At this stage, the most useful thing you can do is stop trying to do a bit of everything and start working out, as accurately as possible, where the remaining gaps are.
That doesn’t mean panicking. It doesn’t mean throwing ten more random practice papers at your child and hoping one of them works some sort of magical grammar-school spell. And it definitely doesn’t mean trying to reteach the whole of Year 5 between now and September while everyone slowly loses the will to live.
It means being strategic.
It means using the next few weeks to answer some very specific questions:
• Which topics are genuinely secure, and which only look secure when there’s no time pressure?
• Which question types are still causing trouble?
• Are marks being lost because of knowledge gaps, careless slips, slow working, or panic under timed conditions?
• In maths particularly, which bits of maths are still wobbly?
Those are the questions that matter now.
And the best way to answer them is through well-designed mock tests and, for maths, a proper diagnostic test.
Mock tests are no longer just “practice”
Earlier in the 11 Plus journey, mock tests are often about familiarity: getting used to timings, layout, answer sheets and the general business of working under pressure.
By late June, though, a mock test should be doing a second job as well: it should be giving you information.
A useful mock test doesn’t just tell you that your child scored 68% in English or 72% in verbal reasoning. That’s mildly interesting, but on its own it doesn’t tell you what to do next.
What you really want is the sort of feedback that helps you spot patterns.
For example:
• Is your child starting strongly and then fading halfway through the paper?
• Are they making a cluster of mistakes in one particular question type?
• Are they losing marks because they don’t know the content, or because they know it but can’t apply it quickly enough under pressure?
• Are they consistently weaker on worded maths problems than on straightforward calculations?
• Are they spending too long on difficult questions and then running out of time on easier ones later?
That is the sort of information that helps you improve a score between now and September.
A mock test, in other words, should not simply produce a number. It should help you work out why that number happened.
Why maths needs something more forensic
Maths is often the trickiest subject to untangle from a mock result alone.
Suppose a child scores 61% on a maths paper. What does that actually tell you?
Not much, on its own.
It might mean they need to revise fractions.
It might mean they’re fine at fractions but weak on algebra.
It might mean they understand the maths but misread word problems.
It might mean they’re strong on straightforward methods but get lost as soon as a question combines three steps.
It might mean they’re reasonably secure overall but have one or two topic gaps quietly wrecking the paper.
A score can’t tell you that.
And that’s why, at this point in the year, I’m a huge fan of diagnostic maths testing.
A true diagnostic test doesn’t just say, “Here is your percentage.” It digs into the paper topic by topic and shows you where the strengths and weaknesses actually are.
That matters because maths is such a sprawling beast. “Maths” isn’t one thing. It’s arithmetic, fractions, percentages, angles, factors, shapes, measures, algebraic thinking, word problems, data handling and all the rest of it, jostling around in one paper and trying to look like a single subject.
A diagnostic test helps separate that tangle out.
It can show you, for example, that a child is:
• strong on place value and written arithmetic
• absolutely fine on perimeter and area
• not bad at straightforward fractions
• distinctly shaky on percentages
• prone to getting muddled by multi-step word problems
• better at number work than at interpreting tables and charts
And that is extremely useful information in July, because it stops you wasting time revising the wrong things.
The goal now is not “more work” - it’s better-targeted work
This is the point in the summer when some children end up doing lots and lots of 11 Plus work without actually moving the needle very much.
Why? Because they’re working hard in the wrong places.
If a child is already secure on punctuation, verbal reasoning code questions and half of the maths curriculum, there is very little value in spending another six weeks revisiting those same comfortable areas. It feels productive, because everyone is busy, but it isn’t necessarily the best use of the time available.
The real gains usually come from finding the weaker spots and tackling them directly.
That’s why the most sensible late-June / summer-holiday plan often looks something like this:
1. Take a premium mock test that gives detailed feedback
Use it to see how your child performs under timed conditions in English, maths and verbal and non-verbal reasoning.
2. Analyse the feedback properly
Not just the score. The pattern.
Where were the marks lost?
Which question types were weak?
Was timing a problem?
Did confidence wobble under pressure?
3. For maths, go deeper with a diagnostic test
If maths feels patchy, or if the premium mock result isn’t telling you enough, this is often the most efficient next step.
4. Make a short list of priority gaps
Not a giant terrifying spreadsheet of everything your child has ever found difficult since Year 3. A short list.
Perhaps:
• algebra
• fractions
• multi-step word problems
• one verbal reasoning type that keeps going wrong
• one or two non-verbal patterns that still haven’t clicked
5. Work on those things deliberately
That’s where the summer effort should go: not into endless random papers, but into shoring up the bits that are still wobbling.
6. Retest later
A second premium mock tells you whether those weaker areas are actually improving under pressure.
That cycle - test, analyse, target, retest - is usually far more effective than simply doing “more papers”.
So what should parents do now?
If your child is sitting the 11 Plus in September, my advice at the end of June is simple:
Don’t spend the summer guessing.
Don’t assume that because a score is “not bad”, everything is fine.
Don’t assume that because a paper went badly, the answer is to do five more of the same.
Don’t keep revising comfortable topics just because they feel reassuring - and believe me, given half a chance, that's what your child will do - and who can blame them!
Instead:
• take premium mock tests that give meaningful feedback
• look for patterns, not just percentages
• use diagnostic testing in maths to pinpoint topic-level gaps
• then spend the summer fixing the things that are actually holding your child back
That approach may not feel as dramatic as panic-buying a mountain of practice papers and wallpapering the kitchen with them, but it is usually much more effective.
The children who make the best use of the summer are not always the ones who do the most work - very often, they are the ones who do the most focused work.
How Club 11 Plus can help
This is exactly the thinking behind the way we’ve built Club 11 Plus.
Our Premium Mock Tests are designed not just to provide timed practice, but to give families useful feedback on how a child is performing and where the weaker areas lie. That means you can use the results to make sensible decisions about what to focus on next, rather than guessing.
For maths, our Maths Diagnostic Tests go a step further by highlighting strengths and weaknesses topic by topic. At this stage of the year, that can be particularly helpful, because it allows parents to see much more clearly where marks are likely to be won or lost - and where revision time will have the biggest impact.
Alongside that, Club 11 Plus also includes a wide range of lessons, quizzes and core mock-test practice across the main 11 Plus subjects, so that once you’ve identified the gaps, you have somewhere to go to start closing them.
So if you’re looking ahead to September and wondering what to do next, my advice would be this:
Don’t guess - diagnose.
Then use the summer to work smart.
If you're not yet a Club 11 Plus member, maybe take advantage of our 2-day FREE trial today. No payment details required.