Dame Alice Owens - Mock?

[Countrylifemama]

Hi

We are preparing for DAO entrance exmas this year - child is doing tutoring. But I wanted to know what the mock exams they should register for before the exam?

Are there any that provide similar types of paper where they'll be able to do these assesments so we can get a view of strengths and weeakness

We are already doing past papers etc but ENglish is more challenging as its subjective. DAO write thier own papers

Any advice would be helpful thanks

Hello 👋 on second round DD was on 126th (or 136th) if not mistaken. She did sit the Herts Consortium too and got enough points for Watford Grammar, Ricky, Parmiters and etc but I ended up going the Independent route and choosing Queenswood School instead. The main factor for us was the class sizes and the number of classes for each year and We felt that for DD coming from a small Independent primary school with only 12kids to classes of 30-35 each would be too overwhelming for her. All the best of luck to you on whichever path/school you choose <3

@Coolparentit sounds like your child is doing excellently. The VR paper is a similar level of difficulty to the GL papers. My daughter was getting similar scores shortly before the exams and VR was certainly her strongest subject. She sat the exams last year. She also did a lot of CGP (they are more stretching) and EPP, bond and FPTP. Mainly cgp. She didn’t use Schofield for vr. For maths, we used all of the above plus FPTP and Schofield. The EPP school specific papers are good but very stretching, probably harder than the real thing. For English, it is normally a continuation or a piece of writing based on the comprehension text (for example to write a speech in the voice of one of the characters). The DAO English papers are very useful for this and she did them all and then repeated them. I left them to the weeks before the second round so she could have the most realistic practice then. I also found other eleven plus comprehension books (ie bond) and would give her my own continuation title. DAO English is very time pressured so good to practice to time as much as possible. Latymer exam has a similar format so you can practice using EPP Latymer papers too. I can’t remember what the DAO writing piece was last year, but I’ll ask my daughter and update here.

@purplejeanie Thanks for your reassuring reply. By CGP did you use the CGP papers or the books as well? If books can you let me know which ones in particylar? Is EPP exam paper plus? I’m a bit hesitant to use them as I’ve heard more neg reviews than + due to the difficulty level. For maths, was it the mental arithmetic boom by Schofield n Sims that you used? We’ve been using the FPTP worded problems book only so far. Would you recommend any particular school practice paper for Eng/ Maths? My child sat a couple of Eleven plus Harrow mocks for SWH/Latymer and scored between 85-95%.Are these exams of the same difficulty level as DAO VR?

Thanks a ton for your response.

@Coolparentwe used cgp ten minute tests for vr and maths and also the cgp papers for all the subjects. EPP is exam paper plus. My daughter was also sitting the HBS exam and the VR in the EPP papers is more realistic for HBS. But I think the English in the DAO EPP papers and some of the maths is pretty useful (you can pick out the questions ). Yes I meant Schofield mental maths. I found it useful as it covers so much and so exposed weak areas. For mocks we also did those Harrow mocks plus Susan daughtery (which were easier). My daughter did HBS and Latymer practices. In the Harrow mocks she did not score as well as your child (she was probably getting in the 70s and then getting in the 80s for the Susan daughtry mocks) but scored well enough in the actual exams to get into all the schools she sat, so I think your child is in a very good position and I’d try not to worry.

@purplejeanie Thank you for your reply. Do you recall if the CGP VR Paper packs were of different difficulty level like Pack 1 being easiest and Pack 3 toughest or did they have the same difficulty level? I noticed the GL VR paper packs difficulty levels increased with the pack numbers, hence, wondered if it was the same with CGP as well? As the exam is just days away, I don't want to buy all 3 packs if the difficulty level varies. In general, are GL VR papers difficult than CGP VR papers or vice-versa?

Cgp papers are definitely more difficult than GL. I don’t think that they increased in difficulty—we didn’t notice that.

@purplejeanie For DAO creative writing I've heard they want literary devices in every sentence and very flowery language. Is that true? What is the style of creating writing they have given in the past, do you have any idea? My child sat 2 DAO mock exams recently and in 1 it said to continue the story whereas in the other it was an essay format with a topic provided.

It’s true they like sophisticated writing but a literary device in each sentence would be too much. A balance of simple and flowery is good. Your child should ensure they use all the literary devices they know across the whole piece of writing. I think it is almost always a piece of writing focussed on the comprehension itself but occasionally it’s been something else, so your child should be prepared. You can google eleven plus story titles and you will find examples for practice. It’s important that no matter what the title, your child still shows off their ability to write.

@purplejeanie thanks for sharing your experience. I came on to the thread to ask this same question. Do we know that DAO creative writing has ever been anything other than ‘continue the story’? I thought I’d heard somewhere that it isn’t always, but not seen it in a past paper to ‘prove’ it…

My daughter has been scoring 70+ (out of 80) in the AE and Walsh VR papers that she has been doing at home. We abandoned the (expensive stack) of GL Assessment papers we bought as we were told ‘be careful as they are on the easy side’ which is pretty disingenuous as they write so many papers for schools. Trying to get DD to do an EPP paper now and she’s been slow to start and complaining it’s difficult . Don’t want to stress her so close to the exam, but finding it really hard to get a consensus on the right VR papers to be doing at this late stage.

Helpful advice to focus on DAO English papers in the last couple of weeks. She is intuitively good at the comprehension but her scores have been very hit and miss over the summer. Thank you

@sweetmelodythe GL papers are on the easy side, but they mirror the DAO VR level of difficulty. DAO VR isn’t hard, it’s just important to be accurate and speedy. So I’d continue those GL papers and don’t worry about the EPP, which are more reflective of HBS.

On the creative writing, I’ve also only every seen continuation pieces and that’s what it was last year, but we were told by tutors that DAO have in the past surprised everyone with something different, so it’s worth being prepared just in case (not sure if this is true though!).

Thank you 🙏 I’m feeling better for DD’s chances. I’m super hopeful that her VR and English will be enough since we are running out of time with her Maths. The standard of the Maths is so high and she’s still making a lot of silly mistakes. But the papers are equally weighted so you never know.
Can I just treble check that these are the GL papers that you mean?

@sweetmelodyyes I meant the GL papers for VR. My daughter sounds a bit like yours re the maths. In the DAO exams she scored well in VR, very well in English and poorly in maths and was absolutely fine. The equal weighting and fact that 2/3 of the marks were in subjects that she is strong in, was very helpful!

Sorry yes, those papers in the picture!

Thanks - I knew what you meant!

Interesting that their strengths/weaknesses aread are similar. Were you given raw scores or just standardised ones?

No just standardised scores and the ranking for VR and then the overall ranking.

My son has recently taken the VR CGP papers and he scores are (based on 2 papers) are b/w 85-90. It's quite less than the GL papers and I am very disappointed. Are the CGP ones tougher in general and is DAO more towards CGP? I've also noticed some topics like 'left over word' 'rhyming synonyms' aren't covered in GL nor CGP papers, wonder if DAO covers it?

That score sounds very good so no need to be disappointed! DAO is very similar to the GL papers. You can’t exactly predict what might come up because GL (who set the tests), can vary what they put in the tests from year to year. Last year rhyming synonyms came up in the Latymer exam (also set by GL). When you say left over word, do you mean ‘shuffled sentences’? I think that can come up too so worth practising.

@purplejeanie thanks for your reply. With just a few days left for the 1st round, I'm a bit worried about his scores dropping in the CGP papers. I ended up accepting an incorrect answer as a correct one so he eventually scored only 83% in the paper today which is a big fall for him as his GL average score was 95% and FPTP practice papers was 92%. I'm contemplating if I should continue with CGP at all 😥for DAO VR. We've only done 2 CGP papers and he scored 90% in the earlier one but 83% was a shock. He did take 2 mocks recently at mock test masters (if you are aware of it) and he scored 96% in VR which is great but the CGP score has shaken me quite a bit. Left over word is a bit like shuffled sentences the only difference being they give an extra word which is not required in the sentence. I wonder how they would give shuffled sentences in a MCQ format as in shuffled sentences, they usually need to re-write the whole sentence unlike left over word where they only need to select the extra unwanted word from the jumbled sentence provided.

@Coolparent scores can vary but overall he’s doing great. Yes, left over word came up, but not in DAO (from recollection).

@purplejeanie Thanks for all your help with the VR input. My son found the paper quiet easy so anticipating a positive outcome. I'm preparing my son for the Latymer and DAO English paper and struggling to find papers with answers provided. I do have the past DAO papers which I will be using closer to time; are you able to recommend any papers for DAO and Latymer with answers preferably. I have used the 2 on Latymer website. There are a few independent school papers but there aren't any answers and I feel the creative writing is quite different to DAO/Latymer. Can you recommend some for both? Also, I feel DAO English is more tough than Latymer, do you feel the same?

@Coolparent hi there, we subscribed to PiAcademy who had papers from many different schools (Manchester Grammer, NLCS etc) and sample answers as well as Exam Paper Plus they also provide answers. We found these quite helpful when prepping for DAO English/Maths

@coolparentglad first round went well. There were quite a few DAO papers so we used them and then reused them after a gap. We also used EPP DAO papers and the Latymer website ones. Also used Bond comprehension books and then got my daughter to write a continuation. Yes, Latymer definitely easier than DAO English. DAO English requires quite a lot of reading and writing in the time available and the questions were harder. The Latymer paper seemed to follow the same format each year and the questions are straightforward.

@purplejeanieI’m just in awe of you getting all this intel out of your daughter! And remembering it a year on!

It was a memorable time!!