Top tips to surviving the ordeal that is the 11+ exam

Whilst many of us are doing nothing more than enjoying the school summer holidays, I know from personal experience that there will be a raft of parents currently spending their summer working with their year 5 children in readiness to sit the 11+ grammar school exam in September.

Let’s get this out the way right off the bat. I think the 11+ is barbaric. I think it puts a huge pressure on our children and makes no allowances for a child who may be exceptional in some areas and average in others. I have four children and my oldest is off to grammar school in September. He sat the 11+ and there was never any doubt from around year 4 onwards that we would put him through it. But that does not mean we will take the same approach with all four. I don’t know the answer, and as Dalton’s mum, I would not change my decision to have put him through it, but it’s not fun and even the most academic of children can come unstuck.

For me it's all about right school for the right child. Be it private, grammar or a comprehensive, the school and the child need to fit together. Some kids will be happy wherever you send them but for others, their specific high school choice is critical to their school happiness. We felt strongly that Dalton would not be happy at the catchment high school. That’s not to say it wouldn’t be right for my other children, and in actual fact, I have heard some fantastic reports about it from other parents, but for Dalton it was never an option. He simply would not have been happy or flourished there. So for us it was only ever about grammar or private as a fall back. And as we felt that he had what he needed academically so it was an obvious choice. But consider carefully where your child will be happy and don’t be swayed by the views of others.

Once the decision is made and you have a goal in mind, its important to take a moment to consider what areas your child needs support in before diving in. Consider what your child’s primary school does or doesn’t support as well. Some schools work with their pupils towards 11+ and/ or cover some areas of the syllabus, others may offer an after-school club and some will not touch it at all. You need to consider what support your child is getting, what their strengths are and consider any gaps. Then you can focus where you need to.

We had a tutor for Dalton and I believe he was invaluable in supporting Dalton, not only in terms of filling in any academic gaps but also in terms of giving him the confidence and self-belief that he could do it. But you have to be honest with yourself and if you are tutoring your child to the extreme point of getting them through the exam, ask yourself if they will be able to cope if they hit the magic number and actually get into the grammar school. Remind yourself it is about the right school for your child. If they NEED tutoring to get them a place, grammar school may not be right for them. If they need tutoring to bulk up weaker areas and give them focused support, then a tutor will be a great investment. However, I personally know children who got grammar school places without any formal tutoring so it is not a necessity to success. It should be a support structure but not the foundations.

I also recommend you take the learning curve with them. I personally could never get my head around the non verbal reasoning element but I tried so that I could not only support but also empathise with Dalton when he got frustrated on occasion.

Exam Tips

These are the top tips we instilled in Dalton and I consider them key to success.

  1. Answer the question! I almost want to type that in capitals it was such a mantra for us. Have you answered the question they asked? There is often two steps to a question. Have you taken into account the second step or stopped at the first bit? Have you read it carefully and answered what they are asking you?

  2. Mark an answer for every question on the answer sheet when you get to it EVEN IF you don’t know the answer and want to skip a question. i.e If you don’t know the answer to question 5, mark an answer anyway in box 5. I know of two children who missed a question and then answered the rest of the questions in the wrong box because they forgot to leave a gap. Plus, you might get lucky and get it right even though you have guessed.
  3. Speed is everything and nothing. You need to be quick but there is no point getting it all wrong because you are in such a hurry.Have a back up plan. Even the most academic, confident students can have an off day and one of the things that I dislike the most about the 11+ is that it makes no allowance for this. Dalton sat the entrance exam for a private school we really liked too so that he didn’t feel the pressure of it all being about one exam, one day.
  4. Celebrate their success in simply sitting the exam afterwards. Dalton and I went out for a steak lunch. We toasted his efforts and I reminded him how proud I was of him for giving it his best effort.

For those of you going through it this summer, I totally get your pain, but hang on in there. If you’ve committed to it, you owe it yourself and your child to make the very best effort in this final finishing stretch. And then burn the books and celebrate the brilliance of your child regardless of the outcome.

Sally Hall is proud mum to four, founder of Dorothy & Theodore and author of One out of Nine - her soon to be published debut novel. She's also a lawyer in her free time! She is passionate about making memories and keeping them beautifully safe.

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