11 Plus Exams Forum

Just wondering how everyones DDs found this exam today. My DD ran out of time in the Maths paper and didn't get to go back to some of the questions she meant to return to at the end. She also didn't get to answer the final question which she knew how to solve but had to just leave it with a big, fat blank. She thinks she missed about 5 qs but did do the ones at the end (test content removed by Moderator - just in case!). She cried and I felt really bad for her as she knew how to solve them but just didn't time herself properly. Luckily the English was first and she thought it was fairly straightforward and finished it in time. One of her favoured schools is in this Group and she is feeling a bit nervous about her performance now. Also, does anyone know if they standardize for age in the girls consortium exams? DD is on the young side. Hope everyone elses DDs went well today.

Poor girl, so stressful, I'm sure it was better than she thought. As far as I know the marks are not actually standardised but I do remember the head at CLSG saying they would call for interview any summer born girl who answered certain questions well, even if overall they were not in top tier. Perhaps other schools do this too. My DS is a July baby and I am hoping they will have that in mind when they consider his application in general. Good luck.

It sounds like she did most of the maths well but in future she should always go for the high mark questions first. Did you do many mocks to make sure she was clear on timing? English is so much more important than Maths as it underpins every other subject. So as long as she did a thorough job with that paper she should be ok. She probably felt she could have done better but what she did was probably really good. Fingers crossed and not long to wait. The interviews for last weeks consortium paper started coming through six days later! DG

Thanks so much for the kind and helpful replies - we do feel much better now. @Fairyelephant thanks for the CLSG tip we have applied there and that exam was last Fri. Ironically DD was really confident when she came out of that exam and finished both papers in time. I hope your DS gets into the school of his choice! They are still our babies aren't they.

@DG thanks for your advice re: English carrying more weight than maths as that was some consolation to us. DD did lots of practice exams in the lead up to the real ones and her timing and accuracy were very high as she got it spot on for Group 2 exam last week. In hindsight we should have advised to do last q's first on maths paper! We just have to play the waiting game now - I probably need to rent an exciting box set now to take my mind off what will soon come to pass via emails or (hopefully) fat envelopes

Ahh, poor her, it can be really stressful if they think it didn't go as well as expected.

Glad you're feeling better. It's always tempting to grill them and try and analyse the results! If it's any consolation, my own dd has in the past been a poor judge of how well or badly an exam went. She did very well at a state school after coming out saying it was really hard and she left a lot of answer space.

Where else have you applied to vlbee?

Hi Middlesexmum, thanks for your kind reply. We applied to 3 schools in the NL consortium; CLSG, SHHS and FH Regents Park and one outside of the consortium St Margaret's in Hampstead. I just had a wonderful email from CLSG saying that she did well in/passed the exam and is being invited for an academic interview next week! Phew! However, I think she will be a bit crushed if she doesn't also get through the Group 1 exams for SHHS and FH. I did think the the School Head and Head of Yr 7 were very good though and I liked their attitude and what they had to say. She is also trying for the drama scholarship there which we haven't really prepared for as we have been caught up in doing the actual exams. If anyone has any tips of what to do for drama scholarships please feel free to pass it on to me We have got some nice age appropriate monologues at least!

Just told DD she got through to interview for City and there were more tears (of joy)!

Lovely news. Talk about an emotional roller coaster!

Don't know anything about drama scholarships but I'm sure someone else will be along who knows more.

Good luck for the interviews to everyone.

Group 2 schools vary in their pass mark starting with NLCS, CLSG and then Godolphin etc

What is the pecking order for Group 1?

NHEHS interviews everyone so you really don't know whether you made the mark until you get the results. But if you get SHHS/St Helens does that mean you can say you passed the NHEHs pass mark

Not too sure about Group 1 order. I think SHHS would have quite a high pass mark - they interview all girls that pass their exam mark before making a final offer. Good luck!