Lincolnshire 11+ tutors and Lincs grammar test prep

Lincolnshire 11+ tutors and Lincs grammar test prep

Lincolnshire has 15 selective schools. Fourteen share one GL Assessment test through the Lincolnshire Consortium of Grammar Schools, and Caistor Grammar sets its own papers. The consortium test covers verbal reasoning and non-verbal and spatial reasoning only, and is sat in September of Year 6.

Quick reference

The Lincolnshire 11+ in plain English

There are 15 selective schools in Lincolnshire. Fourteen of them share one test through the Lincolnshire Consortium of Grammar Schools. Caistor Grammar School sets its own separate papers on its own dates.

GL Assessment supplies the consortium test. There are two papers: verbal reasoning, and non-verbal and spatial reasoning. There's no English paper and no maths paper. Both are multiple choice, and children shade their answers on an optical mark reading sheet. You register through an individual grammar school while your child is in Year 5, and the papers are sat in September of Year 6. Applying for a school place is a separate step: you apply through your home council, and the national deadline is 31 October.

To qualify, a child needs a total standardised score of 220 across the two papers, which is set to pick out the top 25% of children by ability. Reaching 220 doesn't guarantee a place at any particular school, because each school then applies its own rules for deciding who gets a place when it's oversubscribed.

Paper format

There are two papers, sat a week apart.

The verbal reasoning paper starts with a ten-minute practice test. The non-verbal paper is split into sections, each with a few practice questions that aren't marked, and the number of sections varies from year to year. Both are tests of reasoning rather than of what children have learned, so there's no curriculum content to revise. Familiarisation varies by school. Some run their own practice sessions or familiarisation tests (Bourne holds one on 5 September, and QEHS Gainsborough runs two), and GL Assessment's practice packs, which can be downloaded free, follow the same format.

Caistor Grammar runs a different test: two verbal reasoning papers, one standard written paper and one multiple choice. There's no non-verbal paper. Caistor also uses a qualifying score of 220, and its catchment area is 6.5 miles from the school.

The Lincolnshire grammar schools

The 14 consortium schools are:

• Boston Grammar School

• Boston High School

• Bourne Grammar School

• Carre's Grammar School, Sleaford

• Kesteven and Sleaford High School

• Kesteven and Grantham Girls' School

• The King's School, Grantham

• King Edward VI Grammar School, Louth

• Queen Elizabeth's Grammar, Alford

• Queen Elizabeth's Grammar School, Horncastle

• Queen Elizabeth's High School, Gainsborough

• Skegness Grammar School

• Spalding Grammar School

• Spalding High School

Caistor Grammar School is the fifteenth selective school and runs its own test.

King Edward VI Academy in Spilsby works differently. It's a bilateral school: it uses the Lincolnshire 11+ for its grammar stream, but also takes children who haven't sat or passed it.

Two schools are sometimes wrongly grouped with the grammars. Lincoln Christ's Hospital School is non-selective. Sir John Nelthorpe School in Brigg is also non-selective, and it's in North Lincolnshire rather than Lincolnshire. Neither uses the 11+. The Stamford Endowed Schools are independent, fee-paying schools with their own entrance tests.

Each school has its own catchment area, and Lincolnshire is a big county, so distance often decides which schools are realistic.

Typical prep for the Lincolnshire 11+

Because both papers test reasoning only, preparation looks different from areas that test English and maths. Early on, the focus is on reading widely and building vocabulary, which verbal reasoning draws on, alongside getting comfortable with patterns, symmetry and rotation for the non-verbal paper.

In the middle stretch, work through the question types one at a time, because both papers reward recognising a question format quickly rather than working it out from scratch. In the final months, do timed papers and practise using the answer sheet. Shading answers accurately under time pressure is a skill in its own right.

Some schools, such as QEHS Gainsborough, say their own familiarisation tests are enough preparation. Families weigh that up differently, and a tutor is most useful when a child is close to the qualifying score or not used to reasoning-style questions.

Choosing a tutor

Ask whether the tutor has prepared children for the Lincolnshire consortium papers recently, and whether they know the test is verbal and non-verbal reasoning only. A tutor offering English comprehension and maths practice for the Lincolnshire 11+ is working from the wrong format. If you're aiming for Caistor, ask specifically about its standard written verbal reasoning paper, which is a different task from multiple choice.

Given the county's geography, online tutoring is often the more practical option, and it opens up tutors elsewhere who work with GL Assessment reasoning papers.