11 Plus Exams Forum

Hello every1, my dd is currently in year 3 and hopefully going to prepare for the bham based cem exam. Her primary school has introduced the accelerated reading scheme this year and I was hoping someone may be able to indicate at what levels we should be aiming at to be on par for the exam.

thanks in advance

Hi,
I have no idea what the accelerated reading scheme is, but having been through B'ham CEM twice would advise her to read as much as possible of what she enjoys. There is nothing worse for a child than ploughing through a book they are not enjoying. Just experiment with different genres and authors.
Mine really enjoyed Michael Morpurgo,David Walliams,Sarah Lean etc.
Have fun.

Just remembered in year 3 DD1 read all of the series of unfortunate events books - she loved them and they are great for improving vocab!

Thanks for response, not heard of that series, I will look it up and give it a try. Overall I will aim for dd to read as much as she can building on vocabulary and spelling throughout.

booellesmum wrote:Just remembered in year 3 DD1 read all of the series of unfortunate events books - she loved them and they are great for improving vocab!

I agree - 'A Series of Unfortunate Events' by Lemony Snicket is great. There are 13 books in total and they are somewhat addictive!

http://www.renlearn.co.uk/accelerated-reader/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Is this what you mean? It's a reading scheme that allows tracking of progress.

Books my children liked in year 3 (both loathed Michael Morpurgo intensely! and actually neither liked Lemony Snickett either... though I think most children do)

The Grk series by Josh Lacey.
Anything by Enid Blyton but particularly the Mountain of Adventure series and the Trapped! series (they were EB obsessed at that age)
Starting the Harry Potter books
Some of Jeremy Strong's books for slightly older children

Guest55 wrote:http://www.renlearn.co.uk/accelerated-reader/

Is this what you mean? It's a reading scheme that allows tracking of progress.

At the worst secondary school 'marketing' talk I sat through, a principal and three of her 'gifted and talented' pupils spoke at length about AR, the millionaire system and dashboards. I listened carefully, but there wasn't a single comment on the lines of 'I love reading because...' or 'My favourite author/book is... .. because...'' Nor a word from any student who ever found anything hard, because that comp presumably didn't think aspiring parents would want to hear about such kids. It was soul-destroying stuff, ignoring the joys of reading in favour of quant nonsense. I couldn't leave the room fast enough and was happy to observe later that not a single child from our primary school went to that particular comp.

Library tickets are free/cheap. Librarians are helpful. Audio books are great, especially unabridged ones or BBC full cast dramatisations. Incentives aren't bad, but they are a means to an end, not the goal.

@guest Yes thats the scheme that we are currently working with in school this year. Being its such a new scheme its difficult to determine if dd is on the right level to be aiming at the cem exam as we dont have year on year comparisons.

You are looking for assessments such as 'Year 3 above expected' or similar. Have the school explained their new assessment system?