SW London Girls' Private & Grammar - applying for year 7 in 2023

[EmotiveBubblez]

i myself have been looking for this thread and have been unsuccessful. Saw a couple people mention it over the past day or so on the 2022 one.

so here we go, albeit a bit late.

has everyone visited all the schools on their lists?

how many schools are everyone applying to?

what schools are you applying to?

how is the preparation going?

i know some exams have taken place, how did they go?

wishing all the whirls good luck with preparation and exams, hope we all find the right schools for our daughters.

Interesting on the CAT scores - I think that we have only 4 categories: Maths, English, VR and NVR (so I assume spatial and other NVR is all grouped together), but worth checking whether there is a difference in performance between both.
If CAT scores are 'solid' worth asking your current school if they can figure in the cover letter (assuming that they are not in the yearly report and/or the prospective school does not ask for it).

CAT averaged at 128, with range 118-141. Yes, spatial is indeed the problem - just our luck ISEB have ramped it up…!

Spatial question types seem harder for ISEB than CAT too.

Where do you guys all get these CAT scores from? I have no idea. Though my son does use atom and get the SASones there.

@secondaryquandries , my DD's primary indie provides them on a yearly basis (as part of school report). On the SAS ones on Atom, I think that you need to be careful, as SAS on Atom are supposed to be quite different to CAT - if I think that I saw a document a while back where the discrepancy was some 6-9 points, with the SAS in Atom being lower than the CAT scores).

You have to ask the school, but not all schools do CAT testing. I think the Atom ones come in slightly lower than CATs - you have to add ?6 to make them equivalent IF I am remembering correctly.

Ah yes. My ds is state so no cats. His verbal reasoning sas is also his weakest.

Sorry that should read that non verbal reasoning is his weakest

I don't think there is English on CATs. Just VR, NVR, Quantitative (maths) and Spatial. Schools often do different English tests too (usually comp and spelling - eg NGRT and NGRS) but CATs are just those four categories.

Atom usually say add 8 points to their scores to get the equivalent CAT score.

That's still a great average though, and the highest mark possible in the spread. When is your ISEB? There are plenty of Spatial practice books on the market if you have time just to blitz through a few papers!

Lots of state schools do do CATs so it's pot luck really whether any given school does or not. But Atom (plus 8 points) should still give you a good indicator.

You are absolutely right - just had a look at the report again - it seems to be verbal (words), numerical (thinking with numbers) and non-verbal (shapes and space).

Thank you. I have had a look at the scores. Any idea what you need to be aiming for for KGS, Hampton etc?

@secondaryquandries Difficult to say as exams are really different. I think that comparison is easier when format is like ISEB but when there are elements like creative writing, etc, I think it is not a straight forward translation. The schools you are mentioning are quite in demand so I would guess, if I had to venture, that in the 130 region or close by... (of course, all depends also on performance on the day)

Someone told me c.125 is an average CAT score for Hampton (remember some students will be higher than that, some a fair bit lower - there's a brilliant thread on Mumsnet about CAT scores / SPGS which has some great reasoning about the long tail at some schools - worth reading if you haven't already). I don't know about KGS I'm afraid but I'd imagine a similar ballpark.
130+ average tends to be only SPGS / St Paul's Boys / Westminster and the top grammars.

Have a look at the responses on this thread about CAT scores and school offers - it's all very sensible as regards taking "average" entrance profiles with a pinch of salt!
www.mumsnet.com/talk/secondary/4648080-cat-scores-for-spgs?page=1

Thank you all. Very interesting but also daunting! Results for us are not consistent, so o can be optimistic or pessimistic 😂 Well, this time next year they'll all be in a school anyway!!

Thanks, LondonMum! We tried blitzing the spatial stuff, but without much value-added - chiefly, I suspect, as I’m crap at it myself so was of limited value in terms of offering tips’n’tricks. ISEB is almost upon us, so it’s a case of fingers crossed now, I think.

Are your inconsistent results on Atom? We found Atom to be really erratic with results (and I know others on here have found similar) whereas when DD does paper tests (eg practice books) results are really consistent. We stopped using Atom for that reason.

Yes on atom.

Which paper tests do you use?

@secondaryquandries Honestly, I'd ignore those Atom scores. DD has consistently very high CAT scores, and yet when we did a bit of Atom over the summer all her scores showed wild variation (eg 25 point variation in every subject which we've never seen on any CAT score or school test). I don't know what's going on with Atom's algorithms but can only hope that their scoring for Consortium exam and PHS is more robust. Hopefully the ISEB exam - because it's so well-established - will be better. But that's partly why we've given up on Atom.
Re paper tests we just use CGP books which DD likes a lot more than Bond books (which feel very old-fashioned).

Good luck to all for the week ahead!

@QuiteAJourney What has DD got this week? I think a lot of schools are doing ISEB this week? Hope you're all staying sane!