So where's this years Trinity/Whitgift/Dulwich/Alleyns thread

[soooooooknowwhat]

And any other schools you may wish to add... Have used threads from the previous few years as part of my research and ds sat Trinity today! I'm more of a lurker than a thread starter but decided to bite the bullet and offer a hand to hold. Good luck to all dc's sitting exams over the next few weeks!

No, state schools don’t teach VR or NVR - I’d never heard of either before and my daughter never did anything like it in her primary. I think what you’re referring to are banding tests which are NVR I think - two of the six state schools We applied to did them (so my daughter sat two of them) but they are not to decide if you do or don’t get into the school - they are there to make sure they take a certain number of kids from different ability ranges - e.g a certain number from band A, the kids that performed the best, a certain number from Band B, the average performers and so on. No one really prepares for it ( or even knows that it’s called NVR) because it’s not a pass or fail thing.
Most state school kids will never have seen a VR or NVR paper before as far as I know

Hi spacecadet and lilybookins, I find that strange that no introduction or teaching of VR or NVR is made IN SCHOOL TIME if it's part of the system to transition kids to secondary!
If they're using VR and NVR as a proxy for ability (in lieu of a testing kids on stuff they've actually been taught), then not covering it during school time is daft! Wandsworth schools entry criteria is solely based on NVR and VR.

Inthemotherhood I totally agree. Wandsworth and Lambeth use it for banding yet primaries dont to it.

Madness when you think about it but then I honestly dont think our headmaster gives a monkies where his pupils go next. Not even bright kids trying for grammar schools are given any help or advisr. Its all about the sats. I suspect a lot of primaries are similar.

Standard entry to secondary school is via a simple online application via the council. Some state secondary schools will do selection based on banding using the NVR and VR. However these are not taught in state school primary. The idea behind these are IQ based and that children shouldn't need prepped for them. Although most parents do.

also whats good about VR and NVR for banding purposes is that the schools select across the bands. Therefore its not an issue if your child isn't at the top...

Of course parents will prep kids if a place at their first choice school is at stake. One school in Wandsworth has a ridiculously high cut off point for kids out of borough that would be very difficult to achieve with little to no exposure of VR and NVR (although there's always outliers!). I might add I think this is totally fair, as that's the point of a state school system. But this school does drain nearby boroughs of bright kids who don't go down grammar or indie route.

This thread is digressing.

I'm really keen to hear how the St Dunstans experiment of new tutor proof tests has gone. I'm sure W, T, A, DC etc are too...

inthemotherhood digressed indeed! My son did the St D online testing. The ISEB is tough and used by Eton, St Paul's etc. Some kids found it tougher than A and DC and others hadn't realised you couldn't go back and check your work! All I would say is they took a long time to inform parents about the interview, i had assumed it would be quick as it's online. The HM told us at interview that the intake this year will be 'sparky' kids and my DS did well to get interviewed!

Thanks for bringing this thread back on track Inthe!!

Be interesting to hear how you've all found the process this year. Anecdotally, it appears more and more kids are sitting for 6/7 schools. Also, the feedback on the online tests at St D's is that it threw up a fair few challenges.

I have a theory that in 5 years or so, DC's won't go into the school to sit exams but will do it online and will receive their scores instantly.

As an aside, I don't believe anything is "tutor-proof"

Just to round off the digression, can I point out an error in it?

"Wandsworth schools entry criteria is solely based on NVR and VR"

The Wandsworth test, which is used for the 63(?) selective places at Graveney school is based on that. The score required is exactly the same regardless of address (whether in borough or not) though when the score which requires tie-breaking is reached, it's by distance which does tend to favour closer (ie in borough) candidates.

No other school in Wandsworth uses the test results as an entrance criteria. It is feeder school for some (eg Bolingbroke) and distance for all the others, whether LEA or academy (with it without faith criteria, depending on the school). I don't think any are lottery (Kingsdale's in Southwark, isn't it?)

Fab stuff that your DS made it through to interview Spacecadet, I hope it goes well for him and others.

Ooooh Firefox if you ever start a new thread on that topic I'll join you! Sorry for digressions, I'm such a waffler once I get comfortable!! I'll just open this door, wander to the left, oooh what's down that hallway? Lift up the carpet...

Thing about the St Dunstans interview process is that its group or paired; which I think can be daunting for an introvert child. The Head likes to do things differently, I hope he gets the type of impact and data that he was looking for with new tests.

Squirm you may have me on technicalities as I'm not totally sighted. For Graveney (the school I was referring to), my understanding was that the selective stream was the only one were entrance was on score not distance (distance trumping a tie break). Non selective stream used distance then score. This could be wrong though.
Don't the other Wandsworth schools use the scores for banding and selective streams though - as all Y6 Wandsworth kids sit the test in school time (or they used to).

Re Wandsworth - Burntwood School, Ernest Bevin College and Graveney School use the test scores for selective places

Ashcroft Technology Academy and Chestnut Grove Academy use the test scores to split applicants into five equal ability bands

The other schools don't use the scores

Re tutoring - ime it is rife even in the prep schools although few people will admit to it

It does seem distinctly strange that schools are so very preoccupied with tutor-proofing but express so much less concern about the disparities between schools. My son's class has been an interesting social experiment in that he is at a primary school from which a large number of children left between year 2 and 5 for prep schools. It seems clear now that the prep school attenders, who were not the ones who appeared brightest at the primary school (someone who taught them confirms), are having a significantly easier time getting interviews etc. with the most sought-after independents than those who stayed at the primary.This doesn't seem surprising given their level of preparation, especially for writing tasks and for reasoning, where our primary has provided minimal preparation. A few hours with a tutor seems a pretty minor intervention compared with the difference between high-powered prep and standard SATS- obsessed primary - I guess you get what you pay for! The St Dunstan's test, however, is where the primary kids we know seem to be doing better than their former classmates who are now at preps in being called for academic scholarship interviews - maybe it's working!

Are the fees for these places really close to £40k a year?! How are so many able to afford this?! Ridiculous

isa i know that T at least do look at the school a child is at, and take that into account when reviewing their exam performance.

"Are the fees for these places really close to £40k a year?! How are so many able to afford this?! Ridiculous"

It's about £7-8k per term, and that is typical. So just over half the price you say.

Some of the schools on this thread have large bursary pots (older schools often do, despite current low interest rates right now, because of the effect of 400 or so years of compound interest before that).

I think that a kid from a state school might have an advantage in that the private school knows that if the child has done well in the exam it’s because they’re pretty bright rather than just massively prepped. Also many of the schools have A commitment to take a number of state school kids so that helps too.

Did anyone sitting St Dunstans get feedback on their DC performance? Apart from knowing you've done better than most if invited to scholarship?

Inthemotherhood we didn't get a scholar invite however we asked at interview as we always mention our DS issues with English as we would want that acknowledged by any school he goes to. W were fab and had already picked it up in his test and advised of support available. At St D the online pass is based on the average for independent schools. My DS was well above for Maths and exceptionally high at NVR which helped make up for his not so good English. His VR was ok.

The talk about the St. D exam has got me really intrigued. Would really be interested in the format.

2 of the schools my DD sat for had online elements, so half of the exams were online, VR, NVR and numerical reasoning. ( CEM). But she also had to do the typical maths and English exams, one on the same day and the other you had to pass that stage before moving on to the written aspect.

Would be interesting to see how things go forward. I still have one more DC to go through this with in 3 years

warm... the St D was quite a change. NVR,VR, English and Maths all online multiple choice with no option to go back and check. There was also a classroom based assessment where kids were put in groups and set a task. They also had to do a creative writing piece within the classroom assessment. We stuck our DS in for a sports scholarship in the hope that this would perhaps give the edge over others of similar ability....third time for me and one more to go after this....

St D told me that the online got harder as the children worked through it. The JAGS pre test is similar. The feedback in the iv was partially about the exam but as much time spent telling me how she did in the classroom based element.

Interesting space sounds very much like the first stage of one of DD’s exam. They had the online aspect ( school was good enough to send us a link a few days before so the girls were familiar with online format, it was only 5 very easy questions, not really related to exam, but just to get a hang of the online procedure). They couldn’t go back to check as you said, even if they could there were time constraints anyway. And it seems the questions got more difficult the more you answered correctly and easier/ same level of you were struggling. Then they had lessons and tasks as you described above and got asked questions by the headmistress individually in the class setting. They had to solve puzzles in groups and also had other tasks to perform. Took the whole school day.
They had to pass this stage before progressing to the written maths and English exam. It will be interesting to see if other schools adopt this or similar procedures.

I was really impressed with St. D's - having applied as a back up school we're rethinking. Loved the warmth of the place, the fact that the other families at interview were diverse (economically and ethnically) and most importantly down to earth. My dd chatted easily with the other dc's. I really liked the head - he seemed very open and honest about the process and what the school was trying to achieve for its students. I like the fact you were actually even permitted to talk to the head as part of the process! Also it felt that they were trying their best to really look at potential and not just results - lots of observation of the dcs both at the exam and interview. Interestingly, we met several dcs who were invited back to St. Ds for academic scholarship, but did not get an interview at A's or J's...not sure what to make of that! Is St. D's unearthing those with highest potential while A (more so than J who do their pre-test) awarding those best prepped?

I think all these schools are looking for different things? St Dunstans has traditionally not attracted the same calibre of students as DC/Alleyns/W/T - but a new approach could change that?

On the tutoring Q - neither of my kids were tutored and neither were asked in any interviews if they were? Not sure what to read into that?