Didn't pass!!

thanetboy · Post by **thanetboy** » Tue Oct 21, 2008 1:10 pm

I'm new here but wish I'd found the forum a long time ago! My son didn't reach grammar standard and it was his maths (101) that was the problem. We will appeal and see how we go because I really feel that he can flourish at a grammar. I know the raw scores are adjusted for age (he's actually a July 98 baby) but there's such a lot of development that can happen between now and next September.

I've been reading some old posts this morning and was surprised that it was pretty clear in Feb 08 that the tests would move to September. At the moment I feel angry that a) I didn't spot this then and b) the school didn't bring this to our attention. We were informed in May and started working with him, particularly on the VR and NVR papers which were more unfamiliar than maths, (we thought!) and as he's in the top maths group at school we felt reasonably confident he would be OK.

However when we started him on previous papers it soon became clear that maths was a problem, mainly because there were big chunks he hadn't covered at school. We did manage to afford some extra tuition in September, but before then we worked with him ourselves. The school did some work in July and early September and ran a summer "club" (4 mornings).

So, we now feel that we let him down - he so wanted to go to the grammar school his brother attends - because in reality we should have spotted the news in Jan/Feb and started preparing earlier, but also because there's no way we could have afforded tuition, which it now seems he needed to cover the extra maths topics.

But then why should we have to do that? We've always regarded the school as a "good" school, as do many others including OFSTED, so why didn't they flag this up and make sure all the necessary aspects of the syllabus were covered in some way. I've heard of some local schools who were doing 11+ practice as long ago as January, so in comparison ours seem to have been really slow off the mark.

Anyone else have similar experiences? Any thoughts?

keljbj · Post by **keljbj** » Tue Oct 21, 2008 2:37 pm

Hi. I`m so sorry to hear that your son didnt get the result he wanted. We were very late starters to practise, naively believing that the school would do most of the preperation with the children. We did try in the summer to get dd to sit practise papers, but backed off when she became stressed and upset. As a result, we only started "proper" practise when the new school year commenced. At first she was getting low scores, around 50% for all papers. Like you i was surprised at her scores for the maths as she is top of her class consistently in this subject. But it did appear that there was alot of algebra-based questions, which she had never encountered before and really struggled with. Her school only sat one practise paper in each subject, and that was the week before the tests, so i felt very let down by them as i was relying on them to at least steer her in the right direction. They just didnt seem bothered at all. So i was less than hopeful of her chances.

Despite all that we have got a pass this morning. Apparently she was just 2 points short of a pass on her maths but the school provided evidence of her previous work, which was enough to earn her a pass.

I would definitely speak to your son`s HT and see if anything can be done. But i can understand your disappointment and share your feelings of disillusionment with the schools preperation. I was told that schools werent allowed to "coach" children in the 11+, but it seems that while some schools take this quite literally, others choose to ignore it!!!

thanetboy · Post by **thanetboy** » Tue Oct 21, 2008 3:09 pm

Thanks, it's good to know we're not alone! And well done to your daughter. I suspect there will be plenty of others in the same boat, but maybe not quite so many proportionally on this forum where everyone seems so well informed and prepared!

His scores were Maths 101, NVR 125 and VR 113 - can anyone give guidance on chances of success at appeal?

2childmum · Post by **2childmum** » Tue Oct 21, 2008 4:17 pm

We were told that the pass was a total score of 360, and no paper could be below 114, so I'm afraid your DC missed on two of the three papers. But others would know more about your chance at appeal in Kent than I do!