Can someone explain ISEB to me?

[Stircrazyschoolmum]

Just that really.. a number of the indies are using ISEB this year due to Covid. I understand it’s online, multiple choice and covers English /maths/VR/NVR. But how in practice does this actually work? Is there paper to work out the maths on? Is it intuitive how to click on answers? What does adaptive mean in this context?!

We are at a state primary so it’s all gibberish.. it seems a good way to keep kids safe and reduce stress from multiple exams but if your DC has a bad day then all eggs in one basket?!?

@Grammarhopeful I have a “view” button not the right but I only get to it if I expand the section which lists the tests - I’ve included a photo...

@MarshaBradyo I wouldn't think so. Whether paper or on screen, by practicing your child had obviously built up a serious knowledge base required for a selective school. Atom would be helpful to familiriase your DC with the format, but you aren't behind by any stretch!

@Mycatslovedreamies I've got that. It doesn't tell you what the test was post-factum. A little UX fix I am sure Atom will introduce soon. I, for one, will drop this to them as a piece of user feedback.

The point remains, it's entirely possible to score highly on ISEB pre-test mock.

[quote GrammarHopeful]@MarshaBradyo I wouldn't think so. Whether paper or on screen, by practicing your child had obviously built up a serious knowledge base required for a selective school. Atom would be helpful to familiriase your DC with the format, but you aren't behind by any stretch!

@Mycatslovedreamies I've got that. It doesn't tell you what the test was post-factum. A little UX fix I am sure Atom will introduce soon. I, for one, will drop this to them as a piece of user feedback.

The point remains, it's entirely possible to score highly on ISEB pre-test mock.[/quote]
True Grammar, thanks. I got stung by a subscription site earlier but will check it out.

I think ISEB has a couple of examples, which I think we did a while back.

Good Afternoon, do you know if there will be a pre-test for ISEB this year or is it just one main test for independent girls schools like Latymer Upper, Francis Holland NW1 etc?

You can always tell what type of test it is by the number of questions....but it is a bit annoying that you have to look for it!

On the whole it’s a great system though. I think you can definitely improve your math or English score massively with practice as it is rote learning after a while...But I think there is probably more of a ceiling with the VR and NVR. It’s hard to “cram” vocabulary words and it’s also difficult to make a child accurate AND fast at NVR if it’s something they are not naturally good at. This is probably why some schools always place more importance on VR/NVR as it’s harder to tutor.

Actually on that point someone once told me that it wasn’t good to score really highly in the math ISEB and then badly in the NVR as it red flags the child to the school as being “over tutored” ...the scores should roughly align And if anything the NVR should be higher.

Would someone clarify, are the Senior School tests pre-tests or ISEB, and; Atom pre-tests or actual same level mock test? Incredibly confused by all this.

Interesting mycats...
I did A’levels maths. ( many moons ago, and help DC with maths). I got the highest possible grade at the time. But I struggle with some of the ISEB NVR questions. Honestly, I have never really struggled with NVR, until we started this. I have other DC and it really wasn’t that bad with them.

@Mycatslovedreamies Thanks for your message about the scores at your prep school, that’s reassuring. I was starting to seriously worry.
As I said before, when my son sat the ISEB pre test some years ago it was a very low key affair, there was no such thing as Atom. Bofa did exist but from what I remember it was pretty generic VR/NVR and didn’t offer a specific ISEB pre test practice. He did a bit of practice at home but it was nowhere near the big fuss that it seems to be today, and it all went well. I guess it might be partly due to the fact that it was the first step of the entrance process, whereas for girls this year it all relies on this pre test so the cut off mark might be higher?

On a different topic, do you know what are the rough weightings of head’s report vs. actual exam result (ISEB pre test) vs. interview in the final decision?

@WarmAndco3y I also did Math at A Level and also a bit at University as part of Economics......and I also find the NVR very difficult now! I put it down to age though and brain atrophy!! I remember doing NVR tests as part of graduate job interview and finding it easy - now I find myself just looking at the questions and they make my brain hurt! On the subject of whether math and NVR are linked I don’t really know - but my school did say that if a child is performing exceptionally at school and yet they do badly in an “IQ” type test like VR/NVR or CAT tests it can sometimes indicate that the child is putting in a huge amount of work and effort rather than their results coming easily to them (which might be a red flag)....and likewise if a child performs really well in these tests but peforms badly at school this can also be a red flag for a variety of reasons.

@Oceane11plus my prep have indicated that the school report and interview will have a greater weighting this year for the very reason that you have mentioned.

If most schools use ISEB results to select candidates for interviews, does it mean all these school will interview the same group of kids? :)

@uk2020 hopefully not. I guess it depends on how selective they are. I believe the most selective ones will have a higher cut off mark to qualify for interviews, for example only interviewing DC scoring >125 in the actual ISEB Pre test average, the slightly less selective schools will interview all those scoring >120+ and so on... In reality I guess it’s not as simple. They probably look at the breakdown subject by subject, look at the consistency of NVR scores vs Maths, VR scores vs English etc So in reality the cut off is probably not a clear cut average of the four subjects (which matters more for those who are close to the cut off score).

Some like Jags interview all the applicants before the pre test.

SHCH are saying they will focus on Maths and English, while WHS is expected to focus on VR/NVR (as it is their normal exam)
PHS normally sit English and Maths so again, more likely to focus on those first.

I would expect there is maybe less focus on Math and English due to the fact that not every child has had the same level of schooling one the pandemic? Both the Math and English elements require the child to have covered all of the curriculum so I suppose its not very fair to place too much emphasis on it? At least when a school sets its own exam it can leave out certain topics that usually get taught last (e.g. algebra)......or take a view as to whether a paper is generally poor versus good overall with a couple of noticeable gaps? I suppose this is where the school report comes in.....

Our school report last year was next to useless - it gave no indication of DD's ability level, had two paragraphs about things they had done before lockdown (trips they'd been on and things like that) and then one very small paragraph actually about DD. I have no idea how any secondary is going to extract anything useful from that.

I'm also surprised SCHS are concentrating on Maths/ English. The way maths is taught in our school is that the whole school cover roughly the same area in the same half term at varying levels (so they always seem to start off with things like place value in this half term). Annoyingly for us, this means DD is actually covering the stuff she was actually taught last year, and won't be going over the areas she had home learning for until later in the year - so some areas she hasn't actually had proper teaching for since Year 4.

@stellagibbons

Our school report last year was next to useless - it gave no indication of DD's ability level, had two paragraphs about things they had done before lockdown (trips they'd been on and things like that) and then one very small paragraph actually about DD. I have no idea how any secondary is going to extract anything useful from that.

I'm also surprised SCHS are concentrating on Maths/ English. The way maths is taught in our school is that the whole school cover roughly the same area in the same half term at varying levels (so they always seem to start off with things like place value in this half term). Annoyingly for us, this means DD is actually covering the stuff she was actually taught last year, and won't be going over the areas she had home learning for until later in the year - so some areas she hasn't actually had proper teaching for since Year 4.

it's just that their exam doesn't normally include reasoning at all. but as they have now moved to the pre-test ISEB, they are trying to reassure people in saying they will put more weights in the maths/English results- which is what their applicants will have focused on. it's written on their website.

Latymer Upper is saying the same, normally they have their own exam in English and maths only, so they’re not putting ‘very much’ weight on the VR and non-VR. Heaven knows what that means.

I’m not feeling at all optimistic about this, DD had no real teaching at all between March and September, and she’ll be up against kids who had the full curriculum.

@stellagibbons

Our school report last year was next to useless - it gave no indication of DD's ability level, had two paragraphs about things they had done before lockdown (trips they'd been on and things like that) and then one very small paragraph actually about DD. I have no idea how any secondary is going to extract anything useful from that.

I'm also surprised SCHS are concentrating on Maths/ English. The way maths is taught in our school is that the whole school cover roughly the same area in the same half term at varying levels (so they always seem to start off with things like place value in this half term). Annoyingly for us, this means DD is actually covering the stuff she was actually taught last year, and won't be going over the areas she had home learning for until later in the year - so some areas she hasn't actually had proper teaching for since Year 4.

Our school report last year was useless . I don’t understand as the school ran their normal baseline assessment the eek before taking down so could have written the report with data up to that date 🤷‍♀️

Is anyone else finding the atom English exams span far further than key stage 2 in grammar? Perhaps some of these complicated verbs and tenses are covered in prep schools but I’m pretty sure they’ve gone no where near in the state sector? Is that because it’s adaptive?

I agree with you @Stircrazyschoolmum. And my DD is at a prep. There are quite a few concepts I’m sure they haven’t covered at school. We’ve come across some complicated types of verbs and grammatical terms I’m sure they haven’t covered eg transitive/intransitive verbs, indirect object, intensifiers, delexical verbs etc

Glad it’s not just us finding the English very tough! My DC also at a prep school.

We are surprised at how advanced the grammar is as well! Glad it's not just me completely confused at these questions about verb tenses. We are at a prep and have not covered this. You are not alone @Stircrazyschoolmum

We haven't looked at Atom yet as I only want to do a month before DD has the ISEB mainly for familiarisation, but if those are the sort of English questions being asked it's going to be a bit of a disaster really!

Is the maths covered more obviously Yr 5 National Curriculum?

I just had another look at the ISEB website, and here is what it says about the English section: “ English question styles include reading comprehension, sentence completion, spelling and punctuation”. It doesn’t mention grammar. I wonder to which extent Atom does reflect the actual test

As for the maths, I believe most of the concepts needed are in the Y5 curriculum but to have a good score DC need to have a solid understanding of all these concepts in order to be able to use them in unfamiliar questions. I’ve also noticed there are quite a few multi steps problems in the Atom mocks, some of them with more than two steps, so I can see how time can be an issue if the actual test is the same.