Year 4 or Year 5: when should 11+ practice begin?

The short answer

Year 5 is when most families begin test-specific practice, and it gives a child enough time. Year 4 is not wasted - but what helps in Year 4 is reading, number fluency and curiosity, not papers. The question is less “which year” than “what kind of preparation suits each year”.

What Year 4 is for

A child in Year 4 is usually eight or nine. Much of the maths on a GL-style paper is upper Key Stage 2 material that they have not yet met at school, so a Year 4 child sitting a practice paper meets questions that are early rather than hard - and can draw the wrong conclusion about themselves. That is the main reason we would not put papers in front of a Year 4 child.

What Year 5 is for

Year 5 is the year for becoming familiar with the four subjects and the question styles, in short regular sessions. The school will be teaching more of the maths the paper draws on as the year goes by, so practice and lessons reinforce each other rather than pulling apart. Untimed sets first, so method and accuracy settle; a first timed paper towards the end of the year, so the format is not a surprise; and the run-up in the summer and the autumn term of Year 6, when mocks join the routine.

A child who begins at the start of Year 5 has a full school year before an autumn-term test. A child who begins in the spring of Year 5 has less, and still enough for a steady routine - the routine matters more than the length of the run-in. Our guide to how much practice is enough sets out what that routine looks like.

Why the test's timing matters

In most grammar-school areas the test is sat in the autumn term of Year 6, and registration closes earlier - in a number of areas, before Year 6 begins. That is the practical reason Year 5 is the year to plan in: by the time Year 6 starts, the registration decision has usually already been made. Our exam-dates tool lists what we currently understand for each area, with a verification label on every entry; the admissions page of the school or council is the authoritative source.

What to avoid in either year

• Timed papers in Year 4, or early in Year 5, before the content has been met.
• Judging progress by a single score rather than by which topics are settling.
• Letting the routine grow: a longer session is not a better one.
• Letting the test become the family's main topic of conversation.

Before planning either year, confirm that the test is GL-style: our guide to which exam board your school uses explains the four families, and when to start covers the wider question of timing.