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Langley Grammar School 11+ guide

By Atom | Apr 16, 2024, 3:01 PM

Langley Grammar School, Slough (Berkshire)

Thinking about applying to Langley Grammar School? Find out everything you need to know about admissions in 2024–2025 and how to prepare your child for success in the 11 plus entrance exam.

Key information for Langley Grammar School

Dates for your diary

The 2025 exam dates haven’t been published yet. However, they are likely to be the same as 2024. Please use the dates below as a guide.

  • Wednesday 1st May 2024: Slough 11+ registration opens

  • Monday 12th June 2024: Slough 11+ registration closes

  • Saturday 21st September 2024: Slough Consortium 11+ entrance test

  • Mid-October 2024: parents receive test results

  • Thursday 31st October 2024: secondary school applications close at 5pm

  • Monday 3rd March 2025: secondary school national offers day

About Langley Grammar School

Langley Grammar School is a grammar school in Langley, Slough for boys and girls. In 2023, The Sunday Times recognised Langley Grammar as a top 10 school for academic results in the southeast.

Langley Grammar School has a vibrant and cosmopolitan student population. Students come from a wide range of backgrounds to create a friendly and harmonious population. Enthusiastic staff support students to become well-rounded, confident and creative young adults.

Ofsted rate Langley Grammar School 'outstanding' in all areas. It praises the broad and ambitious curriculum, a diverse extracurricular programme, and students' exemplary behaviour.

How to apply to Langley Grammar School

Langley Grammar School is a selective state school. This means that your child will need to take the 11 plus exam to be eligible for a place in Year 7.

Langley Grammar School is a member of the Slough Consortium of Grammar Schools. All four grammar schools in the Consortium share the same entrance test. This means that your child will only need to take the test once – even if you’re applying to more than one grammar school in Slough.

The registration portal for the Slough Consortium of Grammar School will open in April 2025 and close in June 2025. After registration, your child will be invited to take the 11 plus exam at one of the participating schools. The Slough 11 plus exam will be held in September 2025 and you’ll receive your child’s results in mid-October.

To apply to Langley Grammar School, you’ll need to name the school as one of your preferred schools on the secondary school common application form. This will be available on your home council website from early September and must be submitted by 31st October 2025.

Remember – passing the 11 plus doesn’t guarantee that your child will be allocated a place at your preferred school. Many grammar schools are often oversubscribed with qualified children. Schools and their admissions authorities work through admissions criteria to prioritise children for places. We’ve included the admissions criteria for Langley Grammar School below.

What subjects are on the Slough 11 plus?

The Slough Consortium 11 plus exam consists of two papers provided by GL Assessment. Most grammar schools in the UK use 11 plus papers provided by GL Assessment.

Each test lasts around one hour. This includes time for instructions, some worked (unmarked) example questions, and the real test questions. Your child will take both tests on the same day. There is a short break between the two papers.

One paper tests verbal skills, which includes English and verbal reasoning. The other paper tests non-verbal skills, which includes maths and non-verbal reasoning.

Practice papers and video lessons

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Verbal reasoning paper

How does place allocation work at Langley Grammar School?

After the test, your child’s answer sheets are marked using Optical Mark Recognition (OMR). This technology picks up the marks your child has made to indicate which answers they think are correct. Your child receives a mark for every correct answer.

Your child’s raw scores are then age-standardised. This is a common practice in 11 plus scoring to make the exam fair for children born throughout the academic year. Standardisation takes into account how well your child has performed compared with the average performance of all children who took that particular test. It also shows how your child has performed compared with children of a similar age (e.g. born in the same month and year).

The standardised pass mark for the Slough Consortium 11 plus exam is 111. If your child achieves a score of 111 or higher, they will be eligible for a place at Langley Grammar School. In September 2022, 745 children applying to Langley Grammar were considered eligible for a place.

When the number of children who achieve the pass mark exceeds the number of places available, the school applies oversubscription criteria. Eligible children are prioritised for places at Langley Grammar School in this order:

  1. Looked after children and previously looked after children

  2. Children who live within the school Priority Area (up to a maximum of 100 places). Places in this group are prioritised for children who are eligible for Pupil Premium

  3. Children who live within the school Priority Area 2 and who are eligible for Pupil Premium

  4. Children of permanent members of Langley Grammar School staff (employed for at least two years)

  5. Children who live within the school Priority Area 2, in rank order of 11 plus score

  6. Children who live within the school Priority Area 3, in rank order of 11 plus score

  7. Children who live outside any of the priority areas, in rank order of 11 plus score

In 2023, places were filled from criterions 1–5. The lowest score for which a child who lives within Priority Area 2 was offered a place at the school was 116.

What’s the catchment area for Langley Grammar School?

Langley Grammar School has three Priority Areas which are based on postcodes. These are used to allocate places at the school.

  • Priority Area 1: postcodes SL3 7, SL3 8, SL3 9, and SL3 0

  • Priority Area 2: SL0, SL1, SL2, SL3 (outside Priority Area 1), SL4 TW18, TW19, TW20 UB3, UB4, UB7, UB8, and UB10

  • Priority Area 3: postcodes SL5, SL6, SL7, SL8, SL9 TW3, TW4, TW5, TW7, TW13, TW14, TW15 UB1, UB2, UB5, UB6, UB9 HA1, HA2, HA3, HA4, HA5, HA6 W5, W7, W13 RG12, and RG42

Atom’s top tips for 11 plus preparation

The Slough Consortium of Grammar Schools 11 plus exam is designed to select the most academically-able children in Slough and the surrounding area. In 2023, 15% of children who sat the Slough Consortium 11+ were offered places at Slough grammar schools.

Here are our top tips to help you and your child feel confident for exam day.

Bitesize learning

It’s important to build a good knowledge base before the 11 plus. Using a ‘little and often’ approach when learning is key – our brains encode new information more effectively when dealing with smaller ‘chunks’ of information. For children aged 10–11, child psychologists recommend regular study sessions of 20–30 minutes.

Atom Home makes learning a more enjoyable process for your child. They'll explore exciting worlds full of interactive questions, earning coins to spend in the Atom shop. Atom adapts to your child, showing them questions at just the right level of difficulty to keep them motivated.

A maths learning journey on Atom Home

Read widely

11 plus exams test your child’s ability to analyse and interpret written information. Regular reading is a great way to help your child build these skills.

Encourage them to read books from different genres and by a diverse range of authors. Increasing the variety of your child’s reading will help them understand different styles, tones and purposes. Meanwhile, reading a little every day will help widen their vocabulary, sharpen their analytical thinking, and enhance their imagination.

Refine exam technique

When your child feels confident with the topics they’ve learnt in Year 5, they’ll be ready to put their knowledge to the test.

Practice tests can help your child develop problem-solving skills and build confidence working under test conditions. They’re also a great way to consolidate learning and highlight knowledge gaps for further improvement.

With Atom Home, you'll unlock online mock tests and printable practice papers for the Slough Consortium 11 plus exam. Enjoy automatic marking and progress tracking with the online tests, and help your child get familiar with the real exam experience with printable practice papers.

A non-verbal reasoning question on a Slough 11 plus mock test on Atom Home

Celebrate progress

Setting regular, achievable goals and celebrating your child’s progress – no matter how big or small – will help keep their motivation high.

Make sure to encourage a growth mindset. This means celebrating effort, as well as achievement! When your child makes mistakes or struggles to understand a particular topic, help them understand that they’ll improve through practice. Regular praise will help your child improve their resilience when tackling new and challenging topics.

Tailored preparation for the Slough 11 plus

Wish you could give your child a roadmap to success in the Slough Consortium 11 plus? You can. Atom Home has everything you need to get prepared, in one package.

You don't need a tutor to get into your top-choice grammar school. You just need Atom. We’ll create a tailored plan for your child and support them along their fun revision journey.

  • Online and printable Slough 11 plus practice papers

  • 90,000+ adaptive questions

  • 500+ hours of on-demand video lessons

  • Automatic marking and instant progress data

Atom Home

Navigate the Slough 11 plus with confidence.

In 2024, 91% of Atom users got offered a place at their top-choice school.

Start your free trial today. Our specialists will get to work on your child’s plan. Relax, Slough 11 plus prep is sorted.

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Georgie's weekly exam prep plan on Atom Home

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