Woohoo, it's over!! Sort of

[Tinkus-Pinkus]

yes it was 90 minutes, but they had to sit for 2 hours and do practice questions for each section. They got a 20 minute break.

[future]

As far as I am aware, most of the GS exam times are circa 90 mins. ie. SW Herts consortium, HBS, QE etc. The Consortium exams last week consisited of Maths 50 questions in 50 mins and 100 VR questions in 45 mins plus practice time.

[mystery]

Ok, so 100 vr questions in 45 minutes is a similar ratio to 203 questions in 90 mins in bucks. But bucks was a mix of vr, nvr, maths, comprehension. Unless they are very shallow recall questions or fairly quick fire mental arithmetic this is a short time per question to do the reading, figure out the answer, fill in the correct dash on the answer sheet and for some of the maths write down some figures too.

[Tinkus-Pinkus]

And you have to take into account the English comprehension, cloze passages etc.I won't say any more about that because some people haven't taken the test.

[salsa]

Hi
Did they have extra time for reading the passage for the reading comprehension? It wouldn't be fair otherwise as some people are fast readers and others are not! I don't think this would be so much due to how much children have read as they just may process text differently, some really getting an image of what is happening and others just skipping the "boring bits" as I've heard some children refer to the descriptive part! Some boys just want action!

[Tinkus-Pinkus]

No, there is no extra time for reading.

[poohbear]

my poor child has been waking up with nightmares since the test. He had difficulty wit the maths and with finishing. he was so worried that he did not have time to answer all the questions. However this seems to have been the case with lot of them so presumably at moderation it just means you have to compare favourably with your age appropriate peers and its about who got the most right - rather than you having to answer a certain amount to pass? have I put that sensibly?

[mystery]

Look at thread about timing on the General forum. There is a difference in the timing per question for the different disciplines covered in c e m papers. It looks as though bucks was in line with warks ..... Bucks is not superselective, but needs to be able to discriminate between higher score for ooc.

[Guest55]

There is ONE qualification score in Bucks regadless of where you live.

[Sally-Anne]

Bucks is not superselective, but needs to be able to discriminate between higher score for ooc.

I am sorry, but this is just not true, mystery. There is a single standardised qualifying score of 121, regardless of where a child lives. Aylesbury or Timbuktu, the same score applies.

You risk becoming alarmist on this point.