If you heavily tutored for 11+ but didn't get into a super selective...

[nightmarepickle2025]

How do you feel about it? Do you think the additional tutoring was good for your child or detrimental?

We've been told by our daughter's teachers that a decade ago she would have easily got into the nearest super selective but the standards are much higher now and essentially you have to get 100% in the tests. So it seems incredibly unlikely she'll get in. I'm happy for her to go to the local comp, which is a good school. . But she's bright, wants to do the exams and I think it's good to push her. I just don't want her to put in all that effort and then have her confidence dented if she's not successful.

So I guess I'm asking for positive and negative experiences of going through the process and not succeeding.

We tutored our DD for the 11+ and did lots of practice papers. We didn’t go in as heavy as others do because this wasn’t the right thing for our family and DD loves all her extracurricular activities, play dates etc. We didn’t want it to take over her life, or ours. She didn’t make it through but she’s okay about it because we didn’t make it a huge thing.

I was disappointed but I don’t regret our decision to go for it because we’d always have wondered what if and I genuinely think the tutoring has improved her confidence and helped her prepare for secondary, wherever she goes. She’s doing brilliantly at school, loves learning and is no way scarred by the experience. She is so relaxed about SATs and is going to have an easy, fun Year 6.

Heavily tutoring is something only you can decide on. It will of course increase your chances of getting in but will have a family impact and increase the heartbreak if it doesn’t work. I’d say whatever path you choose, just make sure it doesn’t become the be all and end all for any of you. It’s very easy to become consumed by it, especially when other parents are talking about it constantly. Cancel out the noise and do what’s right for you and your family.

The benefit of extra tutoring means she'll go into the top sets at her good comp if she doesn't succeed. That's worth it alone IMHO but be prepared to continue with support and hard work to keep her there.

I would say, set your dc's expectations correctly. Make sure she understands its difficult, but you never know. Also, that the extra work put in will not be wasted, as it will put her in a strong position for secondary. But, I believe in letting the dc try if they want and supporting them with what is necessary. TBH I think if a child is willing, let them, but you need to also let them know how much effort it goes into being successful.

If your kid is good enough to be competitive for a selective school then they will automatically go into top sets at the comp without any tutoring.

If she wants to do the exam then let her but don’t make a big deal out of it and go easy on the tutoring. Consider doing it yourself with past papers and Atom rather than pay a tutor. We took this approach and have no regrets. DS learnt exam technique, got into top sets.

What helped is his friend who sat all the 11+ exams with him also didn’t get in. He was tutored heavily from Year 4 and his parents are still bitter. If your daughter is likely to participate with a friend who will get in then maybe reconsider and don’t apply for the same schools.

Something I have noticed is applicants for the super selective schools are up and the mediocre schools down. People want results now for their money which means those schools with 600 applicants last year will probably have 650/700 this year. Good state schools also have more applicants meaning their catchment has shrunk. How confident are you that you’ll get your first choice state?

We might not get into first choice state if catchments tighten but thankfully second choice is also good (and closer).

I'm not following @roses2 results for money? The more selective the school, the better the results, right? But how does that determine if it's a good school or not? It seems stupid to "pay" just for selective?

This is a common situation in London - the majority of private schools are the same cost regardless of results. If people are going to part with £35k/year they are now less likely to want pay this amount for a mediocre private school that gets the same results as a state school.

If they are going to pay £35k inc vat then they will be more likely to apply for a school that gets better results than state so the super selective will see an increase in applicants and hence harder to get into.

I'm puzzled. Are the parents who pay hefty private school fees not aware of the difference between correlation and causation?

My middle son got into grammar school with very little tutoring. He just "got" non-verbal reasoning etc. my youngest son got way more tutoring but didn't pass the 11+. He was too much of a "plodder" and didn't finish the questions. However he absolutely flew high at his comprehensive school. The tutoring filled in all the gaps in his knowledge re maths and English. He found the year 6 SATS easy in comparison! This put him into the top sets at secondary school. He actually ended up doing better than my middle son in his A levels and he is now at a good Uni studying maths. He's a natural hard worker. So failing the 11 plus did him no harm at all!

This is what happened to us. I didn't realise it was a "superselective" only that it was a grammar and difficult to get into.

My DD is bright and academic and I assumed with prep she'd get in, but sadly not. She was up against children who did hard core prep daily. Similar to other posters, we did regular prep but also let her have a social life/go to scout camp etc.

Also, she has a September birthday so this counted against her.

We were disappointed, but she got over it really quickly and she wasn't at all devastated. We praised her for effort and after the test took her on holiday (before we got the results).

Most of her friends didn't get in, the only one who did spent her free time constantly in tuition.

We got a pleasant surprise when she got a place at a fantastic nearby comp for which we would normally be out of catchment. There is a lowering birth rate in our area, starting with her year of birth (2012) and the impact over the years on all schools has resulted in widening catchments. You might find you are pleasantly surprised too!

We didn't get in. DC is smart but not hugely motivated academically. We tutored but not extensively and probably didn't do enough over the summer.

However my DC isn't too disappointed as we didn't centre his whole self belief around it (which I'm pleased about.) We mostly talked about getting extra exam practice (which was a real plus imo) and the tutoring can only be a good thing.

It's helps that I wasn't 100% sure if the selective school would have been the best fit for him anyway given he's only motivated by subjects he's interested in.

I think one tutor or ten tutor or no tutor, end of the day kids only have certain capacity to absorb knowledge or information. And even if we have whole world sorrounding and teaching them, it won’t be of any use. So see what fits best for your kid and go with it. There is no harm in any strategy. You can have multiple tutors or no tutors as long as kid responds to it.

It depends on your child. My DD1 practiced daily with old papers from mid year 5 but had plenty of time off. We didn't pressure her, she passed.

My DS practiced occasionally, he was 9 marks away from passing, if I had pressed him harder, he probably would have passed. I am glad he didn't as he is flying high at the comp and I am not sure that he has as much dedication to school work as DD1.

DD2 practiced once and passed. I don't think she should go to grammar school as she will struggle with amount of work and homework that's expected but it has been her choice.

DD3 will take the test next year, she will practice but will not be tutored as have none of my children.

Super selective schools can be great, it suits my DD really well but the work load is heavy and she really has had to give up a lot to do well. She has to leave at 7, as the school is a bus journey away and gets home at 5. Evening homework is at least 2 hours.

DC went to a school that prepped heavily for 11+ and other entry tests but we decided it wasn't the right route for her. She sat a "fair banding" test based on the NVR type of 11+ questions and quire enjoyed the experience. So I don't think it was a waste. It gave her a lot of practice in doing timed tests, anyway.

We only have superselectives around here and DD didn't get in. However the 11+ practice did help with Y6 (as she was already familiar with most of the maths, so her lessons were extra consolidation and more of a confidence boost that she could do it) and she is now in top sets in Y7 in the local comp. We did the tutoring ourselves but it was worth it for the extra maths consolidation before secondary.

Going to superselective private makes only sense if you are wealthy and can easly afford it.

Superselective grammar schools have exactly the same curiculum as top sets in good comprehensive schools. Where I live parents of very capable kids have not even been considering sending kids for the exams at the local superselective one gender grammars. Simply, the state schools are in the top 100 best state schools in Uk. From the whole school there maybe were 6 candidates to two grammars. Two Indian kids got in. The same with superselective private. 2 kids who applied got in , one went to less selective.

I suppose I don't regret it as I would have wondered! But I do feel the time was wasted -- all that time on subjects like verbal reasoning and non-verbal reasoning that I don't see translating into actual school work. (Maybe I'm wrong!) Neither I nor DC is not bothered about not getting (YAY!) but I AM annoyed that we wasted a lovely summer and so many evenings (with lots of grumbling) because of it.

We got into the N London super-selective we applied for (with tutoring), but we are going for a nearer outstanding comp instead. My view is that a child who can do the work needed to get into / close to one of these schools will do well in any good school that puts the children into sets. Looking at GCSE grades overall the difference looks vast, but very often the top crew at a good comp will do as well as the kids at the super selective - that's your comparison set.

Also, my child had a tutor through Y5, but we stepped it up a lot from May. From that, I learnt what they're good/not so good at (which I didn't really know before!). They really enjoyed the prep in their preferred subjects. I'm convinced I've already improved their GCSE outcome in their less preferred subjects! As long as there wasn't too much work, and they feel okay about not going to the super-selective, I really think the work is mostly not wasted - mine has developed an ability to study, put in some hours, commit to getting right through a workbook etc. Basically, in May I was already thinking that - if you compare top comp kids w the grammars, the difference in results is minimal. But it was seeing their ability to work and learn over the Summer which made me confident that my child will do well anywhere, and we could ditch the super-selective we'd gone for.

Not applicable to all super-selectives perhaps, but for some, I really think that they're not as good as a more local school for social development. Too many of them are still fairly traditional grammars, how much do you need to approach your curriculum afresh when 3000 parents will put their kids in for your school every year? And having their friends over such a big area just makes all the social stuff (which is important too!) harder - more difficult for the kids to exercise their own agency in arranging socials etc. More dependent on lifts from parents like primary kids.

If you have a child who was willing to be tutored, who put in hours, progressed as she worked - she has all the skills to excel wherever she goes.

@Chocicechocicechocice Why spending all that time, money and effort on prep, even stepping it up - and then not going?.. Wouldn't that be easier just not tutoring if you're happy with the local comp and don't see much difference with grammar? 🤔

@Ubertomusic you're probably right! A lot of my child's friends were doing it and so they wanted to do it too. They have that kind of personality where they quite enjoyed (most of...) the prep. I thought if they got it they might want to go, but turns out they literally just wanted to do the test. Perhaps novelty value of a new process? We are outside catchment for our preferred (non-grammar) school but the school gives out some places to non-catchment children on the basis of a test - because we had to pass a test to get the place at that school we were always going to be doing some test prep anyway.

@Chocicechocicechocice - I’m curious now which school you’re turning down (and which you’re taking)!

We’ve just been through the (gruelling!) process. Dd was eager for most of it, (which helped a lot!) understood what was at stake and relished the challenge of being busy and working with a really clever and lovely bunch of kids. Until the summer hols (when they mostly stopped anyway) we kept up with all the usual play dates and extra curricular clubs and activities, so she took several exams - that wouldn’t help her pass the 11+, but doing activities that she enjoyed and kept her healthy and active. It meant there were weekends when we left home at 8.30, she did 2 different sports classes and a private practice, hopped in the car at 11.45 with a packed lunch and I’d drive her to do 4 hours with the tutor and then she’d fall asleep on the way home, then wake up to do the tutor’s homework… but (I felt) better that than some of her friends who dropped all their clubs and activities to just spend the whole weekend ‘doing 11+’ with no let up or respite…. Some of them haven’t passed any exams (so far - hopefully they’ll have lots of success in the future) and I think it must be an extra kick in the teeth to have nothing ‘else’ to show for that period.

I also really encouraged dd to find and celebrate success along the way - doing better at the tests, getting praise from the tutor, learning new skills etc. As those things are worthy of mention in their own right.

There are long months where you won’t know if all the work has paid off (we have to wait til March to find out for sure)… and I wanted both myself and my dd to be able to not regret the time given up if she doesn’t get a place. It also means if she didn’t succeed I could say ‘ah maybe in hindsight we shouldn’t have taken the extra classes needed for the exam’ etc.

Thank you for sharing your experience. You could have been describing my own with my daughter, currently in the trenches preparing for the Sept 25 entrance exam for a N London school. I really needed to read this as I’m finding it all so overwhelming. She has her difficult days but, on the whole she is working so hard and is so motivated, despite being at a school that does not prioritise home learning. However, deep down I know that her chances of getting a place are slim - it’s just so uber competitive. But I also believe that a motivated child will do ‘well’ anywhere. But ‘well’ is such a subjective term. I look at the GCSE stats and I also see the huge difference between those achieved by the super selectives and the best comps. I’ve always thought it meant that even the top set kids won’t fare as well at the comp than if they’d attended the grammar. But I’m hearing increasingly that they do as well and often better….

Would still love to ‘prove’ it to myself, but grateful for your post reminding me of this. Can’t believe you turned down a hard-fought grammar school place though. I salute you!

I am located in completely comp area (ie no grammars near or far) so cannot comment on the 11+ prep aspect or indeed tutoring generally. Setting is typically only done in Maths and English (and sometimes Science) and, certainly for my DCs' school, was based on school testing (ie not SATS) and setting was very dynamic thereafter.

I say all the above because, I would be wary of seeing 11+ prep as a (plan B) way of 'securing a top set spot' in a comp (as some posters imply). My DC were initially placed, correctly, in mid-sets for Maths and English but over time moved up (or up, down and up again in one case). The driving force behind their success was developing the motivation to work, becoming more self-organised and exercising personal agency (eg personally finding a topic difficult, recognising and addressing that on their own).

So, OP, my advice is that if your DC is keen to take the 11+, then make sure the approach to tutoring helps builds the skills I have outlined rather than focusing on a test, and specific tutoring for it, as a means of jumping onto some kind of gilded conveyor belt that pre-ordains success (whether grammar or comp top sets) because I can see the latter breeds very unhealthy attitudes whereas the former builds skills that carry through to A levels and beyond.

Talk to a therapist. Be honest and get to the bottom of what it is that is driving you to have invested so heavily in the idea of getting your daughter to a super-selective. Discuss the possible impact of failure on your daughter's psyche. Once you have really explored and owned what this is about for you, and got an independent perspective on the possible costs as well as benefits for your daughter, you'll be better placed to make a decision?