How to plan DIY tutoring

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NotAPushyMum
Posts: 27
Joined: Fri Sep 18, 2009 12:17 pm

How to plan DIY tutoring

Post by NotAPushyMum »

I have a limited amount of time to tutor my daughter for the 11plus - we are unexpectedly moving to a grammar school area.

It may be a tall order but we are both prepared to do our best, she's a bright girl and her teachers think she should have no problems. As there are no grammar schools locally and I cant afford a tutor 7 days a week :) , I'm going to DIY.

My question is where to start and how best to plan without making the process very dull for my daughter and putting too much pressure on her. We've started off with some VA questions, looking at each different type per day (this is only day 3) and she's doing well, but I'm not sure this is the best approach.

I wondered if anyone would mind letting me know how they approach the work and how to make it fun?
yoyo123
Posts: 8099
Joined: Mon Jun 18, 2007 3:32 pm
Location: East Kent

Post by yoyo123 »

what area are you in?

The test varies from county to county.

Almost all areas rely on vocabulary, vocabulary, vocabulary!

Lots of word games, scrabble (using a dictionary) word searches, crosswords and lots of reading
NotAPushyMum
Posts: 27
Joined: Fri Sep 18, 2009 12:17 pm

Post by NotAPushyMum »

We will be in Trafford (I've already posted over there with many questions).

Fortunately DD is an avid reader has a good vocabulary so it's mostly about getting her familiar with the tests.
patricia
Posts: 2803
Joined: Mon Jan 30, 2006 5:07 pm

Post by patricia »

Dear NotAPushyMum

Are you able to find out which disciplines are used. [Verbal Reasoning, Non Verbal Reasoning, English, Maths] and who publishes the real tests?

Patricia
Sally-Anne
Posts: 9235
Joined: Wed Jan 11, 2006 8:10 pm
Location: Buckinghamshire

Post by Sally-Anne »

Hi NotaPushyMum

There is a helpful post from "Fairy" on this thread:

http://www.elevenplusexams.co.uk/forum/ ... .php?t=313

If you explore the Trafford section of the Forum, I am sure that you will find more advice. It is not the liveliest part of the board, but there are a number of current posters with recent experience there.

Sally-Anne
NotAPushyMum
Posts: 27
Joined: Fri Sep 18, 2009 12:17 pm

Post by NotAPushyMum »

Thank you all for your posts and the link to the previous thread, which was very usefull.

What I'm having difficulty with is knowing how to approach her practise. For example do I work on VR with her untill she's getting good percentages and in good time and then move on to NVR and Maths. Or do I vary it and do some VR on one day, NVR the next and so on.

Today she's been doing NVR and didn't do too well, when I started to go through the errors she said she knew where she'd gone wrong and was just bored and making silly mistakes. I don't know if this means I should move away from NVR for a bit or carry on or even give her a break for a while. We don't have long, we only just started and she has to sit the exam in November.

Any advice would be welcome. I wish I were a teacher.
fm

Post by fm »

Non-verbal is something that is best done in short bursts of 5/10 minutes. Why not do 5 minutes each day on it, then devote the rest of the time to either maths or vr or half and half. See what suits her.

It is very tempting when children start scoring poorly to keep pursuing that area but sometimes it is wiser to leave it for a few days rather than try to push through a bad spell.
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