2023 11+ LATE start (independent or grammar)

[MyBoiledEggIsTooSoft]

Everyone seems to be so incredibly well prepared and/or tutoring their children….

I am belatedly starting to prepare DD for sitting the 11+ this autumn. We have atom learning (need to make it work) and I have ordered verbal /non verbal reasoning bond books, a set of 11+ maths papers, some vocabulary flash cards and some comprehension papers.

DD and I have also shaken hands on starting to prepare and to do a good job…

any tips at all?

or anyone keen to join in on a late start?

support, tips, comments all welcome !

There are still four months to grammar exam and six months for independent.

The level of preparation required depends on a number of factors:

Your kids current academic level
how competitive your area in
how competitive your target schools are

So I'm not sure it is too late but I know in London it is very normal for mums prepare for 1-2 years in advance for the most selective grammar and independent schools.

Most selective I mean the school won't go down to waiting list very far (probably less than 30%) of total applicants.

It is possible for selective London Independent schools, but like @PreplexJ it depends on your dd current academic level and the schools you target. My dd started end of May year 5 and we used Atom learning to help us figure out what schools to target. She got into all the schools she applied to. She is not that hard working, but is very switched on and has an excellent memory. If your dd is motivated that is a great first step. My dd is from a state school and we used a tutor once a week (group zoom session) and Atom learning. That was it. For my ds we have more time so I started him on Atom and will get him to do some written practice tests, as his are written.

Thank you both!!

@PreplexJ We are in London and I think it is very competitive. DD is fairly academic: very good at maths, decent in English (top set of four) but I have no idea of verbal and nonverbal reasoning. I have never even checked her homework before 😣.

@SamPoodle123 that sounds promising, your DD sounds like she did so well!!

we will start tomorrow and see what happens!

We didn’t commit to 11+ revision until last Easter. It’s not too late, especially if you have an academically able child.

Decided to go with 90 mins a week tutoring (plus a little tutor set homework) because DC responded so much better to working with someone who wasn’t a parent.

I did worry that we’d left it too late, especially when we met a year 4 child who’d been tutoring for six months and had 16 months to go - that’s excessive IMO 😅

We focused on maths and non-verbal reasoning because literacy skills we already really good.

Long story short, DC got a grammar place. It was a close call (they didn’t get an offer on offer day, they were literally a few tenths off the pace and got a place off the waiting list a few weeks later) which did make me wonder if we should have started earlier! But it wasn’t that I don’t think, the score is ultimately just a reflection of how well they did on the day. So much pressure for kids of 10 ☹️ Good luck!

@MyBoiledEggIsTooSoft I assume you have some target schools in London in mind.

In London area some grammar school are harder to get in than the other. For example, some grammar school in north london, SW London are more selective than some school near Kent or historical Essex county grammars.

Worth do some research work on exam format, historical PAN and applicant number, and waiting list etc - so you can have an idea how competitive your target schools are (some info can be found at elevenplusexams forum) . This can help you to plan according for your school application strategy for both grammar and private.

And worth doing mock exam at some stage (during summer?) to find out where your DD levels at compared to other students in the same year. This will also let your DD familiar the exam conditions. I would say a lot of pupils at top set from state school will give a try to grammar (prepared or not).

I think still time, just need to prepare well.

@Jellycats4life congratulations to your DD!! It is heartening to hear success stories. It will of course depend on that specific day they are sitting the exam (s).

@PreplexJ I will start to look into schools, a mixture of grammar and independent I think. We can (just) afford independent but if we go down that route, I want it to be a really good fit for DD.

I am waiting for the books to arrive (I am actually a bit excited) and will try to do a mock exam later this week to get a base level to work from. DD has done atom learning independently so I will also try to figure out where she is with that.

So, step 1: establish a base level
step 2 and ongoing: work on weaknesses
step 3: look into exam formats for potential schools
Step 4 (in another 4 weeks or so): another mock to see how we are doing.

Does that sounds reasonable?

Definitely not too late. We started preparing in September, aiming only for G&L and LU. My daughter got into G&L. Good luck!

Definitely not too late - we started preparing ds in June and the 11 plus was the first week of September. He got in. I found that he definitely needed some prep, but eventually he plateaued -even over the course of only 3 months. They're not going to carry on improving indefinitely, so in my view it's just about familiarity with the format/exam technique and making sure the basics are secure. That doesn't take two years! Good luck!

@crazycrofter perhaps more context, what area is your DCs grammar and when was that?

You are not too late. We started Atom in April last year and dc got into a super selective, which held tests right at the start of September.

my tips: lots of practice tests. Atom offers unlimited practice tests. We did one a week in July and August and fortnightly before then, on a Saturday morning under exam conditions so dc would get used to it. The month before the test switch from the Atom practice tests to paper-based (Bond are realistically hard)

dc went to the online atom classes (and enjoyed them) and raced through the content to get stickers and trophies. We mixed it up a little bit with vocab on the way to school in the morning.

this isn’t a bad time to start (although it is a bit late) because your dc won’t be jaded by the time the exams take place.

Also, make use of the data that Atom provides: there’s a dashboard showing how your dc is performing relative to others the same age, and also they have data on what scores dc need to be averaging to be on a par with kids from previous years who’ve got into their target schools. We had a full atom subscription, not just maths and English, and it was really worth the money (much cheaper than a tutor)

Atom is very useful for practice maths and nvr and my DD enjoyed it.

Just to note that for VR NVR, atom does not fully resemble the actual GL paper format most grammar school is using, so important to also take time to practice paper version from other publisher too.

And the atom SAS score thing, last year we found it is quite good indicator for indi schools, for grammar schools some of my peer parents think it is over optimistic.

@PreplexJ admittedly it was 5 years ago, but it was Birmingham, where the grammars are super-selective and very oversubscribed, so fairly similar to London I believe.

I agree a mock is a good idea; I'd forgotten that ds did one. We also used elevenplusexams forum extensively, so I knew roughly what raw score he'd need for the various schools and how the different areas were weighted. That was very useful. Dd did better than him two years earlier without any proper prep and she also got a bursary to the most selective independent -but she was at a higher level than he was, and I knew he was more borderline.

Having worked in highly selective schools, if your child needs more than 6 months' prep, then they are more likely to struggle when they get there. And if they need a lot of adult input, then you should be prepared that they might quite possibly continue to need adult support throughout year 7 and 8 at least.

So basically, if you start now, and if she's enthusiastic and self motivated, then you know that she will cope well if she does get in!

@crazycrofter Birmingham most superselective has applicant to PAN ratios about 20% i.e 5:1 or 6:1. While this ratios is similar to some of the selective school in London. It is not as competitive as those most selective school in certain London area. Hence I suggest poster need to put their target schools into context.

I'm not at all suggesting the difficulty of getting in means a better school. It just highlights the reality.

"if your child needs more than 6 months' prep, then they are more likely to struggle when they get there"

Not sure if any substance in this statement? Any fact or evidence?

@PreplexJ true, but my point really was that children don’t keep improving for two years. The exams aren’t that complex! I don’t believe my ds would have scored higher had he had a few more months.

@crazycrofter I don't think parents prep for two years are just practicing exam papers, and yes I agree there maybe diminishing in return if not do it properly. So some parents may choose small and little building style earlier, and some other may choose intensive shorter time, it depends on the kid as well as the target schools.

Wrt exam papers, it depends, for some exam the complexity of lies in the speed and accuracy required rather than the difficulty of the questions.

Intrigued, does this imply majority of students in highly selective secondary schools are struggling to keep up at current time? 🤔

Well, I suppose there must be lots of kids who've been heavily tutored who didn't actually need it, and who would probably have passed with less intensive preparation.

There are some kids who do better "at the bottom" of a selective school, because the work ethic is the norm, and it pulls them along. But there are other kids who don't cope at all well with the pressure, and their self-esteem takes a massive hit, and these kids would be better off "nearer the top" of a non-selective school.

Having taught in super-selective schools, there are some kids who are tutored up to the eyeballs for 2+ years in order to scrape in, and those are often the kids who struggle. And/or those parents end up providing a lot of support throughout the school (supervising homework carefully, and maybe paying for private tutors). Nothing wrong with that at all, but it can be a big commitment, especially for parents who thought they'd "done their bit" by getting the kid into the selective school.

Only my own experience of teaching in such schools! The "6 months" was a bit arbitrary, but the sentiment stands. Maybe there are "exam factory" schools where the teaching is basically intensive exam coaching. But the school I worked in (London, 800+ applicants for 100 places when I was there) expected the kids to be real scholars. To show intellectual curiosity, not to want spoon feeding, to engage in robust debate and to happily put in the hours outside the classroom as well. Performance in public exams was pretty much taken for granted!

@MightyEagle

"To show intellectual curiosity, not to want spoon feeding, to engage in robust debate and to happily put in the hours outside the classroom as well"

A bit contrasting with the "6 months prep" comment. Without students own motivation surely no matter how long prep it does will have little improvement. On the other hand, one need to put in proper hours to stand reasonable chance.

These highly selective schools are mainly taking students by academic ability at 11+ exams, regardless the time and efforts for preps.

I'm not sure the one you used to work in is the case but for the very top end of the spectrum, a significant amount of students has very similar natural abilities (talking about top set, for example), the main differentiator is unfortunately the preparation efforts, which is one of the implicit critiera most of these schools using. And of course the performance in public exams was pretty much taken for granted!

I'm sure the opposite is true, there are also kids with intellectual curiosity who missed some school they are supposed to thrive on because too relax in preparation (or too late). I also believe some of these kids would be better off "nearer the top" of a non-selective school but why would the parents risk their opportunity on joining the fantastic school like you described you have worked in?

Hmm… I am definitely feeling that I may have left this to the very last minute 😫.

ok, so we have done two mocks on Atom Learning today. They have a breakdown of strengths/ weaknesses and we will assess those tomorrow.

score ISEB maths 130
score ISEB English 117

DD has promised to do at least one VR /NVR later.

what do these scores tell me? what level should we aim for as a minimum average? I would assume that VR and NVR are bad - DD has practiced on her own but not really sure about what to do there.

OP that’s not a worry. Your dc will improve once she’s started the practice. 130 is good, and will get a place at most schools, whereas 117 is below the threshold for the most competitive schools, but would get in at others. This is a reasonable starting point and the scores suggest your dc would do fine at a selective school. (Tbh, if they work hard and have supportive parents they’ll do fine most places, but that’s for another thread!)

I think these scores are decent scores for first attempt (esp for maths). I think different atom mock will have different results but you start engaging your DDs interest which is really positive sign.

As a parent probably try to find out more info of your target schools - can do this together with your DD to draw her interest and motivations.

Try to gather info on 11+ admission process, catchment requirements, understand difference stage exam format between different schools. Some grammar school application deadline will be approaching in a few weeks soon so don't miss that.