fact they are only progressing at the rate expected for a child of that age. Of course, if parents have just spent a fortune on a tutor to get their child's score up by 20% the last thing they want to hear is that their child would have achieved that even without a tutor.

Yellowtip · 03/06/2013 13:23

poppydoppy schools actively discourage it.

seeker · 03/06/2013 13:32

In the area where I live, schools are specifically forbidden by the LEA from offering any 11+ coaching at all.

Yellowtip · 03/06/2013 13:32

saintlyjimjams has described almost exactly how my DS3 was with essays/ rabbit freeze and almost exactly what I did to get him to stop at two or three (short) paragraphs. I'd advocate getting a whole load of boy books into the house too - Alex Rider etc.

Yellowtip · 03/06/2013 13:33

I mean the grammar schools discourage it seeker.

seeker · 03/06/2013 13:36

Oh, I see, sorry- the grammar schools discourage tutoring? That's working well isn't it? Grin

seeker · 03/06/2013 13:40

And I know that the research indicates that tutoring doesn't increase VR and NVR scores- but it does seem really, really counter intuitive. I am naturally very bad at NVR, for example- but once somebody has carefully explained to me how to do each type I can them do them. It's like cryptic crosswords. I couldn't do them to save my life, so my father sat down with me and the Times Crossword every morning for about a fortnight, and by then I could do it ( I was in my 30's at the time- he wasn't being a pushy dad!)

poppydoppy · 03/06/2013 13:48

Why is everyone tutoring if schools actively discourage it?

I know children that attend great prep schools yet they have been tutored for 2 years to sit entrance papers. I feel that schools are teaching less and leaving more and more work to parents/tutors.

Entrance tests will get harder and harder if parents keep tutoring their children.

Children are only little for such a short time let them be free from such pressures until theyre older.

Yellowtip · 03/06/2013 13:49

Well the grammars can't insist on no tutoring since there's no mechanism by which they could do that - they can't put a SPGs clause into the application form while they're constrained by the Admissions Code. So I suppose what they're doing, putting in place the Durham tests or restructuring their own tests, is the way to go.

poppydoppy · 03/06/2013 13:57

My 11 year old is now doing GCSE work at school because of tutoring ( they teach at the pace of the class), he has kept up so far but now cracks are beginning to show. In order for him to keep up next year I will have to tutor him all through the summer or he will drop down a set. How is this fair to a 11 year old?

gazzalw · 03/06/2013 14:00

It would be interesting to see if there's a year-on-year upward trend in the 11+ results with all this tutoring going on.....anyone work in grammar school Admissions who could tell us???

Swipe left for the next trending thread