11 Plus Exams Forum

Just joined the forum as my son is about to start year 5 and we are keen to have him pass the eleven plus.

We are in catchment area for KEGS and CRGS is also an option.

Son is at a high level in school and in the top few pupils in his year. Nonetheless we have arranged for a tutor who begins in September but in the meantime we have been trying some 10 minute tests with him (in maths for now as this is his favourite subject).
My question is any advice on understanding question format? We have found that if we leave him to do the test himself he gets only a few right and the rest he will say he doesn't understand yet when we go through them with him and explain what is asked, he knows the answer.

Thoughts please

Hi there, I have a DS at CRGS and another sitting the 11+ next month.

What age books are you using on your DS ? You need to pick the 9-10 year books when you start. These will be apporpriate and will get your child used to the idea of doing ten minute bite sized exercises. I would also not expect him to do the work to time, just build his confidence and familiarity to start with.

Do bear in mind that your DS will not have covered all of KS2 yet so another useful tool might be to buy the relevant work books to cover what is expected of him.

He has a lot of time so just build confidence and familiarity now.

Great advice thank you.

We have the cgl 10 minute tests for 10-11 year olds so need to take a step back me thinks

Yes that's good advice. Start with the 9-10 books until he's understanding the types of things they ask and the question styles and once he's getting most of them right throw in the odd 10-11 one going over any he didn't understand. You'll be amazed how quickly it all comes together and he'll be doing the harder ones without any troubles in a few months.

Just wanted to say hi!

My DD has just gone into year 5 so we're just starting out too

We've been concentrating on vocab building and just speeding up her times tables, I've ordered some books from s+s so will be starting those when they arrive too.

DD3 just started year 5 here too, absolutely dreading this 3rd time around. I hardly know where to start, I have collected so many books over the years, but very unsure about how to approach it with the new exam.

Planning to DIY this time. We tried to start a bit over the holidays but it was not very successful. She didn't want to work, rushed it, left out lots of questions and pretended to have finished...

So far I've tried to focus on English. I am trying exercises from a couple of Bond books aimed at 11+ common entrance and SATs - one is called "up to speed practice" and one is "spelling and vocabulary". I've started with 9-10 yrs.
Does anyone have any views on suitability of these? there is a 10-11 set and a 10-11 stretch set too.

I keep nagging about reading....

I've printed off Patricia's word lists - as used for VR prep in the past, just for vocab, antonmyns/synonyms etc. Is this still worth doing?

Not done any VR or NVR yet, I am not sure how much to do, even if there are not many marks for this, I imagine you would need to be at the same standard as in the past even if speed no longer so important, which still means quite a lot of regular practice.

I wasn't planning to do CEM as only aiming for ColChs, but now we have access to practice materials for this test, is there any value in using these too?

I have tried coaxing my son into a few exercises over the summer hols too but he us just not interested.

I see this as a long upward slope

I am just starting to DIY with DS2 (who has also just started in Yr 5). Even though they are not doing SATs anymore, I am still getting him to work through the old SAT Buster books at the moment - his old tutor used to use these (alongside other resources) with him too. Some of the stuff is quite basic, but they do provide quite good general coverage of the KS2 curriculum. I will aim to move on to the actual 11 plus resources in a couple of months time. We will be doing VR practise as well, as he will also be sitting the King John test - which is still 100% VR. Thinking we might try some CEM practise a bit later on - as well as standard (might help with general problem solving, and shake things up a bit when he gets bored/complacent etc.) That's the plan anyway - but 'best laid plans', and all that . . .