11+ mock exam waste of money or benefit

[Lenazayka]

Hello everyone,

My DC is in Year 5. We teach ourselves; but on Friday, we attend a learning centre.
As a mum, I am interested to organize the best condition for studying.

Our preferences:

• Queen Elizabeth Grammar boys, Barnet
• King Edward VI Grammar, Essex
• Colchester Royal Grammar School
• Bancroft’s school ( private)
• Bishop’s Stortford College ( indie)
• Haileybury Imperial College (private)

Could you share with me your opinion about 11+ mock exam please? Have you found it useful? Could you recommend them any? If you were not happy, yours experience is also interested to me.

Thank you 😊

We didn't do one and she passed. I suppose it depends on whether your primary has set your child up with timed tests for anything, so whether they are used to them. If not it may be easier, cheaper and less stressful to do a CGP or Bond exam pack at home but under exam conditions. If you do, do not give more time. Otherwise your child will have unrealistic expectations.

I will pm you the test service we used as I don’t want to breach any advertising guidelines. I have no affiliation with it I might add. DD went through this process a few years ago and is now in Y9 at a superselective Grammar. She did tests for three Grammar regions and one independent. We did home familiarisation and found mock tests in the Feb and Spring helped focus on areas of improvement. The provider we used outlined which style of questions were weakest so we could focus our efforts. It also helped with experience of juggling question paper, answer paper and (for some of the exams) working out paper all on one table. We also found out that DD wasn’t always marking the answer box clearly (very slight diagonal rather than very full and horizontal) so the computer didn’t see her line.

We did try Explore Learning but found them ineffective for DD’s learning style amongst other things,

We did one organised locally. It was useful for us to gauge how she was doing and for her to see the format/timing of the papers.

DS3 did one, not to find out where he was academically, more for the experience of being in a huge hall with hundreds of other children under test conditions.

He's at a London SS grammar now. I just asked him if it helped and he said, yes, he knew what to expect for the real thing.

Our dd did mocks at a London 11+ centre. It was a useful gauge but more importantly, provided test conditions so that she had experience of what to do/when and how to cope in strict testing conditions with lots of other kids and their dramas (nerves, tears, pencil dropping and all sorts..). We did one mock and my dd passed her 11+. We did not use an external tutor.

DD1 (now yr8 at grammar) did two mocks, one in the June and one at the end of August before the exam at the beginning of September. For her it was very good practice and as well as the obvious things like experiencing being in a big hall, doing the different papers under strictly timed conditions etc, as a left hander it gave her the opportunity to see how the desks would be laid out. Might sound silly, but they were set up for right handers - answer booklets on the right (no good when you write with your left hand!) question booklets on the left etc. From the mocks, she knew that she'd have to swap everything round once the real exam started.

We did one and found it useful for the experience of queuing up with lots of others and what a real exam felt like. It also gave us a score and ranking with was helpful to confirm that our DD is v good at English but needed a bit of work in maths still.

Look at elevenplusexams website. All things 11+ related including mocks for the exams you've listed which are super competitive. I would do 2-3; around Easter of Year 5, then June then end of July. Sutton mocks are highly rated but sell out within hours. You need to watch the forum like a hawk for the release date.

Never mind the mocks, I am just amazed that you live in a location that allows access to schools across such a geographic spread. Would it not be best to concentrate on (say) Essex or wherever you live?

Putting children through long commutes to school is rarely productive.

Depends on the child.

Did some for my DD. She found it useful and took it all in her stride.

Tried it for it for my DS who didn't want to go and didn't do very well. Didn't go to the last one I paid for as it seemed counterproductive.

Are you planning on moving as those schools cover a very wide geographic area?

Thank you very much for the detailed comments. 😊

Just wanted to add:
Some entrance exams in GL format, but other - CEM.
Yes, we have a plan to move closer to the school. Currently, we live on the border of Hertfordshire and Essex.

However, I am not sure 🤔 do we needto book at least one of each ( GL & CEM)? Or anyone of them is ok?

Me DH thinks that mock is pointless but I do not want to see a fear of the unknown in the eyes of my child.

GL and CEM are different formats with different timings. I think mocks are just as important as the prep. Difference between qualify or not especially if your child is borderline. I wouldn't have an athlete in a competition without the right prep. Just saying.

We did two 11+ mock tests for each of our children. They were ones organised by the PTAs at two Sutton grammar schools. It'is very useful, because children usually haven't done exams in a big hall by themselves. It also gives you an idea of where they are in the cohort and where they may need more work.

Our son didn't have tuition but did do a mock 11+ in exam conditions. A local tutor hired a church hall and set it out with exam desks and offered it to "outsiders" as well as his own pupils. DS and ourselves were worried because he'd had no exposure to "proper" exams in primary school. DS came out happy and said it really helped him and improved his confidence when it came to the real thing. We weren't actually that bothered about how well he had done - it was all about the experience.

We also did a Sutton mock organised by PTA. Invaluable experience for us. We had started the whole grammar school prep pretty late and the mock clearly showed us which areas needed looking at as well as giving the "exam" experience.

Where do i find mock tests centres? Do i call the schools or any tutoring agents? If its tutoring agents, Can anyone please share details of reliable agents? Thanks

@Umaa I suggest you start a new thread as this one is several years old and people might reply to the original question rather than yours.

If you put the area you're targeting in the title of the thread (eg "11+ mock test centres Essex") you will hopefully get some responses from people who know about the area.