Early Years (years 3 and 4) 11 Plus Maths Exam Preparation.

During this period if you focus on making your child an absolute ace when it comes to times tables and ensure they are working accurately when using the four operations then you will be doing more than most.

Equally you will need to ensure that children are working regularly and are using the skills they have. Tutors, tuition centres and guided courses build this in automatically but if you are preparing at home then you’ll need find some appropriate exercise books.

As years three and four progress you will need to start introducing new topics and begin moving ahead of where the school is working at to ensure the whole KS2 syllabus is covered before your child sits the test.

All these core skills are really useful for children to do and often we hear of children who as a result have moved into top sets (tables) at school and are therefore benefitting from a higher level of school work. Many parents at this stage are not entirely sure if their child will go forwards and sit the test, the good news is that work done on core skills is never wasted. Children will benefit from the better grounding core skills work gives them for the rest of their lives.

When we look at the mistakes children typically make in their 11 Plus exams, they are often times tables based mistakes or four operations (+, -, ÷, x) mistakes. Children who develop excellent (not good but excellent) times tables and four operations skills in years 3 and 4 generally do much better in their 11 Plus exams.