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Timing Practice

Posted: Wed Jun 24, 2009 4:31 pm
by 2010 mum
Hello everyone,

My DD will be sitting the Bexley exams in september and I would like some advice as to when I should start the timed practice with her.

I do not want to start to early, niether do I want to start late. So any suggestions would be helpful and how to help maintain the speed until the exams.

Posted: Wed Jun 24, 2009 4:41 pm
by yoyo123
how about doing the tests and marking where she gets to after 50 minutes, then carrying on to end.

Or timing to see how long each section takes.

I ecently did 2 papers and noted the time each section took, some took only 2 minutes and one took 16 minutes. It helps to realise that some questions take longer than others.

Posted: Wed Jun 24, 2009 4:46 pm
by Milla
... and for you, therefore, to work out where the stumbling blocks are. Would do no harm to do one now and establish a base line as it were. Having said that, my son (takes his in November) did a 50 minute paper recently (100 questions) and only got to about question 62 in 50 minutes. I hid my panic (!) but the next one he did, supposedly harder, he did in 39 minutes and got 89% in. Mind you, take no notice of me or him, he is utterly random. Therein lies my fear! If you're anything like me (and I hope for your sake you're not) you'll need to think of some sort of routine or system where you try to keep on top on the ones causing the most confusion - often it's something seemingly obvious which they just haven't "seen". Let us know how you get on!

Posted: Wed Jun 24, 2009 5:15 pm
by 2010 mum
Thank you, Yoyo123 and Milla.

I will try to adopt both practice and will feedback on how it's going.

Posted: Thu Jun 25, 2009 4:59 pm
by Tolstoy
2010,

With my eldest, last year, I timed his tasks (10 minute practices of 20Q of each type as we covered them) right from the start. His timing was excellent when we got onto full papers.

With DS2 I have made the mistake of not timing him when he did them. I then realised my mistake and that there is no point giving him a full test as he would never finish it.

He has done two of the 10 min dailies and his timing is way off so I will continue to give him those until he has the timing right and only then will move up to the longer papers.

Timing is crucial and IMHO is one of the most significant factors for success. Bare in mind that this also includes doing papers too quickly , re careless mistakes, as well as too slowly.

Posted: Thu Jun 25, 2009 5:54 pm
by 2010 mum
Hello Tolstoy,

Thanks for the suggestion and I will introduce the 10 min test asap.

I have being getting my DD to do the whole test paper, but not timed.
Did try to time her once but she got quite a few wrong including the ones I knew she was capable of. When I asked her why, maybe she did not understand it? She said, she was more concerned with the time that she did not read the questions properly. So I think the 10 min test maybe a better approach.

thanks all.

Posted: Thu Jun 25, 2009 5:59 pm
by yoyo123
the more practice she gets the faster she should become as she will be familiar with each type of question and know what to do.

If she finds she is getting bogged down , get her to make an "intelligent guess" at the answer. Note the question number and move on. She can always come back to it in teh end. Each question is only one mark, so it is no use spending several minutes to get one question right and gaining 1 mark , when you run out of time and leave 7 at the end.

Also , make sure that in her haste she doesn;t mark teh question in teh wrong space (if itis multiple choice) I did that myself last week and nearly lost lots of marks , right answer, wrong question!

Re: Timing Practice

Posted: Sun Jun 28, 2009 2:38 pm
by James David
2010 mum wrote:Hello everyone,

My DD will be sitting the Bexley exams in september and I would like some advice as to when I should start the timed practice with her.

I do not want to start to early, niether do I want to start late. So any suggestions would be helpful and how to help maintain the speed until the exams.
Hi 2010 Mum.
It's also good to get your child to site for mock test under exam conditions to get used to the timings. Most primary schools in Bucks conduct practise exam near to the main exam. If your child don't have that option at the current school then try other ways for your child to get used to exam condition and timings

Edited to remove name of website as advertising is not permitted.
Alex

Getting good timing

Posted: Sun Jul 05, 2009 12:22 pm
by um
I have been trying to get my 10 year old (sitting tests this Autumn) to improve his exam technique, but he is simply resistant to 'working to time' - he's a bit of a perfectionist and the problem is, if he comes accross something he finds tricky, he will stubbornly sit for 20 minutes trying to work it out - rather than move on to the other questions. I'm really not sure how to improve his technique. In his last mock test he lost quite a few maths marks due to running out of time - although to be honest there's normally plenty of time in the Bond tests. Has anyone else had a child like this and how to I persuade him to leave something and move on if necessary?

Posted: Sun Jul 05, 2009 2:42 pm
by Bexley Mum 2
One of my DCs was a bit like this. I found doing some tests with him was the best way round this. It's a good confidence booster in that you can let them get the answer before you and be impressed by their speed :wink: But also you can say, "hmm, we're not getting this one are we, let's put a mark against it and come back to it later".

I'm not actually a great fan of doing timed tests. I prefer to focus on getting my DCs to work at a reasonable pace and get to know how long is "long enough" to spend on a question. I agree with Yoyo - they speed up naturally anyway with practice. You would never know how the questions in a real test were going to be spread. So it's no good saying to a child that they need to be half way through the questions at half time. It might be that the first questions are easier and there are some real corkers towards the end. Just working steadily and not getting bogged down by questions you can't do is, in my opinion, the best approach.