Confidence in NVR

Advice on 11 Plus NVR papers and problems

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Anna

Confidence in NVR

Post by Anna »

My son has been with a tutor since Easter and previously she said that he was good at NVR. However, he's just started doing timed NVR tests (previously he didn't work against the clock) and it's completely thrown him. He panics and only gets to put down answers to two-thirds of the questions and often gets them wrong. He's completely losing confidence and I don't know what to do. His first entrance test (which is all NVR) is at the end of October.
Ilesh, London

NVR

Post by Ilesh, London »

Anna, my son, also attempting exams in October went through a similar phase of loosing confidence as soon as faced with timed tests. Although I did not have the benefit of a tutor, two things helped in our case:

(1) Do not allow the clock to limit the amount of paper he covers, you need to let him complete the paper and the speed will come with practice - the key thing here is that he gets familiar with the type of questions and the format/ layout of the questions - quite honestly practice, practice, practice is the the golden key

(2) in my son's case I had the good fortune of finding boys who had completed their exams this time last year - it was fantastic - the 'graduate boys' found their own ways of explaining 'tricks' to certain questions and soon the companionship was getting results, and very encouraging for my son - so much so that in the end he was keen to take the other kids on in a timed test!

Hope my experience helps.

:wink:

Ilesh
Bo Peep

Post by Bo Peep »

Excellent advice - thanks very much...this was just what I needed to hear since my son has recently started timed papers and it had really knocked his confidence.

His older brother passed 4 years ago (despite the fact that at that time I thought he would have 50 mins to sit the NVR and could make time up on the easier questions - what a shock the timing was to him, poor thing - but he passed. Praise the Lord!)...so I think I will get big brother to join us, won't he be pleased!!!!!!!!!!
Bournemouth

Post by Bournemouth »

My son enjoyed me doing a test alongside him. I kept an eye on how fast he was going so that I didn't streak ahead. In the weeks running up to the exam we started with a realistic amount of time for a test, say 60 mins and then knocked off 2 minutes from the time allowed week by week. He was always allowed to finish the test if the time went over. It wasm't 'times up, pens down'. This worked for us. (It was VR rather than NVR for us).
Bo Peep

Post by Bo Peep »

You kept an eye on the time so that you didn't streak ahead :shock:

Are we talking about the 6mins Nfer Nelson papers - lol....cough cough, yes that's what I do too....

Good advice though - many many thanks! :lol:
Bournemouth

Post by Bournemouth »

LOL! OK, maybe not 'streaking ahead'. He's much smarter than me - especially in English. It won't be many years before he realises how totally uneducated I am and starts finding I can't hold a stimulating conversation with him. Struggling to help him with the Latin homework already :oops: LOL
SJ
Posts: 171
Joined: Sat Sep 30, 2006 11:14 am
Location: Lincolnshire

Post by SJ »

Bo Peep wrote: Are we talking about the 6mins Nfer Nelson papers - lol....cough cough, yes that's what I do too....
Please be aware that in Lincs we had NFER Nelson NVR and the practice papers sent by the grammaer school were questions in minutes, section sin total = questions.
Wen it came to the actual paper it was 5 sections, some had 16 and some 17 questions with 8 minutes per section and a total of 65 questions
Bo Peep

Post by Bo Peep »

Please be aware that in Lincs we had NFER Nelson NVR and the practice papers sent by the grammaer school were questions in minutes, section sin total = questions.
Wen it came to the actual paper it was 5 sections, some had 16 and some 17 questions with 8 minutes per section and a total of 65 questions
Thank you so much for this - I have been very confused about this for years now! My son did his 11 plus 4 years ago - not in Lincs though - and at the time we believed he'd have 50 mins to do 60 questions so the short bursts of time per section were somewhat of an 'interesting surprise'. Nevertheless I distinctly remember him saying that there were lots of questions in a section and various time limits - 5 mins, 8 mins and so on....

Now, some years later I am better prepared for pressurised time limits and my second son is now able to answer questions in 30 secs or less (most of the time!) but I am very very grateful to you for sharing this - since it seems likely that your information shared is similiar to what my son experienced - someone just switched a light on for me!

And yes - he did have to answer 65 questions and I was always wondering where the extra five came from!
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