11 Plus Exams Forum

Which are the hardest Maths papers for 11 plus?

With just four weeks to go until the first exam on September 1st I need some harder papers.

Anyone got any suggestions?

Thanks DG

I don't know about hardest, but I thought the Merchant Taylors specimen papers (http://www.mtsn.org.uk/admissions/speci ... ce-papers/) looked pretty hard. Consider this from their 11+ Official Practice Paper (http://www.mtsn.org.uk/fileadmin/conten ... ePaper.pdf):

19. Given that a = 2, b = -3 and c = 4, find the value of the following expressions:
(a) 5a + 2c
(b) ½a² - b
(c) 3ac
___2b³

Each is just worth just 1 mark. In (b) you're subtracting a negative number (hence adding a positive number) - how many 10-year olds have been taught that? In (c) you're cubing a negative number (so it's sign flips to positive as you square it and then back to negative as you cube it). For a 10-year old? Too much.

(I hope the above had rendered correctly - I had to be a little creative to get the denominator on (c) to indent correctly.)

I think you need to distinguish between tthe CEMs are indie papers. I presume you mean the former. As you know they are totally different proportions on the whole. If I looks at the materials from CGP, fttp, etc, CEMs are not 'hard' . They are just quicker and require a little more rapid agility and to be able to keep cool under time pressure.

Indies are generally not as time pressured but require more lateral thinking. I wouldn't recommend the MT papers as prep for CEMs.

I am however interested in hearing from others on CEM prep. Are there good materials out there beyond CGP, fttp, letts etc?

DD did the HBS test and for CEM Maths prep we used GL Assessment 11+ and Bond 11+ test papers (old GL style) multiple choice assessment papers, CGP CEM papers (packs 1, 2, and 3), Bond CEM papers (pack 1 and pack 2) and FTTP multi-part and quick fire papers.

The GL style papers (from Bond and GL Assessment) were quite good at testing knowledge and problem solving skills which I think were useful for CEM.

The CGP CEM papers were well balanced but we felt that the Bond CEM papers were a bit hit and miss, some quite manageable and some ridiculously hard. The FPTP CEM papers were grunt work, extending DD's knowledge by covering unfamiliar topics such as bearings and rule for interior angles, exterior angles, faces, edges, vertices etc but they were easy and quite repetitive.

We also used DAO, Latymer, NLCS, girls consortium, St Pauls Girls, Habs Boys, Manchester Grammar and Withington Girls papers for CEM and for the HBS second stage.

We felt that the DAO was very easy. Latymer and girls consortium paper were, on the whole, quite easy. The St Paul's Girls and Habs Boys papers were good. We bought the Withington Girls papers after someone mentioned them on the forum and we found the first paper that DD did to be tough but the others were OK. In the end, I think the Manchester Grammar papers are the gold standard as some of the questions get a 10 year old child to really think and be innovative rather than go through well rehearsed steps.

In going through some of the maths papers it was also clear that there was quite a lot of variation in the clarity of questions. Some papers had quite a lot of ambiguity in the questions whereas the Manchester Grammar papers seemed to have been written by people who have a decent background in maths so can spot and avoid the alternative interpretations.

nyr

Primary and Junior UKMT challenges are a good source of lateral thinking maths questions for the 11+,past papers can be bought in booklet form.

The recent Primary Maths challenge and Junior UKMT papers are freely avalable online.

Are you looking for multiple choice or standard questions?

If the latter, then Manchester grammar is worth a go. Also the pre-2015 Oundle papers (junior entrance).

Thank you.

I am looking for standard format Maths papers for DAO, Mill Hill and HBS. DG

I'd also have a look at Bancrofts sample paper as well. http://www.bancrofts.org/wp-content/upl ... 2013v2.pdf. It has a separate section on its scholarship questions.

Try 13+ papers?

Oundle school has a few scholarship questions on its website.