11+ Kent Test Pass Marks - raw and standardised scores

Kent Test Pass Marks – Standardised Score

Each child taking the Kent Test (11+) will be given three standardised scores: 1 for Reasoning, 1 for Maths and 1 for English. It should be noted that the reasoning score covers both verbal, non-verbal and spatial reasoning questions.

Effectively a mark of 100 is seen as that expected by the “average” child. In 2014 and 2015, to automatically pass the 11+ your child needed to achieve a standardised mark of 106 in each of the three scores and also get a minimum aggregated mark of 320.

Standardised scores take into account factors like age of the child at the time of the exam. Further info on standardised scores can be found in this very useful GL Assessment document. I've also included the official Kent Education web site link below too.

http://www.gl-assessment.co.uk/sites/gl/files/images/Guide-to-Standardised-Tests.pdf

http://www.kent.gov.uk/education-and-children/schools/school-places/kent-test

Kent Test Pass Marks – Raw Score

However, what surprises many parents is that, in terms of the raw score achieved in each paper, the percentage to get a pass mark is quite low. I found that being conscious of these pass marks reduced the pressure to achieve ever higher grades in the mock papers my children took (I will publish a listing of these marks in a later posting). At a extreme level, the maths pass grade in 2014 was, depending on age, 37%!

The following tables provide a breakdown of the raw marks needed to achieve a 106 standardised mark in each of the three papers taken in the Kent Test.

For the 2014 test, a child aged 10 years 1 month on the day of the exam needed the following scores to achieve the 106 standardised score in each paper

Column1	raw pass mark to pass	Total questions	percentage
Maths	11	30	37%
English	16	24	67%
Reasoning	37	80	46%

More 2014 data can be found at the following link:
http://www.elevenplusforum.org.uk/viewtopic.php?f=24&t=93&sid=aed2cc09f271420ae1f0fa3c2767d35b

For the 2015 test, a child aged 10 years 1 month on the day of the exam needed the following scores to achieve the 106 standardised score in each paper

Column1	raw pass mark to pass	Total questions	percentage
Maths	10	25	40%
English	12	24	50%
Reasoning	33	80	41%

More 2015 data can be found at the following link:
http://www.elevenplusforum.org.uk/viewtopic.php?f=24&t=115

Commentary of the variation in pass marks between 2014 and 2015

Having had both my children take the Kent Test (11+) in 2014 and 2015 I can add the following commentary to the variation in the raw pass scores between the 2 years.

1. It is clear that the Maths paper in 2014 was too hard. As touched upon in an earlier posting, pupils were left with too short a time to fill in the questions (30 questions in 25 minutes), something that was compounded by some of the questions being very tricky. By reducing the number of questions to 25 (in 25 minutes) this has eased the tricky nature of this paper.
2. Conversely the English paper was a little too easy in 2014, indeed to get the top standardised mark of 138 you needed to get all 24 questions correct- regardless of age. It would seem that this issue was rectified in 2015- with a significantly lower percentage required to get a pass mark.
3. With reference to the reasoning paper- from feedback it would seem that the verbal and non-verbal all followed the type of questions in the GL Assessment practice papers. However, there was one spatial section in the 2015 paper that was, from feedback, exceptionally tricky- it was based on shape nets- and I wouldn't be surprised if this section alone was responsible for  the fall in the reasoning pass mark in 2015.