11 Plus Guide: A Six Month Countdown
Many parents who hope to send their child to grammar school will need to be aware of specific key dates and deadlines. This 11 plus guide is perfect for parents of children currently in Year 5 who are looking to send their child into Year 7 of a grammar school in September 2023.
April 2022: Most grammar schools will open their registration in April or May, but there is some variability, so it is essential to check with your individual school or region. For example, Buckinghamshire automatically enters all pupils for the 11+ exam, and so any parents who want to opt-out have to actively withdraw their child from the process. It’s also important to check the deadline for registration; usually, it’s in June or July, but this may change due to COVID-related disruption.
September 2022: The 11+ exam occurs typically during the first two weeks of September, but again it’s worth checking with schools directly.
October 2022: Exam results for the 11+ usually are posted around the middle of October.
1st March 2023: School allocations will be confirmed, and children can start getting excited about secondary school.
Given this timeline, students currently have around six months to prepare for the 11+ exam. Many parents will be thinking about how best to prepare their child and may want to check out our top 10 tips for passing as a starting point. Yet rather than just jumping straight to past papers, here’s our guide for how to structure your child’s revision over the next six months:
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March 2022 | 11 Plus Guide: 6 Months to go!
Parents should make sure that they know what exam board their child will be taking; check out this guide about the difference between CEM and GL assessments here.
Once parents know which papers their children will be sitting, it’s important to check that your child has mastered key English and maths skills. It might be tempting to start doing practice papers straight away, but there’s no point in just ’teaching to the test’ – if there are gaps in a pupil’s knowledge, then their progress will quickly plateau.
Instead, parents should check the national curriculum guidance for English and maths and work out a list of topics that they can colour-code under a ‘traffic light’ system. Green means a student has mastered the subject, orange means they are confident but still needs work, and red means they are unsure.
There are many helpful websites online that break down KS2 topics: The School Run has these helpful checklists for English and maths.
April 2022| 11 Plus Guide: 5 Months to go!
Once you have a better understanding of your child’s ability, now is the time to do some focused revision on core skills, again concentrating on English and maths. For example, you might want to do regular spelling tests, times tables exercises, build a vocabulary bank or buy some KS2 workbooks to go through. Oxford Owl has a great range of exercises, activities and recommended books for Years 5 and 6.
Given the disruption of the last year, it is likely that your child may have some gaps in their knowledge or need extra support in certain areas. Group tuition is a safe, cost-effective and fun way to accelerate your child’s learning, and starting now gives them plenty of time to consolidate everything they will learn.
May 2022 | 11 Plus Guide: 4 Months Remaining!
Now is an excellent time to introduce them to the Verbal Reasoning and Non-Verbal Reasoning papers. You can find our guide to practising the papers here and more past paper examples here.
It’s well worth remembering that because verbal reasoning and non-verbal reasoning questions are not taught at primary schools, it may take a while for students to get the ‘knack’ of what the questions are asking for. Regular practice in short bursts is key – again, rather than going straight in with past papers, it might be better to start with 10-minute exercises that gently introduce students to different question types. CGP has lots of great exercise books with short exercises to keep students engaged – remember, it is a marathon, not a sprint!
June 2022 | 11 Plus Guide: Only 3 Months Left!
This is when parents should start introducing their children to real past and practice papers. At this stage, parents should allow the students to take as much time as they need and use notes and resources if necessary. Diving straight into test conditions is likely to simply overwhelm and stress out the child, and at this point, it’s all about building confidence and familiarity with the various papers.
Parents should make sure to do regular health checks,’ where they go over students’ answers, check to understand and respond accordingly. Again, group tuition can be really beneficial at this stage, as you can choose courses that revise specific topics. For example, if your child struggles with fractions and linear equations, then you can choose from both our advanced and standard classes.
July 2022 | 11 Plus Guide: Getting Prepared in the Final 2 Months
Over the summer, parents should slowly but surely start to make the practice papers more challenging. At first, reduce the number of resources your child uses to help with the paper (for example, limit them to only referring to one textbook) and have a few more practices.
Next, say that your child has to do the paper ‘closed book’ (so with no external help), but they don’t have to do the paper under timed conditions. If they get stuck, miss out a question or get an answer wrong, then make sure to give them plenty of encouragement. It is best, wherever possible, that students mark their own work and work out where they went wrong themselves – they will learn far more than if they just have the correct answer given to them!
August 2022 | 11 Plus Guide: Final Preparations
Finally, when they feel confident enough, students should now practice completing practice papers under timed exam conditions. It’s important that students don’t suffer from burnout or have too much anxiety around the 11+, so parents need to make the experience as positive as possible. Frequent breaks, lots of rewards and regular praise can all help to make exam practice more stress-free.
It’s also key that parents and students don’t obsess too much over marks and percentages. It’s almost impossible to predict what the pass mark will be as it varies year on year. So instead, it’s better to focus on areas of improvement and trying for your own ‘personal best’ rather than going for arbitrary benchmarks.
If your child is also applying for independent schools, then you can use this timeline too. As most independent schools’ entrance exams take place in January and February, it’s best to start revision around June / July and ramp up past paper practices over the Christmas holidays.
About the author:
Kristina is an Oxford English graduate and qualified English teacher. She trained through the Teach First programme before working at one of the top independent schools in London. She is now a private tutor and freelance writer.
