Child going to grammar but not working at greater depth

[MyBloodyBrother]

Would you be concerned about this if it was your child?

My ds1 is in year 6 and after finding out he’d passed his 11+ back in October got confirmation this week that he got a place at his chosen grammar. It’s a competitive area and although 4 other kids in his class also passed the test and put this particular school as their first choice, my ds was the only one who actually got a place. His 4 classmates had all had tutoring for a couple of years, I hadn’t done that with ds as his dad trained as a maths teacher before retraining and wanted to try and tutor him himself. He did about 3 months worth of tutoring for an hour every weekend.

But, having had his parents evening on Friday his teacher said that he is hoping DS might achieve greater depth for one aspect of his english SATs (ds is a voracious reader) but was predicted that he’d achieve expected standard for the rest. He was looking down his graph to see where ds was on it and I could see he was scoring about 2/3 of the way down.

Would you be concerned about this as a parent? He has very fragile self esteem and I hate the thought of him being at grammar school and being unable to keep up. This was one of the reasons I was reluctant to commit him to 2 years of intensive tutoring. But then equally, he did really well on the 11+ without all the help. I asked his class teacher and he said that it’s a very supportive school so even if he does struggle he’ll be helped.

@steppemum @cortisolqueen @Deltasigma your conflicting comments about pass marks highlights the differences between how the 11 plus is administered in different areas, and even between different schools in the same area.

@MyBloodyBrother I agree with the majority on here that say that if your DS has been offered a place at a grammar like Colyton after only minimal tutoring, he should be absolutely fine.

Does your local grammar also have distance criteria once people have scored above a threshold to be ‘grammar pass’? Some do. So some kids with very top marks won’t get a place as they don’t live close enough.

Not that many are super selective without any catchment area and purely going down the ranking of the exam.

Dont worry….assessed as being at GD is fairly meaningless and Grammar Schools will pay less attention to it than Comps, where they need something to distinguish between students. Expectations for all the kids at Grammar willbe high. But don’t worry it will be too hard. They are all 11 year olds, doing 11 year old work. It’s just that they can go faster and spend more time on depth.

If he passed, he’s earned his place.

@WombatChocolate it does have a catchment area but it’s fairly large. Also in recent years there’s been a big increase in people with second homes (big issue here) using that address to gain a place and moving down if they’re successful so it makes it more competitive.

I'm trying to work out which school it is now- I didn't think the pass marks got shared anywhere?

I'm somewhat local and without wanting to be outing I've taught students who've left both the boys schools at sixth form (so obviously a biased view) but I don't think any of them would describe the boys schools as supportive.

That said, I doubt scruffy handwriting will be an issue- I'm not sure the idea that it "won't matter" is necessarily true- I think you'd need to talk to the school about whether a laptop would be an option.

That said, what's your alternative? I've not heard great things recently about DHSB (but again that's from students who are leaving or their parents), for example but it's probably still better than a lot of the alternative schools in the city?

Oh, sorry, ignore me- apparently I can't read threads today.

I don't know the school you've mentioned, so my comments aren't relevant.

@MyBloodyBrother just wondering how your dc is getting on. My DD appears to have had a good first year and so far settling into yr8

I’d say he will be fine if he got a place. Grammar schools can be competitive though. We don’t live in a grammar area but live near the Surrey / south london grammars that are hugely competitive. A friends son was there and hated it, he was very bright but so was everyone else and he struggled to make friends and came to the local secondary for sixth form. She didn’t bother putting her other children through it. I guess if his dad’s a teacher he can help him