Tip #2: Will it make the boat go faster? !

The achievement of the English Rowing team at world meets including the Olympics are part of the folklore. I recently heard a fascinating story regarding how the team prepared for the Athens Olympics following the failure at the world championships the year before.  As explained by Sir Matthew Pinsent, the whole team which included not only the four rowers, but also the manager, nutritionists, and the boat builders adopted a mantra - a Code they lived by - "Will it make the boat go faster?". Every decision was questioned by this matra and if the answer was "no", then they knew it was not worth doing. They took it to extreme even questioning appearance of the team at the inauguration ceremony of the Olympics ! (because standing for 7 hours would not make the boat go faster).

This may sound as an extreme attitude to take with a child's eleven plus grammar or selective school exams, but consider the following:

• There is no pass mark in the eleven plus exam - It is all comparative so no matter how smart or clever your child is, if they are not in the top few, they don't make it.
• The eleven exam cant be retaken - A child gets only one chance at it and it may decide their fate. Unfair but fact of life.
• There is no syllabus for the eleven plus exam - So you cant really  buy a book and prepare for it.
• There is no access to past eleven plus papers (no matter what your tutor tells you).
• No school provides any guidance on their selective eleven plus exam. In fact most schools pro-actively resist giving any information .
• It is the first real competitive exam for your child. In the current environment of political correctness where even schools sports day are organised so as to "make all children feel equal", this is the first serious jolt of real life.

So all parent who are thinking "I should not be stressing about this", I would urge you to read the above bullet points again, and then search the web to see the performance statistics of a local grammar school and compare it with a local comprehensive.

So given the odds and what is at stake here, perhaps it is not a bad thing to adopt a mindset to achieve success in this exam after all. Discipline is the key. Some things which every parent can adopt or look out for (to make the boat go faster !):

• Time ..time..time. The eleven plus exam is a race against the clock so get your child to do every mock eleven plus exam against the clock.
• Simulate the environment - Most exams require the child to "colour little boxes" on an answer sheet with a pencil. Has your child seen this? Most tutors only use a blank paper and not the kind shown in the figure. Or are they in for a surprise on the final day ! If you need some blank multiple choice filling sheets drop me an email and I have some in PDF format. Also try and find out what format of exam does your school of choice have.
• And don't just practice ! Measure their performance so that you can "fill in the gaps"
• Stay calm and build their confidence, but be realistic when giving them feedback on their performance so that the child is aware that they have a way to go. Make it positive.

Best of Luck with making your "boat go faster" !

Della
http://www.11PlusDIY.co.uk