Dear all,

Can I please ask a few questions on the format of NW exam:
1) How long is exam?
2) is it VR and NVR only? Heard they added some maths last year (2018).
3) is it still broken down into 15mins sections?
4) does a child need to circle the answers on the same paper or fill in a separate answer sheet?
5) if anyone knows how many questions there are (approximately, how many questions to complete per minute), that would be useful. In general, is there much time pressure? I understand Bexley test gives them more questions than can be answered.. is it the same here?

Even if you can not remember all of the above, some / partial information would be very useful.

Many thanks!

Hi It’s 2 50 minute papers of verbal and non verbal reasoning, no maths. 15 minute sections for non verbal. They fill answers on separate sheet. School sell a specimen paper on day of open day.
I would recommend doing a mixture of Bond, CGP, GL papers and try to time them.
Be careful of over tutoring, best way is to do 15 minutes a day and go through what they got wrong with them, start in year 5 or summer of year 4. In the summer before exam can increase amount they do.
I think Newstead is probably most tutor proof paper as it just tests verbal and non verbal reasoning
Good luck for exam

As these are tutored only subjects, it is the least tutor proof.

I think I have written before about the national maths challenge which a number of schools are taking part in during Y6 - which has a number of questions I would call 'tutor proof' and the results were significantly different from the selection tests (that year a number of girls got into NW but only ONE of them passed this challenge!).

Presumably this 'challenge' is neither the Primary Maths Challenge nor the Junior Mathematical Challenge? Neither of these has a 'pass mark'. There may be Bronze/ Silver / Gold certificates for achieving above a certain score, but those who don't get at least a Bronze haven't 'failed; the point is to encourage pupils to enjoy 'doing maths'.

_________________
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The aim is to reach the second round.

For this you needed 80%.

Although technically you are right, it is not called a pass mark, it is a much better indicator of ability than most of the grammar tests as they are tutored for.

Thick as a brick I disagree. Maths is very easy to tutor for.
You can spend 4 hours a day doing non verbal reasoning with your
Child but it will not guarantee success in a non verbal paper where as that
Will pretty much guarantee you success in a maths paper.
The 11 plus exam is 1 day and I suspect the results a child scores will vary from day
To day. No exam that tests a 10 or 11 year old can ever be a true reflection of ability
as in my opinion they are too young to be tested at that age. Unfortunately, it is the
System we have.

It very much depends on the test.

If the questions give multiple choice answers, I agree, it will boil down to how quickly one can find the answer that fits which again is mostly down to practice.

Where you are not presented with any answers and the questions actually require a level of reasoning that even some adults might not find easy, it is a different ball game - as evidenced by the very different results.