Eleven Plus Time

When children complain to their parents that they have no time to play, mothers are perfectly at liberty to retell a little story their children.

There were some fish in a stream adjacent to a railway line. The fish assembled at the times scheduled for the arrival of the trains - when they were fed by passengers. If the train arrived late, (leaves on the line?) then the fish ignored the train. If a train arrived early – and had to wait at the station – then the fish, once again took no notice of the train. The fish made no response to trains arriving at any but the regular time.

It is not only fish that need to think about time – think of a busy mother with children at three different schools, juggling transport, attention and interest. Think too of a mum at home all day with three under school age children. Think of the work she has to do with her commitments to her children – and the family in general. Many mums must, at time, wish they were back at work!

Think too of the mother who has been at work all day – and arrives home to the chorus that the Eleven Plus exercise was not done because there was no time.

Some mothers feel at one time or another, that when there are competing demands, it is easy for the mums to get into a rut and put their own needs last of all.

Lists could hold the key.

List all the things that you, as a mother or father, like doing – but can’t do because of lack of time. Once the list is reasonably complete, organise the list into some order of priority.

Now list the things you do not like doing.

This `NO!’ list could include watching programs on TV that you don’t really like. Changing bed clothes or helping with `hard’ Eleven Plus mathematics questions.

Now swop around some of the `good activities – and leave the rest for a spell.

Some mothers will no doubt pray that at a given moment some unseen physiological element comes into play. As soon as 4.15 strikes your child will immediately’ pick up a previously sharpened pencil and starts on a complex verbal reasoning exercise. This brings us to the well known Eleven Plus Law.

`”Eleven Plus work is most often executed when there has been a structured elimination of environmental cues.”