Take the 2nd paper or not???

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sykeswinn
Posts: 1
Joined: Thu Sep 19, 2019 3:39 pm

Take the 2nd paper or not???

Post by sykeswinn »

Help!!

My son took his first paper last week and only answered 50 questions out of 80. Given the low amount should we really let him take the 2nd paper? He is normally at the top of his class but struggled with his exam technique and tried to persevere on questions instead of moving on.

Even with standardised scoring we cannot see him achieve the pass mark and feel it might be kinder to take the stress away from him.

I am told you do not pass or fail, is that true? We don't want him to think he has failed. Are we just being too soft?

Any thoughts would be much appreciated.
hermanmunster
Posts: 12817
Joined: Fri Sep 15, 2006 9:51 am
Location: The Seaside

Re: Take the 2nd paper or not???

Post by hermanmunster »

Which area are you in?

I would be cautious about accepting a child's comments on how they did in an exam - trouble is you don't know how others did
ToadMum
Posts: 11945
Joined: Wed Jan 18, 2012 12:41 pm
Location: Essex

Re: Take the 2nd paper or not???

Post by ToadMum »

sykeswinn wrote:Help!!

My son took his first paper last week and only answered 50 questions out of 80. Given the low amount should we really let him take the 2nd paper? He is normally at the top of his class but struggled with his exam technique and tried to persevere on questions instead of moving on.

Even with standardised scoring we cannot see him achieve the pass mark and feel it might be kinder to take the stress away from him.

I am told you do not pass or fail, is that true? We don't want him to think he has failed. Are we just being too soft?

Any thoughts would be much appreciated.
Hi :) .

It might help if you asked the mods to move your post to the relevant 'geographical' section.

On a general note, most / all right out of 5/8ths of the total questions set could be at least as much as the number answered correctly by the majority of those who answered them all. It would seem a shame for your DS not to have the chance to find out.

cross posted with HM.
Outside of a dog, a book is a man's best friend. Inside of a dog it's too dark to read.Groucho Marx
Pudpud40
Posts: 1
Joined: Wed Nov 15, 2017 1:34 pm

Re: Take the 2nd paper or not???

Post by Pudpud40 »

Hi :)
I’m not sure what area you’re in but wanted to answer as I had a very similar situation with my Son.
He did the first paper and missed out the last 20 questions and I felt absolutely dreadful for him. As it was his weakest we also wondered if it was worth putting him through the stress of the second paper.
After a lot of consideration, we decided that he should finish the process and take the second exam which thankfully went a lot better than the first!
The end result was that (much to my surprise) he achieved above the qualifying mark in both papers and was able to secure a place at our local Grammar School.
So I really just wanted to say that if your son isn’t too stressed and feels able to carry on, then it’s still worth trying because you really can never tell what the results will be x
loobylou
Posts: 2032
Joined: Thu Nov 27, 2014 5:04 pm

Re: Take the 2nd paper or not???

Post by loobylou »

One of my friend's children begged her mum not to make her do the second paper of our school entrance exam. She "just knew" she'd failed and fine terribly. My friend said she was completely convinced and very nearly agreed. Her DD passed very easily.
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