11 Plus Exams Forum

hello all - I'm looking for guidance on the best books to work from for the SW Herts tests this September, which I think are slightly different to many other 11+ tests, ie standard not multiple choice. Perhaps those of you who've just been successful could pass on some tips?!
many thanks, and sorry if this is posted in the wrong place or already answered, I just couldn't seem to track down anything specific re. best materials to prep for the SW Herts schools. Thanks!

Athey, Walsh and Bright Sparks VR, GL and Alpha Maths, lucky old you not having to do NVR and English! There are others but get started with those. CSSE Maths when you need more challenging material. DG

Does Bright Sparks have VR papers in standard format? When I checked they only seemed to do MCQ.

See link on Amazon for SD Bright Sparks standard type VR papers. Think you can also buy them on here.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=nb_sb_nos ... &x=16&y=14" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Thank you so much, doing a trolley dash round Amazon right now! What do you think of the Bond series, are they the right kind of thing too? And if so, are the 10 minute ones good, or do you need to work on building up concentration over a longer period of time? thanks!

We used Bond as the basis of our SW consortium prep. We mixed up the full Bond books and the 10 min tests. Nearer the test we used full practice papers from Bond and some of the others listed above.

bel wrote:See link on Amazon for SD Bright Sparks standard type VR papers. Think you can also buy them on here.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=nb_sb_nos ... &x=16&y=14" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Thank you bel. I didn't realise that the Bright Sparks series was by SD .

Daisyduke, we're in the same position as you. 2013 entry. I bought some Bond books too, I don't know how useful they are but can't hurt. From advice from this forum my DD has started working on the papers DAO has posted. Just started with Athey but I think they are the easiest, 95%+ so far! Good luck.

It sounds as if we are all doing the Herts Consortium exams for 2013 entry. Maybe we can help each other along the way

Definitely bel and Longjourney - nice to meet you! Can't decide how I feel about being the guinea pigs for the new system, and what it will be like to get a score and have to work out what to do with it! And the summer hol won't be as relaxing with the tests looming in Sept! but at least Oct half term will be a decent break instead of worrying about Nov tests! pros and cons I suppose.

I found the Bond How To Do 11+ Maths invaluable for setting out all the topics and little tests to see how much/little you know. Not got all the materials in there to teach the topics - you'll need somthing like the AE Tuition books or Peter Robson books (both sold on this site I think) for that but it's an excellent starting point and to check you don't miss something - good if like me you haven't done maths since O Level! Past papers were Letts, Bond and we also used DAO's because we had them though they were a bit flaky.

For VR we mixed up Bond books (different lengths) and Letts plus Athey is probably the closest to the proper test for VR, as you can't get past papers as such. We used Susan Daughtey's books on VR types to explain how to do some of the code-type questions, and videos we found online (from previous experience I may not say where).

We didn't try the Bright Sparks papers but everyone on here says how good they are.