Workshops/Seminars for parents?

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Thea
Posts: 250
Joined: Mon Dec 05, 2005 4:01 pm
Location: Richmond

Workshops/Seminars for parents?

Post by Thea »

Hi - is there such a thing anywhere as seminars or workshops to give advice and guidance for parents who would prefer to 'tutor' (for want of a better word..) children at home?
Best Regards,
Thea
patricia
Posts: 2803
Joined: Mon Jan 30, 2006 5:07 pm

Post by patricia »

Dear Thea

In the last two years I have started wokshops for parents wanting to teach their own children, this has stemmed from too many children on my waiting list.

Unfortunately I cannot help for your area of Richmond, I deal with Buckinghamshire.

This site/forum is extremely informative, so keep plugging away/asking questions, eventually someone will be able to help you.

Your first step is finding out what type of tests your area deals with, ask schools/LEA/parents

Patricia
Mike Edwards

Post by Mike Edwards »

Hello Thea

I will assume that you are a parent of a year five student who will be preparing their child for 11+ tests next year.

Use this site for every query, any day, any time, there are tutors here that will help you and support you.

Find out the structure of the test from the LEA.

Let us know what it is.

We can then guide you to relevant resources or post advice on the site.

Regards


Mike
Kaz

Post by Kaz »

What area are you going to apply to? There aren't any Grammars your way are there?
Guest

Post by Guest »

Tiffin School
Thea
Posts: 250
Joined: Mon Dec 05, 2005 4:01 pm
Location: Richmond

Post by Thea »

Thanks - what a lot of very helpful and responsive people, my stress levels have diminished rapidly over the last two days! Am very grateful to the people on this site who have given such reassuring advice..(have bought books here, so am not a total parasite...!)

Yes the only local state selective school is Tiffin - I have posted in the Surrey section that there is complete hysteria among parents in Richmond about Tiffin, which has almost the same mytholgical staus as the Grail Castle, only harder to get into.

My son is in Year 5 of a good local state primary - and you are probably only too aware of the change in parental co-operation that starts now... everyone is in 'competition' - can't imagine what its like in the counties with the 'normal 11+' -pretty dog-eat-dog, I imagine - or maybe that just a feature of Richmond parents!

Teachers will not give an opinion on a child's chances - they seem to be ideologically opposed to selective or independent schools - you just have to infer from their relative abilities to their calssmates, as gleaned at once removed.. (The school charges for references to private schools, but will happily give free references for state schools)

We will not pin our hope on Tiffin, but plan B will be a local independent school, so exam and interview prep will be necessary in any case. At least Tiffin there is no interview!

Thanks again - this site is a godsend!
Best Regards,
Thea
SB

Post by SB »

Hi Thea,

With yesterday's verbal test at Tiffin boys, my son has just completed this year's 11+ exams. To give you a flavour of things from our experience:

I tutored (coached) my son. We started the process only towards the end of August 05. In our case he is reasonably ok in studies. He enjoys problem solving, number and word puzzles, etc. This statistics was important in our case and based on that I was able to assess his potential and make the appropriate starting point and hence didn't start a year early!

Tiffin follows Nfer formatted verbal and non-verbal tests. In my view this is good because many children don't fancy doing english test that includes essay writing.. More over the Tiffin uses multiple choice question format which again in my view is an advantage.

In non-verbal there are mainly 5 types of questions. 11+ practice paper publications also have books that are full of 'tips' and 'tricks' to enable the children to grasp the different logics to look for as well as patterns. These are good and with practice children will be able to easily apply different logics to each question and identify the correct one. Don't just limit with the practice papers. Browse the local library and use any books you find on this subject.

For verbal reasoning vocabulary plays an important role. Possible Nfer word list can be downlaoded from this site (posted by Mike Edwards). Tips and Tricks kind of books available to purchase and there is a freely downloadable document available from Athey website as well.

Have a plan. I used to keep a register of all the questions (purchased, free downloads, etc), answer sheets and answers with unique number scheme (VR-001, VR-002, etc.). Plot the score, time taken and date for each trial. You can record more/less info depending on your interest. Start with simple examples and not with the actual papers. Identify the practice papers according to their level (easy to hard) and introduce then accordingly. Once the child attains a level with the full understanding of different logics, patterns, types of questions he/she will be ready to handle any practice paper.

I stop here. Otherwise I will be here all day writing a book! Please post for info on these subjects and there are many willing parents and tutors to help.

Regards,
SB
Thea
Posts: 250
Joined: Mon Dec 05, 2005 4:01 pm
Location: Richmond

Post by Thea »

Phew! Organsiation is clearly the key.Thanks for taking the time to post when the exam was only yesterday! When do you get the results? I belive with Tiffin the 'result' is whether you get in or not? It seems that in the 'normal 11+' the result is given in the form of a number, from whcih they infer the result from the known pass mark?
Best Regards,
Thea
forumadmin
Site Admin
Posts: 1188
Joined: Sun Aug 15, 2004 4:31 pm

Workshop/ Information Day for Parents

Post by forumadmin »

Dear Thea et al,

We at Eleven Plus Exams would be happy to arrange a venue where parents can meet experienced tutors, authors and other professionals if there is enough interest from parents to attend the kind of workshop/ information day proposed by Thea.

We would propose that this takes place early in the new year, allowing next year's 11+ parents a good 9-12 months preparation time.
Last edited by forumadmin on Wed Dec 07, 2005 3:15 pm, edited 2 times in total.
Guest

Post by Guest »

I think for us it is a long wait March 06. May be a holiday and good Christmas will lower the stress level!!

SB
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