Moving to Amersham - what are choices if you don't pass 11+?

[Paperowls]

I realise this is a very specific area related question, but... we are looking to move to Amersham in the next six months. My DS is now in year 5 so will nearly be year 6 when we move. He will need to take the 11+ within a few months of us moving. I'm worried that this might mean he won't pass. Should I be getting him tuition? And I don't know anything about what his options will be if he fails the 11 plus. Is it the Amersham School? What is that like? I'm finding it quite hard to find stuff out when you don't live in the area already and the estate agents are useless for pointers!

Amersham School is the only non grammar in Amersham, but there are other secondaries in nearby Chesham and Gt Missenden.
My children are too little for me to know much about it specific secondary schools, but I do know that in some grammars there is a bulge class in year 8 to take pupils who passed on re-taking the following year.
There are practice books you can buy to get an idea of the verbal and non-verbal reasoning aspects of the test, and they would be a good idea (possibly as good as a tutor, depending on whether you can work through them and understand them yourself and work with him).
Hope someone with older kids can help you. Have you looked in Mumsnet local for advice?

Ooh, what's mumsnet local?

www.mumsnet.com/local

There's a Buckinghamshire page. If people are logged in and have told mumsnet they're in Bucks, new posts in that topic are highlighted ahead of active conversations.

It's not very busy, unfortunately.

You need elevenplusexams.co.uk (specialist forum) you will find everything there, and there are regional forums where there is advice on materials to use etc. I don't know about that area, it is important to find out which exam board it is likely to be, how selective it is, which areas are tested etc. It is though important to make sure you are also happy with the non grammar options too.

The talk section is under forums, but other useful info on the site.

Amersham school isn't great (I know a teacher there who has just left and my previous au pair did TA work there last year too).

There are other good comps though nearby. Beaconsfield secondary school is okay for example. Start doing the work books now with your son, they have a new test next September so you need the GL style books - you can get them from amazon.

They test on maths (numerical and word problems), English (comprehension), verbal reasoning and non-verbal reasoning.

I would also book on a few mock exams the Susan Daughtrey ones are very good. A company called Beaconsfield School of English offer an intensive 4 week course over the summer holidays, which I can personally recommend, although it is very expensive.

My eldest starts at Dr Challoner's on Wednesday.......

Thank you, this is really useful to know.

And good luck for Wednesday!

The Amersham School and The Beaconsfield School are not comps. The Amersham school has been consistently better than the Beaconsfield School. There is also The Misbourne School at Gt Missenden, The Chalfonts School and Chesham Park. They are all technically secondary moderns because the grammar stream is missing.

If you are not already in Bucks, I assume you do not have a primary school place and this will be challenging because you will find the good schools do not have places. You may have to travel a long way to find one unless you get lucky. Once you have found a place in a school, your DC takes the exams in the first few weeks of term for Y6. So look at the Bucks CC web site to check the details. For VR, Susan Daughtrey is good, but your DS will need to work accurately and at a good speed for everything else. Getting a tutor now may be helpful if they know the Bucks exams. Getting one after you move may be too late because they may not have vacancies. A crash course could be the only option. Familiarisation with the exams really helps but the knowledge needed cannot be built up in a few months. You could see if any prep schools have places so he can stay into Y8 and have another go if necessary.

The primary school places are my other headache (I need three) but I've just accepted that it's unlikely they will all end up in the same school and there is very little I can do to influence what I'm given. I also thought that all the primary schools in the area were either good or outstanding so it was hard to find a bad one. Is that not the case?
I'm confused about what you mean by 'the knowledge'. I thought the 11 plus was a test of ability rather than memory or fact learning. Have I got that wrong?
Also, after looking at the ofsted reports the Amersham School gets 'good' whereas Beaconsfield gets 'requires improvement'. I know Ofsted reports aren't everything but still...

It is not the case that all schools are equal. If you look at Chesham and Little Chalfont/Amersham border you will find there are huge differences in schools. The struggling ones will have places and it is highly likely that any school you like will not have spaces and that will probably apply for quite a large area around Amersham. Bucks usually put a list of school vacancies on their web site so you will be able to check where spaces occur. Where I am a governor we have no spaces but fairly constant enquiries now and we are not in Amersham, but within a short drive. Some primary schools will barely have any children getting to a grammar school. The aspirational parents avoid these schools.

The 11 plus is based on the national curriculum but it is much wider than the basic curriculum taught in school. There is an element of "general knowledge" which greatly benefits the child who is able to access educational activities outside school and has parents who are well educated themselves. This is what I meant by knowledge. A wide vocabulary, backed up by reading widely, is very important but the type of questions can be alien and are not standard classroom questions. For example, one year my friend's DD had to know the opposite of "Oriental". (My friend did not know the answer but 10 year olds are supposed to).

The way to approach the questions, deciphering what they mean in the time allowed, and being able to make decisions in a time test are elements many children have not faced before. Exam technique (and knowledge of style of questions) is often more important than ability at the borderline level. It will get the child over the line.

The Beaconsfield school has had problems for years and years. It suffers from the loss of pupils to grammar schools and the private sector, as you can imagine. It is not the school of choice for many in Beaconsfield and the surrounding affluent area. The Amersham school has always had a much brighter profile and is preferable. Ofsted is not everything but in this case they are correct.

You need to look on the elevenplusexams website but in many ways it is a test of ability, knowledge and exam technique. You can prep him yourself and many do, but be aware that there will be children who have been intensively tutored from a young age with less natural ability than your son and might leapfrog your son if you do nothing.

Examples of questions might be 'what type of word is THWACK'/ A map of Holland is drawn to a scale of 1:400000. What real distance is represented by 1cm on the map? Some 10/11yr olds might know that at the beginning of yr6, but many will not without additional work. It is perfectly achievable in a year, but don't assume that he will get in without any preparation.

Bucks says on its websitge that aspects of all 13 grammar schools admissions and some other schools are under consideration by the Office of the Adjudicator.

Office of the Schools Adjudicator that should be.

Amersham School got a new head a few years ago, long enough to have made her mark. The word in the playground is that it is becoming a bit sought-after.

You could look at Chenies school for primary. I think there are spaces in most year groups and many families travel from Chorleywood, Little Chalfont, Chesham or Amersham.

I'm starting to wonder if we are doing the right thing by moving now! I had blithely assumed that we'd get a place for each child at a half decent primary and then worry about whether or not we could get my eldest through the 11 plus. It sounds like we would definitely need a tutor and that the primary schools either don't prepare a child at all for the exam or don't prepare them sufficiently. Maybe we need to look at a different area as the odds of us getting a good outcome out of this seem quite low.

Primary schools do not teach for the 11 plus at all. Ever. They teach the national curriculum and that is not the same thing at all. In my school, the governors never discuss who gets the 11 plus and who doesn't. It happens but we are oblivious to it because it is not a classroom activity and the school is not judged on it (thank goodness).

Many children who perform well in Sats (old level 5/100) don't get grammar school places. The test is designed to select grammar calibre children not who can be taught most effectively at primary school. The OSA looked into how some ethnic minority children fared and it clearly shows who gets the places in the grammar schools and that tutoring assists. Money counts.

I think all you can do is contact Bucks CC and see where there may be school places in the quality of school you want. Chenies is a small school near the Herts border but accessible from Amersham.

You don't definitely need a tutor (lots of people diy), but you need to prepare.

DIY prep is not possible. We both work full time and the rest of our spare time is spent juggling three kids' clubs, hobbies plus homework etc etc. There wouldn't be a slot in the week where either of us could sit down and go through extra stuff with just the eldest. A tutor would be the only option.
What I've realised now is that getting a decent primary and a grammar school place is a very best case scenario and a slim chance. For this to happen we'd have to be spectacularly lucky and get a good primary, find a good tutor, pass the exam and be offered a grammar school place all in the space of 6 months, just after moving house. I think I've got better odds of winning the lottery! The more likely outcome is that we get a place at a primary school that no one wants to send their kids to and a very limited choice of one of two secondary moderns. It's taken the shine off Amersham quite a lot!

Parents who are less well educated themselves or who don't know the type of exams struggle to diy. This is one of the big problems in ensuring fairness.

Bucks publishes its vacancy list for primary schools next week.

My friend is in the middle of this now in the same area. Got child number one into grammar school. She started looking for a tutor at the end of year 4 and ended up on waiting lists as the good ones were booked up years in advance!She has bright children but it took a lot of work. Her second child takes the exam in a few weeks and has done 2 hours work every day over the summer holidays. Grim, especially as they are less academic than the oldest.

Her take is that it is almost impossible to pass without extra work/ tuition unless your child is extremely academically gifted. Competition is fierce- her daughter was the only girl from her local primary class to pass. Children come from all over which increases the competition- there's even a bus that comes in from Ealing in west London.

I am afraid parents in Bucks are as discerning as anywhere else and places at good schools are snapped up. There may be vacancies periodically in good schools but no shortage of immediate takers who are already resident. Also looked after children get priority and they move around quite a bit. No school wants empty places because it means less money coming into the school. As is most areas, there is a pecking order of schools.

If your child is working at the top table at a school with strong academic children, they may well be ok for the 11 plus. If they don't read much, then it's a bigger problem because the verbal section is weighted equivalent to maths and non verbal added together. If you are moving, clubs may change anyway and most people would look to do 11 plus work at the weekends because school and activities takes up weekday evenings. There may be coaching over the holidays as well. I have not looked recently but you may get lucky with a tutor. A very bright child doesn't need much and mine worked through the Susan Doughtrey books until she was sick of them! We had exam technique for a week and that was it. If you want Bucks, it's best to plan moving here very early.

Have a look at Berkhamsted a few miles away. The secondary school is Ashlyn's and is rated good with some aspects outstanding.

Whilst not in Bucks it is right on the border and many many children get into Chesham Grammar and the single sex grammars in Aylesbury. In fact, 70 children from Herts (read mainly Berkhamsted) started at Chesham this September.

All of the primary schools in the town are rated good or outstanding and there are / were currently spaces at most of them (albeit perhaps not the same school for all children).

Or look at Tring. Or Thame.