Articles for parents

How will Kumon help my child pass the 11+ exams?

May 2013
 Does Kumon help children with their 11 plus exams?
We set the bar very high in what we expect our students to achieve through our individualised instruction

The Kumon Maths and English Programmes are designed to achieve the maximum effect in the shortest time possible. They are both structured in a linear way with each learning topic following on from the one before. Furthermore, the Kumon Method of Learning aims to foster self-learning skills; the ability to learn for oneself topics that have not yet been covered at school.

For students to have the opportunity to study material they have not been taught before, we aim for them to progress to a level higher than that of their school grade within their first year of study with Kumon. Therefore, given that you enrol with us a minimum of one year prior to the 11+ exams, your child will have progressed to a level of work higher than their respective school grade by the time they sit their exams.

The Kumon programmes are not specifically designed to match the style of questions or every exact topic covered in the 11+ maths or English tests. In fact, as Kumon is an international organisation, our programmes do not directly follow any country's school curriculum. However, we set the bar very high in what we expect our students to achieve through our individualised instruction, in a relatively short period of time, and this produces outstanding results.

Our students develop strong academic ability in these two core subjects; discipline and perseverance in their studies; a strong sense of the importance of goal setting and what it takes to achieve these goals, which ultimately leads to strong self-confidence and belief in one's own power and worth.

Equipped with these skills for life, our students are able to excel in all other aspects of their school, academic or even extracurricular life, be it in different subjects, like science or history, project work, or the 11+ exams.

More specifically, in the maths programme, after rigorous training in the four arithmetic operations - addition, subtraction, multiplication and division - including the traditional long methods and operations with fractions and decimals, students will typically be introduced to algebra and the study of linear equations prior to the 11+ exams.

Similarly, in the English programme, they will have covered all the grammatical elements needed for the 11+ exams, including proper punctuation, sentence structure, paragraph structure, identifying key ideas of paragraphs and summarising texts, all through practising reading comprehension exercises that support the students in building strong spelling ability and a strong vocabulary.

To discuss how Kumon study can benefit your child, contact your local Instructor.