Learning Hub
Most 11+ advice is sorted by maths topic. That is not how the problem arrives. It arrives as a marked paper and a feeling that something keeps going wrong. So this is sorted the way you would describe it out loud.
…keeps making silly mistakes
Marks lost on questions they can plainly do.
Careless mistakes in 11+ maths: why “slow down” doesn’t work · and 1 more
…isn't improving
Same score, paper after paper, however much they practise.
How many past papers should my child do? · and 1 more
…forgets what they were taught
Knew it in class. Gone by the time it counts.
Is your 11 plus tuition working? How to know what stuck · and 1 more
…rushes, or runs out of time
Half the paper done brilliantly and the rest in a scramble.
Running out of time in 11 plus maths — and the child who isn’t actually slow
…misreads the question
The right maths, done to the wrong question.
The right maths, done to the wrong question
…panics, or has lost confidence
Knows it at home; freezes when it counts.
The question they didn’t start
The same lens, one topic at a time: not how to do it, but where the marks actually go.
When should you start preparing for the 11 plus?
The exam is sat about a week into Year 6 — so Year 6 is not the preparation year, it is the exam. That one fact changes the answer for a Year 4 and a Year 5 in completely different directions.
The five most expensive fraction mistakes in the 11+
Fractions is where selective papers earn their reputation — and where children who can do fractions still bleed marks. Five wrong turns, the thinking behind each, and the one question to ask at the kitchen table.
A reasonable question with an awkward answer: the number is not the thing that decides it. Score 80% on a forty-question paper and thirty-two of those questions told you something you already knew.
17 September 20264 min read
The exam is sat about a week into Year 6 — so Year 6 is not the preparation year, it is the exam. That one fact changes the answer for a Year 4 and a Year 5 in completely different directions.
17 September 20265 min read
Two students sit the same lesson and keep different halves of it. Finding out which halves is not something an hour of teaching can be spent on — here is what it actually takes, and why it is not a reflection on the teaching.
14 September 20265 min read
A tutor teaches the topic. Nobody checks what each child actually kept from it — and there are four good reasons why they can't. Here is how to find out, and why it isn't a reflection on the tutor.
14 September 20265 min read
Two children lose the last five marks of a paper. One is slow. One is fast and careless. The score cannot tell them apart, and the fix for each would make the other one worse.
14 September 20263 min read
A blank on a paper is read as “couldn’t do it”. Often it means something else entirely — and the two need opposite work. What a blank can tell you, and what it can’t.
14 September 20263 min read
A child works a question out perfectly and still loses the mark, because the question wanted something slightly different. It is not carelessness, it has a shape — and it hides from every kind of practice organised by topic.
14 September 20263 min read
Your child forgets what they were taught, and you and the teacher both know it was taught properly. Here is how gaps in a child’s maths quietly form — the forgetting curve, the moment nobody thinks to check, and why the people closest to a child are the least likely to spot it.
4 August 20268 min read
Three different things get called careless, and they need opposite responses. Here is how to tell which one your child is doing — using a paper they have already sat.
3 August 202612 min read
Two children sit the same paper and both score 62. One needs harder questions; the other needs a week on the basics. The number can’t tell them apart — the pattern underneath it can.
1 July 20265 min read
Fractions is where selective papers earn their reputation — and where children who can do fractions still bleed marks. Five wrong turns, the thinking behind each, and the one question to ask at the kitchen table.
25 June 20265 min read
“Careless” describes everything and explains nothing. Most lost marks come from a handful of specific, repeatable wrong turns — and once a wrong turn has a name, you can practise against it.
12 June 20264 min read