Independent schools 11+

[jdr1234]

Evening all
we are just about to embark on the exams and I am having a panic re atom scores and what the magic numbers should be. DS is sitting for Habs, City of London and a couple of others.
He just did his Cat 4 and GL tests at school and got 126-130 across the board however his atom scores are not consistent and seem to be anywhere between 105-125. With the odd one being above this. He is doing the quest atom mocks. Atom says 120 for super selective schools so am now worried we aren’t being realistic…anyone who has sat for these schools and could share experience would be really helpful. Tia

I could have written this. Same scores for CATS and atom can go from 101-125 for us.
When I read her corrections I feel disappointed that she’s been lazy and getting the simple questions wrong

I asked my prep about the gap between what DC1 got in exam prep and scores on Atom learning. Very wise experienced teacher pointed out Atom is a business and it does no harm to make parents paranoid about this so they keep using it. She was right DC1 had 5 offers and is at one of the London super selectives.

@jdr1234 @FridayFriesDay Just adding in that we're in the same boat. I have read that scores on atom seem to get very variable at this time of year? Not really sure why? Maybe there's a lot more kids using the exam uplift part of the platform?

@Cageauxfolles I hadn't even considered that Atom may manipulate the data (also thanks for sharing, good to hear these anecdotes when you're swimming in the sea of the unknown)
We used to do a one of the Quest 10 minute tests a day as DC enjoyed the positive feedback of getting a good score, but I've pulled back a lot as it was upsetting him so much when he got a poor score. We'd all love to be in a place where we are consistently get high SAS scores, but I think I'm just falling back on the idea that we can't know whether they'll get in, we're just trying our best, and barring doing a reasonable amount of prep, then there's a little bit of luck. I think what helped my stress levels is choosing a back up option of a less selective school.
We're going for CLS, Highgate and UCS

DD exactly the same. High CATs and decent scores in written tests but Atom and Quest and ISEB mocks are all over the place.

I personally don’t think the adaptive format works for such a short test. There is a big penalty for getting early questions wrong as the child then only gets fed easy questions and can’t score highly, there isn’t time to work back up to harder questions. I also don’t like that it is impossible to skip a question and come back to it later as that leads to guessing - sometimes a child may be lucky with their guess and sometimes not. Or a child who doesn’t want to guess may use far too much time on that one question. Anyway lots of issues with it IMO.

We have a mix of exam formats among the schools we’ve applied to - written papers and adaptive online testing. So let’s see.

Sounds like lots finding atom a bit of a mine field and I agree with above that if you get question 3 or 4 wrong then your basically your score is screwed, I guess this does resemble what would happen on the actual day though.
Ds did a quest maths yesterday and got 101 and was upset so did another and got 130 which is the most he’s ever got, no consistency whatsoever!
@Cageauxfolles do you remember if your DD were in the same range and by the exams were they still all over the place?

Take atom with a big pinch of salt. CAT of 130+ for my DD at start of y6 and GL Maths 134 end of year 5 and a few weeks before the exam scored SAS of 96 on a mock test for what we thought was incredibly safe school on Atom. Then proceeded to be either 130+ or less than 100 on a number of other tests that we did which made for a very stressful few weeks… in the end she got offers for all the schools we applied for (including an academic scholarship).

Just use Atom as a tool to get the timing right and consolidate knowledge that maybe weaker at this point, and to focus on getting the initial questions correct so it can unlock the harder ones for the adaptive tests.

good luck!

@jdr1234 I don’t quite follow the question about ranges? Do you mean whether there was a correlation between CAT scores and Atom scores? I honestly can’t remember details I’m afraid as we are a few years past that. But I do remember 11+ from now to December being horrible and stressful for me more so than DC!

@NookAndCrannying I’m not sure if it’s manipulating the data as such but it’s not an uncommon experience for things to be awry with Atom scores at this stage.I just wanted to reassure people going through it now as I considered withdrawing DC1 from some exams which would have been wrong. Atom is a helpful way to practice but not the be all and end all and I think we ramped it right down just before the exams. Our prep was very good, quite relaxed and a much better data point to be honest (which I know won’t be the same for everybody - sorry).

Btw the marketing from Atom 11+ exam season underlined the point about it being a business and plays to parents worst fears. It suggested it was a “mistake” to stop online tests and you should keep on for the rest of year 6 to get ahead in secondary. Total nonsense! My children would have mutinied and there are far better things for 10 year olds to be doing!

Good luck to all of you and your kids. In the end every child I know had good offers to choose from, has ended up at the right school for them and is happy and doing well a few years down the line.

@Minnowmeow this is so interesting- he did two tests yesterday - verbal- one he got 96 and the other he got 132. Makes literally zero sense! Going to try and not get too worked up in the scores! Thank you for sharing

Ditto. thanks for sharing guys, so reassuring to hear others experience.

Don’t worry about atom scores at this stage. I would focus on the practice for the actual exams for the schools you are applying to

Same issue here - no CAT scores as DD is state, but her Atom ones are way below her sister's at the same stage and I don't think she is that much worse.

I'm finding the ISEB mocks really odd on Atom as well - especially VR. They only seem to test 2 or 3 types of question, and not have a wide range. So if it is something that DD isn't that great at, she does awfully. Surely the actual ISEB will be a range of question types?

Agree the ISEB mocks are hugely unpredictable - massive swings in DD’s marks on these, even more than Atom. I really hope the actual ISEB is better.

When is everyone’s first exam? Ours is next week. 🤨

That’s quite early. Ours first in the end of November.

yes feels early, another the following week then annoyingly 2 in January!

Ah that’s an annoying long stretch.
we had similar with a grammar and semi selective over sept and Oct and then indies staring end of Nov, through to beginning of Jan. really wishing we didn’t have one past Christmas…
feels like such a ridiculous slog..

We have 2 next week and 1 in January 😬. It’s a marathon not a sprint….