Eleven plus

I failed!!! However ended up with a 2.1 honours degree and law degree. Apparently when the teacher went round the class asking what we wanted to be when we grew up I said ‘ I want to be happy and enjoy myself’ I would say now not a bad aspiration

Indigo8 - I think the top stream took CSEs and stayed to 16 to take them. Most left at 15 without being offered to take any CSEs. In my area it was some years later before CSEs became widespread, possibly after school leaving age rose to 16.

I took the 11+ in January 1955. I remember it as being a very cold snowy day, and as I passed my mother's friend's house on the way to school she wished me good luck.
Despite being second top in the class that year I failed it.
The results were posted to the school a few weeks later and the names of the pupils who had passed were read out first, and mine was not amongst them.That was all that was said. I cried on the way home as my parents had been told beforehand that I would sail through it.
My mother said nothing at first, just stared at me and walked out of the room.When my father got in from work, and heard about it he actually told me I was stupid. This was the first time in my life I felt I was a big disappointment to them.
I did very well at the secondary modern school however despite my parents never ''taking'' to the school. Neither of them ever came to the open days.
I went on to have a very successful and contented career as a nurse, which I later discovered I would not have been refused an entry, in those days, despite having not had an academic education.
I am very pleased my children, grandchildren and great grandchildren have not had to suffer this humiliation at an early age.

We still have the 11 Plus where we live. My daughter decided against doing it. I suspect she would have passed but she’s doing fine in a much smaller school than the Grammar.

My school was a large Junior School, all 96 children in our year took the 11+ in the school hall, I think all other pupils had the day off on the day of the exam as most classrooms opened onto the hall.. We had practiced for the 11+, like most if not all Primary Schools in our town - unfortunately we all had to take the exam twice as it was found that one of the papers at least had been used as a practice paper by a number of schools. I remember being given the results at school. Names were read out in class and asked to go to another classroom and the some pupils arrived in our classroom. We were told we had passed, names were read out for the the Boys Grammar School, the Girls High School or the Technical High School which was a mixed school. I passed for the Technical High - when we were walking home my Auntie (who was in my class but had failed) and I were both crying and bumped into our dance teacher who asked what was wrong. My Auntie replied I've failed and she's passed her 11+, who's going to look after her when we change schools?....she had always very protective as I had always been very small.

I took the first half of the 11 plus in 1962. This was inthe North Riding of Yorkshire.You hadtopass the first half to be able to sit the second half.Luckily I passed both halves and went to a convent grammar school which I enjoyed and which gave me a great education.I was one of sixteen children who passed the exam from my primary class of fifty six. The primary school class sizes were huge then, Itwas very formal, so unlike today.

For Shelflife -- your comment is at least ill-considered, and you've contradicted yourself anyway. Those that failed 11-plus didn't automatically get "sub-standard education" and you've stated that you got a decent Uni degree?!

Those taking it are hardly "young children" - and what would you do without SOME assessment?

YOU would presumably build gigantic schools for 20,000 kids, chuck everyone in, a complete mix of abilities, those who are dim and/or don't want to learn being disruptive and destroying the education of the brighter ones, THAT is your ideal? Oh, and mixed-ability classes are notoriously difficult for teachers to handle.

NB -- It's "grammAr" BTW.

My sister was a year above me and she passed. My mum was away visiting her sick mother when the results came. I remember my dad sending her a telegram saying “ J has passed QESS” = Qualifying Examination for Secondary Schools, commonly called the “scholarship”. So naturally nobody was surprised the following year when I passed, and no great fuss was made.
I had the choice of three schools, one was co-ed, two were single sex. I think there were extra classes added because of “the bulge”, so quite a few of us passed from my junior school. This was 1956. I had already jumped a year, so I was the youngest pupil in my grammar school.
I don’t remember much about the exam, but we had practised the type of questions for three months. We had weekly tests and were re-seated in rank order each week, with the weakest at the front under the teacher’s eye. She was a brilliant teacher. I enjoyed comprehension and verbal reasoning, but nowadays I know I would really struggle with the non-verbal reasoning and the maths.
I loved my grammar school ( except PE) and went on to university, but what benefitted me most was the music- choirs and orchestra, a love which has lasted all my life.

I also took it 60 years ago. We did an English paper, maths paper and 2 verbal reasoning papers. We did two morning I think they were a week apart. I remember the short English essay was to write a description of how to clean muddy shoes, then there was long essay that I can't remember and a comprehension about the history of Disney and how he started his studio. I don't remember a thing about the maths paper except my teacher saw it and asked me what on earth went wrong. Very relieved when I passed. We received letters in the post with results and I knew the results were out as some kids got their letters before school. I had to wait till I went home for lunch. My dad was holding the letter and I knew I had passed as my letter was pink and failed letters were blue.

Haven't thought about that in years

I was in the ‘top’ class all through primary school and took my 11+ in February 1970. Mum had already ordered my girls grammar school uniform and was in shock when she read the letter which said I’d failed, but was borderline.
I seem to remember a discussion whereby I was invited to take further tests. She declined saying she’d rather I was at the top in a secondary school than be scraping along at the bottom of the grammar school.
This did wonders for my confidence as you might imagine, however I did coast along at secondary, under very little pressure and was in the A stream class all through school which meant I took O levels, not CSE’s.
I passed my O levels and then went to
the grammar school VI form
to sit my A levels.
Mum recalled at the 1st parents evening there, that another Mum from my primary school days, looked at her on arrival and said something along the lines of ‘what are you, doing here?’.
Mums retort was classic- she said, ‘the same as you’….
I left there with my A level passes, went to uni, got my degree, became a teacher, did various qualifications including master’s, culminating in the NPQH- and retired in 2017 as a deputy head of a large primary school-deciding that I didn’t want to be a Head after all as I enjoyed being a teacher! Not bad going for someone who was technically written off at 10…

We had to travel to the grammar school a few miles away by bus to take the test which was nerve wracking to start with considering I’d always walked to school. I recall thinking it was quite easy. I passed, a letter was sent to my parents. They were so proud but neither of my best friends had passed and I was feeling very different about the outcome. I started at the Grammar School, 3 miles away by bus, full uniform (including a hat 🙄). The teachers wore caps and gowns and I found it very intimidating. It soon became apparent that buying the uniform was only the start! I needed hockey kit, tennis kit, fancy ingredients for cookery classes. My parents couldn’t keep up with the cost and I felt very inferior. After 2 years I refused to go. I ended up going to the secondary modern and was with my friends again but it was never the same. All in all my schooldays were a very unpleasant experience for me. I still feel guilt for putting my parents through a very tough time but it was would destroying for me and I wish they’d understood. 😢

REWIRING

I failed!!! However ended up with a 2.1 honours degree and law degree. Apparently when the teacher went round the class asking what we wanted to be when we grew up I said ‘ I want to be happy and enjoy myself’ I would say now not a bad aspiration

I think I wanted a car and a telephone as we had neither. 😁
And my ambition was to be a teacher only because I wanted people to call me Miss Smith because, of course, everyone called me by my first name when I was 10!
(Not my real name.)

Shelflife

I remember being told I would not be going to the grammer school with my friends!! That was awful. My parents were amazing no recriminations. Having ' said ' that I ended up with a first class degree from a good university.
Assessment is very subjective and to test such young children is utter madness!! How can a child be written off aged 11!? and sent to a secondary modern school to receive a sub standard education. Despite my loving parents I always felt a failure. I would hate to see a return of the 11 plus.

Same

Iam64

Shelflife

I remember being told I would not be going to the grammer school with my friends!! That was awful. My parents were amazing no recriminations. Having ' said ' that I ended up with a first class degree from a good university.
Assessment is very subjective and to test such young children is utter madness!! How can a child be written off aged 11!? and sent to a secondary modern school to receive a sub standard education. Despite my loving parents I always felt a failure. I would hate to see a return of the 11 plus.

Same

And the reverse. At grammar school I had a friend who passed her 11 plus, but struggled all the way through because she really was not academic, but was driven by a mother determined that her daughter should make the most of all the opportunities she never had.

She did poorly in her exams, developed a bad stutter and lost all confidence in herself. A year after she left school, she went off to Australia and never came back.

MOnica is right, the system also wasn’t helpful to people who weren’t suited to grammar school environment
Thank goodness for excellent comprehensives.

MiniMoon

I remember sitting the 11 plus and thinking that I'd done well. I was totally crestfallen when the results came and I hadn't passed. It was awful to feel a failure at 11. My mother tried to console me by saying that it would be better to be top of the class in the sec. mod., than bottom at the grammar school. She wasn't really very helpful as all my friends had passed and I had to make a whole set of new friends.
The worst part of it was that the girl I thought was my very best friend totally ignored me whenever we met in the small town where I lived.
It wasn't until I was an adult with a good career in nursing that my mother told me she had gone to ask the headmaster about my 11+ result.
Apparently, that year there had been more children passed than there were places at the grammar school. In another year I would have passed.

Same experience for me.
We moved regularly, not army but similar background, dad moved when told to. I did 5 junior, 3 high school places. No national curriculum so I did the Vikings and little else in history.
It was a dreadful thing to banish the majority as failures and give an excellent education the the few

Is it too late to join these memories?
I took the 11+ exam in the mid 1950s. We had practised the “intelligence” part (called the AH4 I believe) for a while beforehand so we were well used to the format of the test.
My parents received a letter in a brown envelope and I was feeling sick with anticipation as it arrived. When opened, I found that I’d passed, but unlike the earlier mention of a mother’s “chagrin” my mother was so excited by the result that she ran out into the street immediately and knocked on the doors of all the neighbours madly screeching ‘my daughter has passed the scholarship’. It was then that I ‘realised’ that this had all been for her and I felt that somehow I was alienated - no longer a child yet unready for adulthood.
At Grammar school I found it a little difficult to fit in culturally - learning to say ‘large’ instead of ‘big’ for example. However, the teaching was excellent and though I left school when I was still 15 (born in August) I found that I must have absorbed a great deal when 20 years later I went back into education to study A levels, a degree and PhD.

We had to write our name and address in best italic script with a fountain pen beforehand. Our results were sent, addressed to us, not our parents.
The letter offered me a choice of grammar school or comprehensive. In the event, I chose neither and went off to a lovely homely boarding school.
I still have my 11+ letter.

REWIRING

I failed!!! However ended up with a 2.1 honours degree and law degree. Apparently when the teacher went round the class asking what we wanted to be when we grew up I said ‘ I want to be happy and enjoy myself’ I would say now not a bad aspiration

What a wonderful ambition for a child to have - I do hope you achieved that early wish. Apologies - off post - but when I was working in a school, a class of children were asked what they wanted to achieve; one little sweetheart replied 'To get the highest possible level of benefit'.

The county I lived in didn’t do the 11+ anymore by the time I was due to leave primary school in 1970 . Some of very clever children sat tests for scholarships for local private schools .
I went to my local high school and was in the top sets , which meant we took O levels, the middle sets took a mixture of O levels and CSEs and the lower sets took CSEs . My school didn’t have a 6th form , so those wanting to do A levels had to move to another school . Some left school at 16 and some including myself went to the local polytechnics for further education.
We’re very close to the boarder of a LEA which still has grammar schools and both my AC sat the 11+ . They were both in the top sets and their teachers suggested they had the ability to pass, which they did.

Nano14

Marydoll

I knew I had passed, because I was sent to the school office to help the secretary sort out the letters. There were two piles, those who had passed and those, who were not so lucky. I didn't see the letters, but was able to work it out from the names in teh piles.
They were then given out at home time.

I remeber there was a maths and English tests, but if I remember correctly, also what were termed intelligence tests.

Yes, there was definitely an intelligence test. I think I heard I had passed by letter, sent to parents. I also seem to remember there were two parts. My sister only passed the first part and went to a secondary school, while I went to grammar school.

I seem to remember we were the first year to have only an intelligence test to determine who went to the senior secondary. I loved all those ‘ hat is to head as glove is to…….’ questions.
I presume the results came by post, as I remember meeting my first love on the way to school, and he told me he had failed. I was distraught.

Knittypamela

I remember walking home afterwards and my friends were saying what their answers were. I was horrified as my answers were different. As it was, none of us passed. There was a scandal years later when it came to light that girls had marks taken off them.

I think that the percentage of girls passing the 11+ was much lower than the percentage of boys in most places.

There were fewer grammar school places available for girls. Even the mixed grammar schools tended to take more boys and there were simply more grammar schools and direct grant schools for boys. Therefore the pass mark for boys was lower.

I find it extraordinary that so many had preparation of some sort for the exam all those years ago. It was barely mentioned in my school - certainly we didn't do any test papers or trial runs.

LovesBach

REWIRING

I failed!!! However ended up with a 2.1 honours degree and law degree. Apparently when the teacher went round the class asking what we wanted to be when we grew up I said ‘ I want to be happy and enjoy myself’ I would say now not a bad aspiration

What a wonderful ambition for a child to have - I do hope you achieved that early wish. Apologies - off post - but when I was working in a school, a class of children were asked what they wanted to achieve; one little sweetheart replied 'To get the highest possible level of benefit'.

I want to be happy and enjoy myself

It is lovely, isn't it!
Not like materialistic me who wanted a car and telephone.

Perhaps I took being happy for granted but probably thought we might be happier still if we had both of those like my friends!

The 11+ was scrapped in Cumberland in 1967, but a new system of secondary education was introduced where every pupil had to spend two years in a secondary modern and was then assessed whether or not they would go to the grammar school. What happened was half way through the second year, a head of house would meet up with the teachers and decide from your three school reports if you were suitable for the grammar school ot would stay in the secondary modern. You would then get a letter sent home in the February of the second year which would state grammar school, borderline( you could go to the grammar school, but stay in the secondary modern if you wanted) or secondary, which meant you had to stay in the secondary moden. I got the words " grammar school" on mine and my mother bought me a Monty Python LP for passing.
The system was more equitable as it removed the them and us situation of the 11+, but there were big differences once you changed schools at the start of the third form. The 25% who went to the grammar school took O and A levels, studied subjects like German and music that weren't taken in the secondary modetns, and had better qualified teachers. For the 75% stuck in the secondary moderns, subjects could only be taken as CSEs to age 16, and there was a heavy emphasis on craft subjects for boys and home economics for girls, with academuc subjects being less important.
This system, which was probably unique, ended in 1984 when all the local schools merged into 11-18 comprehensives and the 13+ was abolished. It was interesting that many of the secondary modern teachers who were over 50 that had basic teaching qualifications took early retirement, and the ex grammar teachers now had to teach a wider range of pupils( some retired early as well after a year or two). Also while the rigid distinctions with subjects and qualifications was phased out by 1986, the school did have streaming for various subjects.