Are There Any Grammar Schools in London? Recommended Schools and Tips For Parents

Mixed Gender Schools

• The Latymer School (Enfield)

• Bexley Grammar (Bexley)

• Chislehurst and Sidcup School (Bexley)

Girls’ Schools

• Henrietta Barnett (Barnet)

• QE Girls (Barnet)

• St Michael’s (Barnet)

• Townley Grammar (Bexley)

• Newstead Wood School (Bromley)

• Nonsuch High School For Girls (Surrey)

• Wallington High School For Girls (Surrey)

• Tiffin Girls’ (Kingston)

• Woodford County (Redbridge)

Boys’ Schools

• St Olave’s & St Saviour’s Grammar (Bromley)

• Beths Grammar School (Bexley)

• Tiffin School (Kingston Upon Thames)

• Ilford County (Redbridge)

• Sutton Grammar School (Sutton)

• Wellington County Grammar (Sutton)

• Wilson’s School (Sutton)

A quick list of popular grammar schools in neighbouring counties

Schools in Buckinghamshire

• Dr Challoner’s Grammar School, The Royal Grammar School, The Royal Latin School, Wycombe High School

Schools in Berkshire

• Herschel Grammar School, Langley Grammar, St Bernards’s Catholic Grammar School, Upton Court

Creative Writing Prompts For 11+ Students

Whilst schools are closed, we’re working on sharing materials and resources to help students make the most of their time indoors.

Today, I’m sharing a set of 6 Creative Writing Prompts that are ideal for helping your child to improve their writing.

These title-based prompts are great for helping students to write stories based on topics or titles that could potentially come up in the exam.

However, if your child isn’t preparing for the 11+, don’t fret, you can still use them. Feel free to encourage your child to write stories that are imaginative, engaging and fun.

What Examiners Are Looking For

Teachers and examiners pay attention to four specific things when marking creative writing compositions. I call these things SOCs (and yes, I’m proud to say I made that acronym up myself :)

Read on to learn what SOCs stands for:

Structure

• Has your child laid out their work correctly using paragraphs?

• Do their sentences flow?

• Do they use fronted adverbials to transition between sentences?

Originality

• Is your child’s composition original?

• Do they demonstrate the ability to use language creatively?

Creativity

• Does your child have creative thoughts and ideas?

• Can they convey these ideas clearly without confusing the reader?

• Can your child include twists and turns whilst still making the story interesting and easy to follow?

SPAG (Spelling, punctuation and grammar)

• Has your child read through their work carefully to prevent and reduce SPAG mistakes?

The acronym (SOCs) helps students to remember how to score higher marks in a way that’s really easy. Plus, who doesn’t love acronyms? I’m obsessed with them and I’m proud to be able to say I completely made SOCs up :)

Free Festive Creative Writing Prompt - Ideal For Christmas or The New Year

Happy New Year!

As we celebrate the start of 2021, it’s a great time for students to spend a bit of extra time building their writing skills.

To help your child do just that, we’ve created this creative writing prompt that has been inspired by Christmas.

Before you download the prompt, here are some quick tips to help your child:

Emphasise the importance of checking SPAG (spelling, punctuation and grammar).

We encourage students to check their SPAG as many times as possible because most people will make SPAG mistakes at some point (we’re human after all). However, to minimise the amount of mistakes made, it’s key to check SPAG over and over again.

Read a wide variety of literature for inspiration.

Most children prefer to stick to reading one type of literature (which is perfectly normal). However, to improve one’s writing, it’s important to read a wide variety of texts as it helps with sentence clarity, vocabulary and the overall development of excellent writing skills.

Listen In

If your child isn’t much of a reader, encourage them to listen to child-friendly radio stations (you can listen in with them and discuss the topics for even better interaction). If you’re able to, consider an audible subscription as audiobooks are fantastic for helping children to visualise texts and enhance their imagination.

Make writing fun

If your child has an exam coming up, it’s natural to feel the need to pressurise them to write as much as possible. However, the best writers are those that genuinely enjoy writing so try to have a positive attitude and mindset around it. For example, use fun and engaging writing prompts like the one below or create your own if you’re able to.

Finally, download our free Creative Writing Booster Kit to help your child improve their writing in as little as 5-days. We’re offering it for a limited time only so grab it whilst it’s still available.

THE UK’S 50 BEST BAME STARTUPS AND BUSINESSES ANNOUNCED – TECHROUND’S BAME50 UNDER 50

26th October 2020 – London, UK –

We are delighted to announce that Victoria Olubi-Ademosu of Tutoress has been named as a finalist in TechRound’s BAME 50 Under 50, which ranks the top 50 BAME-driven and founded businesses and startups in the UK, praised for their innovation and contribution to the UK's fast-growing startup scene, whilst smashing social barriers along the way.

The announcement follows over 500 applications and a week of judging from an expert panel including Linda Plant; successful entrepreneur and renowned interviewer on BBC’s The Apprentice, as well as Rajeeb Dey, co-Founder of Learnebly and Startup Britain, Kike Oniwinde, Former Team GB athlete and CEO of BYP Network and Bindi Karia, the UK’s ‘Queen of Startups.’

TechRound is the UK’s leading voice for startup news and opinions and the BAME50 Under 50 highlights the diversity and success in the UK startup and business sectors, with people from all walks of life and from all nature of backgrounds demonstrating their ingenuity and creativity. TechRound remains the best place in the UK to showcase the talent and progress in the startup and tech industry.

The judges commended the innovation and hard work of all the entries and the entrepreneurs. One judge reportedly said that she was ‘bloody impressed’ with the quality of candidates and their ideas, which is a huge credit to the BAME community living in the UK, who continue to work hard and thrive despite various social and economic challenges.

TechRound co-Founder David Soffer commented: “The UK is one of the best places in the world to start and grow a startup. TechRound’s BAME50 Under 50 goes to show that people of all backgrounds have thrived in the UK. The BAME50 Under 50 also goes to show that there are some wonderful businesses and ventures, started, run and sustained by the UK’s fabulous BAME communities, something we hope will continue.” 

“Part of what makes the UK such a huge global player when it comes to startups, tech and innovation is that there is such depth of diversity, with people bringing their different experiences and backgrounds into startups and business, which are both all about being creative.”
TechRound co-Founder Daniel Tannenbaum said: “ The BAME50 Under 50 is set to be a game changer and will promote those individuals who have fought harder than most to succeed and their stories will outline their journeys. As we are well aware, BAME entrepreneurs have historically been underfunded and underrepresented and this list’s purpose is to help change the status quo.”

“We want to celebrate people from all backgrounds and businesses of all sizes and this list will be a testament to those individuals who are diversifying the UK’s startup landscape.”

---ENDS---

For more information and press interview, please contact:

Co-Founder & Editor: David Soffer – david@tudorlodgeconsultants.com

Co-Founder & Editor: Daniel Tannenbaum – daniel@tudorlodgeconsultants.com 

About TechRound

TechRound is one of the UK’s fastest-growing platforms for startups and tech businesses. Founded in 2016 and based in London, TechRound has worked with some of the UK’s hottest startups and has helped countless startups and fledging businesses get off the ground and achieve success. TechRound is a regular source of information and guidance for new businesses and a platform for some of the best-known companies in the world to gain exposure to new companies and opportunities.

How To Write Engaging Character Descriptions - Facebook Live Tutorial ( Part 1)

Firstly, a big thank you to all of the parents that have sent in emails and messages to share how much your child enjoys our Facebook Live sessions. It means the world to us!

In today’s blog post, we’re delving into character descriptions. To tackle this very important area of creative writing, we’re sharing one of our recent Facebook Live tutorials where our founder, Mrs Victoria, teaches students how to write descriptions that impress teachers.

You see, when it comes to creative writing, it’s vital that students know how to write character descriptions in a way that is effective, gripping and interesting so that they can maximise marks.

It’s also a lifelong skill that is needed throughout KS2, 3 and 4. Furthermore, writing great character descriptions helps students to make their stories more interesting, vibrant, unique and engaging so that the reader wants to continue reading their story.

Unfortunately, most children write stories with boring character descriptions. Let’s take a look at some examples of these types of descriptions:

• He had brown hair.

• She was a short and sweet girl.

• He was incredibly rude.

Why are these descriptions bad?

• Because they don’t allow the reader to picture the character that is being mentioned.

• They give us little information about the character and these descriptions don’t enable our imaginations to run wild.

To score top marks, we want to write vivid, colourful descriptions that create pictures in the mind of readers.

The thing with creative writing is that improving your child’s marks doesn’t have to be a difficult process - it really just involves teaching them quick but powerful tricks to help them write more descriptively and imaginatively.

Let’s look at some great descriptions by watching the Live tutorial below. Click the ‘play’ button to get started.