Ewan M

I’ve successfully prepared students for 11+ for leading schools including St Pauls’ Boys and St Pauls’ Girls, King’s Wimbledon, Ibstock Place, NLCS, UCS, Whitgift, City Boys, Tonbridge, Wellington and others. I’ve also had extensive experience of 13+ entry. In addition I have a specialist knowledge of the ELAT exams for Oxford and Cambridge, and have coached a number of successful Oxbridge applicants.

11+ English (Independent School Entry – St Paul’s Girls’ School)

I tutored this student over eight months in preparation for the 11+ exams across a range of academic London day schools. We focused on improving her comprehension, creative writing, and on some period literary texts (Wordsworth, Shakespeare etc) in anticipation of the extra paper and interview. She gained confidence in expressing her ideas clearly and learned to plan responses to be written under pressurised timed conditions. We also worked hard on expanding her critical vocabulary in order to give her more ways of expressing ideas about the writer’s craft. She secured offers from multiple schools, ultimately accepting a place at St Paul’s Girls’.

13+ English (Key Stage 3 – Whitgift School)

This student received weekly support across six months in preparation for the 13+ entrance exam for Whitgift. They are a very talented hockey player, but had failed to achieve a place at 11+ at any school – in part because of their demanding training schedule. Their confidence was low in English and particularly for creative writing. I also discovered that provision for them in English basics such as SPAG and essay writing had been impacted by low quality lessons during Covid. We developed their ability to write structured analytical paragraphs and improved their vocabulary, spelling and grammar. We also spent a great deal of time on exam technique in order to help them get down more high quality writing. We also spent a lot of time playing writing games to help them develop their imagination and confidence in writing creatively. They were successful in their application and took up a place at Whitgift.

Key Stage 3 English (Year 9 – London Oratory School)

This student struggled with reading comprehension and essay writing in part because of dyslexia, which had been masked by his considerable intelligence. His parents wanted me to support him by reviewing his skills and helping ensure that he could do the basics that would be required for GCSE in Year 10. Over a full school year, we focused on identifying themes, structuring both short responses and essays and expanding his critical vocabulary. We also looked at short stories, a selection of heritage poetry and some Shakespeare. By the end of Year 9, he had moved from below-average to top of his set in English. His teachers noted that his written performance in end of year exams was significantly improved.

IGCSE English Language and Literature (Edexcel – Whitgift School)

I supported this student for 18 months leading up to his IGCSEs – we shadowed his school work throughout. Initially, he needed guidance on developing literary insight and refining his analysis for Literature. He was often able to spot interesting implied or secondary meanings in texts, but struggled to write about why the writer was using them. He had little experience of writing about unseen poetry and so needed help on this too. English Language was proving difficult for him because of the complex demands of the exam paper with multiple questions and answer styles. We eventually worked up to practising past papers extensively and he achieved 9s in both Language and Literature.

A-Level English Literature (OCR – King’s Canterbury)

This student received weekly support of an hour throughout the last four terms of Sixth Form (Year 12 into Year 13). He had only barely achieved a D grade in Y12 summer exams and was in danger of missing out on his university targets as a result. He had managed to get by in class but was lacking a detailed knowledge or understanding of all of his key texts. We had to start by re-reading and re-teaching all of the key texts, before moving onto improving his writing and exam technique. We concentrated on improving argument structure, engaging with secondary criticism, and relating difficult historical context to the texts. He progressed from a D to an B, securing a place at Bristol.

A-Level English Literature (AQA – Tiffin Girls’ School)

This student held a Cambridge offer but had lost confidence in her English after receiving a C grade UCAS prediction in English. She had been confused by conflicting advice from teachers and the complex requirements of the exams was making this worse. We worked for a short period of around two months and focused almost exclusively on simplifying the exams and the format, structure and style needed to write essays. She did superbly, gained an A* and her place at Cambridge.

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