11 Plus Exams Forum

The forum is very quiet compared to this time three years ago when my DC1 was sitting the test! Please reassure me that I am not the only parent feeling stressed and anxious on the inside, but desperately trying to keep things calm, play it cool and hide my fears from my DC sitting next weekend! Or is everyone else feeling confident and totally prepared?!

It is quiet but I believe there are plenty of lurkers....
Lurkers - this forum is a great place to let off a bit of steam just before Super Saturday & we're all a friendly bunch (well most of us are)

We are just spending the last fortnight working specific weakness, which we see in error trends in ds's work. We're focussing on key problem areas in Maths and NVR.

I was here 3 years ago too and it did seem busier.

On a post I did the other day, there are 2200 registered in Warwickshire for test this year, compared to 1800 3 years ago!

We aren't as nervous as we we were two years ago when ds1 sat the exam. We are anxious, yes, but this is tempered by the fact that the local comp has improved significantly in the last two years. It is a suitable fall back.

Thinking of you, I admit to lurking, because I am in Warwickshire too. Dd2 took the exam three years ago - and ds2 will take it next year. We haven't started anything and doubt he has a chance, I bet you all started ages ago. Back to Bond books to start I think as he can't sit still!

I don't have much advice. I do think it helped dd2 because she had no pressure, we are lucky to have a good comp near us, although she wanted to go to the gs. So she didn't seem nervous, although I imagine most dc are very nervous.

Nervousmom, I'm shocked there are 2200 registered! I wonder how many there will be next year.

suzysu, I bet nobody is feeling confident and totally prepared.

Good luck to you all. I will carry on lurking in Warwickshire (I'm East Warks, and seem to remember most discussions were about South, but I'll still be around). Good luck.

Ginx I remember you from our journey 3 years ago!

I was surprised how many were registered this year. It was a difficult one to call, but I thought the combined exam may have had an impact i.e some People, like us, were registered through Birmingham and Warwickshire 3 years ago.

This year we are registered through Warwickshire, but looking at Bham school as first choice. Bham has 5300 registered!

ginx wrote: suzysu, I bet nobody is feeling confident and totally prepared.

ginx, you're not wrong there (hello btw from another 3 year agoer). You always feel you can do more: even when DS1 was certain to get a place I was still worried we hadn't covered all those bases and certain areas could still let him down. DS2 isn't as clear cut so I'm even more worried. It's a part of the job description that reaches a new peak at times like this.

1800 or 2200 (or 5300!), it's still an awful lot of children whichever way you look at it - but then again someone's got to get those places so why can't it be our DCs

I was trawling through the posts & saw that it's roughly a 1:7 chance of gaining a GS place in Brum now;
blimey......back to those stress symptoms......

I have just found the paperwork - in 2013, when DS2 took the 11+, there were 2000 applicants for Warks, so it looks like it has gone up roughly 10% each year, which is not that massive, really - there has been more economic uncertainty, therefore possibly slightly higher uptake from otherwise prospective private school children, and there has been more promotion of the GS system with the PP system. I suspect the combined exam might have meant that some people who could get to either (but in the past would have opted for either Birmingham or Warwickshire) might be having a punt at both (i.e. sharing results) so numbers may be artificially inflated? Not sure!

However, I get that if a child gets in parents like to quote the figures - "he/she was up against 2200 others, you know" and if a child doesn't get in "well, there were 2200 people for x places so it was almost impossible"!!