11 Plus Exams Forum

if so i thought we could support each other

I have a daughter in yr 5. I never gone down this route before so its all pretty knew to me but i am learning.
We would love her to get into the wirral grammar but even if she passess the 11+ i have doubts she will get in due to distance as we live 9 miles away and what i can gather alot more kids are sitting this year due to the kids sitting it in september and getting the results before we apply for schools.
I think our back up school will be upton hall - this is further away (14 miles) but we are catholic so hopefully if she passess she will get in

Hi Bati
My son is sitting the exam in September. I've already taken my eldest son through this process-he's in Yr 10 now at Calday Grange-we live 7 miles away. It's worth having a bash as all grammar school intake is based on passing the exams, distance and other factors come after this so if there is a low pass rate for the year then you would have a chance. I don't know whether the girls schools were over or under subscribed last year-does anyone else know? Upton Hall is a very excellent school too. Wirral also has some very good girls state schools in Prenton High and Birkenhead High. You'll find all the info you need on this site.
Good Luck
Denise J

Hi
good luck to your son [smile]
From what i can gather the girls tends to be harder to get in, dont know why. Also alot more kids are sitting it this year because of them sitting it in sept. I am worrying over this as i have it into my head that more sitting equals more passing and we live out of catchment
what practice papers do you recommend for my daughter to practice with we only started a couple of weeks ago looking at 11+ stuff (hope we have not left it to late) Do you do much with your son

Hi
Don't worry too much about the change of date-It's the same year group taking the exam so the same amount of kids. In your favour the rolls are falling generally for secondary schools on the Wirral and many are laying on buses from south Wirral, Chester and North Wales in an attempt to attact pupils from those catchment area. The girls schools are perceived to harder to get into because there are slightly less places -West Kirby/Wirral girls 338 against Calday/Wirral boys 355. However there are more boys than girls in the Wirral population so this evens out.
See the table for 2010 at

http://www.wirral.gov.uk/my-services/ch ... ber-pupils

What is for sure is that more girls live in the Wirral South Area(catchment Wirral G) than in the Wirral West so Wirral G for girls has always been harder to get into if you are ouitisde the ctachment
e.g 2010 table
Age 7 in Jan 2010 Wirral South 346 in primary schools girls, Wirral West 229 in primary schools
Age 8 in Jan 2010 Wirral South 320 in primary schools, Wirral West 249 in primary schools
This would suggest that statistically for you it's better to go fo West Kirby. This was certainly true in my eldest son's year when one of his class mates was denied a place to Wirral GG although she's passed because she lived in Little Sutton but West Kirby were still taking girls who had changed thier mind about which school to go to. Tghis of course doesn't mean this will happen for the next inatke-as I've already said the population is continuing to fall and the amount of girls in primary schools has fallen by at least 200 since my eldest son took the test in 2007 but you need to make sure you give your DD the best chance of a place by choosing wisely on the preference form

Another plus side is of the Catholic grammars, Upton takes more girls than St Anslems takes boys although it my understanding they offer places to most children who pass and have it as a first preference due to falling population and rschool rolls.

Regrading preparation
You still have time to prepare but you need to start now . The Wirral exams for Wirral Girls and West Kirby girls consists of 2 verbal reasoning papers compiled by GL assessment. There are 21 types of questions and only 21 types of questions, and your DD will need to know the best way to answer these types of questions.Frankly, some questions are harder than others and the the key things your DD will need to have along with the knowledge of the method and technique is good maths skills and a good vocabularly because some of the words they are expected to know are rarely used in converstion between young people! The good news is that girls are better than boys at the wordy question types.
My personal choice is to use the IPS materials to start with
Buy the IPS method and technique book which shows you how to do each question type, the starter papers pack and the practice papers with the A on the front. Go though the starter papers together and go through each question type in the technique book and show her how to do it using the explanatons in the technique book. After a week or so her loose on her own on the other parctice papers. If you need more then the Tutors materials are also very good and designed with the wirral test in mind. In the summer you'll need to do harder papers so the GL Assement and Bright Saprks ones are more like the real tests. Timing is also crucial but it's more important to embed the method first. Make sure you are using the multiple chocie answer sheets with the materails as the answers on some questuion types can be used can help your DD to answer the questio-you'll spot which ones as you are going through the types. If you get stuck the answer to the problem will normally be somewhere on the forum. Keep reading this and the 11+forum anyway as you'll pick up great tips.
The tests for Upton is completely different and are a combination of verbal reasoning, maths and english so in that sense is more general
Hope this helps

Thanks for all your advise
I think i will be putting wirral grammar down as 1st choice just because there is a school bus she would be able to get where upton there isnt. Plus wirral grammar is nearer. West kirby is the furthest away so dont think we will put that down
Do the schools find out what preference you have put their school down (in cheshire they dont) just worried that if we dont put upton down as 1st choice and we dont get the wirral grammar then we wont get upton either as its not our 1st choice
I gave my daughter the 11+ paper the lea sent last night to do - she only scored 85% and was 10 minutes to slow. if we manage to quicken her up would 85% likely to get her in
It highlighted 2 areas she is struggling with both are wordy ones she got all mathmatical ones right (she should of been a boy lol) so i now know where she needs the help
Do you know if they are provided with a piece of paper so they can work things out on, if not can they write their workings out on the the question paper. I didnt give her any paper to use and she didnt wright on the question paper last night and i imagine being able to do this will quicken her up
Once again thankyou i really appreciate the help

85% should do the trick. Don't worry she'll speed up. Try 10 minute tests you can buy a book of them. Yes they are given a piece of scrap paper for working out. Good luck!

she has done another one that i got from this website. i gave her paper to do her working out on and she could see the time as well this time - she got 92% with 5 minutes spare
the one she did was a tuitions one dont know if theirs is classed as easy/hard etc but it gave her the boost she needed

Re the question as to whether the schools know where you ranked them on your form, the answer is no. Only your home LA knows your full list of preferences. The school (via the LA in which they are situated if not your home LA) is only told that you want a place; they then look at your application in the light of their admission criteria, and advise the LA as to whether or not they can offer your child a place.

On national offer day in March your home LA will allocate your child a place at the school that you ranked the highest for which s/he fits the criteria. So, if you would really prefer a place at a particular school, put it top of your list, even if your chance of getting it e.g. in terms of distance, is not great. It makes sense to have somewhere on your list a non-selective school that you should get a place at if all else fails, but please ignore the myth, unfortunately still doing the rounds, that you won't get a place at any particular school simply because of where you ranked it on your list

Thanks for all the advise
I have just been to Upton Hall to drop off her application form. Not seen much of it but what i Have seen looked amazing
We are going friday next week to have a proper look around. I think i actually prefer this school from what i have read on their website and what i have seen this morning but its further away than the wirral grammar and there is no school bus, so now not sure which i will put as 1st choice if she passess both the exams

Hi
Although transport is important it becomes less so once after the first couple of terms and you will work something out.
If you live on the east side of the wirral and you can get to Birkenehead the 437 Arriva bus goes from the bus station right to Upton Village-a lot of the Upton girls get this bus.
Many Upton girls get my sons's school bus from Upton station 621 which then carries on to Calday and West Kirby and the bus stop is right by the station so if you are in west/south wirral that may be an option for you.
Denise