How to prepare for the Chesham Grammar School 11+

The exam at a glance

For September 2028 entry, Chesham Grammar School uses the Buckinghamshire Secondary Transfer Test (STT) as part of the county grammar school admissions process. Chesham Grammar School’s admissions information makes clear that Year 7 applications are handled through Buckinghamshire Council’s co-ordinated admissions scheme rather than by the school alone.

The school’s own admissions page and Buckinghamshire Council’s transfer-test information confirm the test is part of the Buckinghamshire grammar school selection process. However, for 2028 entry, the test provider, exact paper structure, tested subjects and delivery method are not confirmed on the sources reviewed. That means it is safest to avoid assumptions about whether the test follows any particular commercial style. Parents should check the school’s admissions page and Buckinghamshire Council’s Secondary Transfer Test pages for the latest official detail when registration opens.

What the day usually looks like, in broad terms, is:

your child is either automatically entered through a Buckinghamshire primary school or registered separately if they attend an out-of-county or independent school;
the test takes place in early September of Year 6 for the cycle shown on the school site;
results are released before the secondary school application deadline, so families can make informed preferences on the Common Application Form.

Because the detailed format is not yet published for 2028 entry, the most sensible preparation is to build strong core skills, practise careful timing only once official familiarisation materials are available, and avoid over-specialising too early.

Registration and key dates

Chesham Grammar School says Year 7 admissions are managed through Buckinghamshire Council. For the transfer test, the route depends on where your child goes to primary school.

Buckinghamshire local-authority primary schools: Buckinghamshire Council says children in Year 6 at a Buckinghamshire LA primary school are entered for the Secondary Transfer Test automatically unless their parent withdraws them.
Out-of-county and partner schools: Buckinghamshire Council says children attending Partner Schools can sit the test at their own school if the school has agreed to host it, but parents still need to register by the stated deadline. Children at other schools, including many out-of-county and independent schools, must be registered by a parent or carer.
How to register: Buckinghamshire Council uses an online registration form for children who are not automatically entered.

For the most recent timetable shown on Chesham Grammar School’s admissions page, the school lists Secondary Transfer Test: 10 September 2026 and Results: 9 October 2026. The same page notes that out-of-county parents need to register their child for the test at an earlier date via Buckinghamshire Council.

Buckinghamshire Council’s 2026 testing page gives the fuller timetable for that cycle:

Registration opened: 2 May 2026
Registration deadline: 13 June 2026
Secondary Transfer Test: 10 September 2026
Results released: 9 October 2026
Secondary school application deadline: 31 October 2026

For children starting Year 7 in September 2028, parents should treat those dates as the latest published pattern. If Buckinghamshire Council has not yet published the 2028 entry timetable when you read this, the process usually opens in May, closes in June, the test is typically in early September, and results usually arrive in early October, based on the 2026 cycle published by the council and repeated on the school site.

Documents and details typically needed for a manual registration are set by Buckinghamshire Council through its online form. The council’s guidance should be your first stop, especially if your child is not at a Buckinghamshire LA primary school, if you live outside the county, or if your child has an Education, Health and Care Plan.

Who can apply: catchment and admissions

Chesham Grammar School is a selective grammar school, so children normally need to be eligible for grammar-school admission through the Buckinghamshire selection process as well as meet the school’s oversubscription criteria.

The school provides a catchment area map and says parents can check whether an address is in catchment using Buckinghamshire Council’s catchment checking tool. This matters because Buckinghamshire grammar schools often give priority by rule categories set out in their admission arrangements, and parents should always read the current policy rather than rely on local hearsay.

For published capacity, Chesham Grammar School’s admissions page states there are 180 places in Year 7.

Buckinghamshire Council’s school directory page for Chesham Grammar School confirms it is a grammar school and shows the school serves children from 11 to 18. The school is part of the county’s co-ordinated admissions system, so even if you qualify for grammar school, you still need to submit your local authority secondary application on time.

The school website also highlights that Chesham Grammar School is part of the Red Kite Schools Trust and has an Outstanding Ofsted judgement. Those points do not affect eligibility directly, but they help explain why places are often keenly sought.

What parents should do now:

Check whether your address is in catchment using the school link and Buckinghamshire Council tool.
Read Chesham Grammar School’s current admission arrangements carefully once the 2028 policy is published.
Do not assume that living in catchment guarantees a place.
Do not rely on unofficial pass-mark claims or distance guesses. If a cut-off or qualifying score is not published officially, treat it as unknown.

On competition, the school and council sources reviewed do not publish a specific recent applications-to-places figure on the pages fetched for this guide, so it is better not to quote one.

A month-by-month preparation plan

Because the exact 2028 test format is not yet confirmed publicly on the sources reviewed, the best approach is to prepare broadly, steadily and calmly. For most children, consistent work matters much more than long sessions.

Below is a sensible plan working back from a typical early-September test date in Year 6.

Month	What to do
September to December, Year 5	Keep preparation light: around 1 to 2 hours a week split over short sessions. Focus on reading fluency, accurate maths methods, vocabulary growth and careful working. If your child enjoys puzzles, use them to build attention and stamina rather than speed.
January, Year 5	Increase to 2 hours a week. Start identifying strengths and weaker areas. Build a steady routine: one reading-based task, one maths task, and one short skills review each week.
February, Year 5	Continue with core skills. Encourage your child to explain answers aloud. This builds reasoning and reduces careless mistakes. Keep sessions short enough that concentration stays high.
March, Year 5	Move to 2 to 3 hours a week if your child is coping well. Start gentle timed bursts, such as answering a handful of questions in a set time, but do not overdo full timed papers yet.
April, Year 5	Check Buckinghamshire Council and the school admissions page for the new test cycle. If familiarisation materials appear, use those first. Make any preparation more specific only once the official format is clear.
May, Year 5	This is the point when registration has recently opened in the latest published cycle, so make sure administrative steps are in hand. Academically, keep building accuracy. Aim for 3 hours a week across several sessions.
June, Year 5	By now, children should be comfortable with regular practice. If official familiarisation materials are available, begin using them carefully. Introduce one longer timed task every week or two.
July, end of Year 5	Start timed papers only if your child already has a sound skills base and you know the official format. One paper or paper-section at the weekend is enough for many children. Review mistakes properly rather than rushing on.
August before Year 6	Keep the routine steady: around 3 to 4 hours a week. Alternate practice with rest days. Focus on stamina, instructions, checking habits and confidence. Do not turn every day into a mock exam.
Early September, Year 6	Taper slightly in the final days. Use light review, sleep, normal routines and reassurance. Last-minute cramming rarely helps.

If your child is becoming anxious, cut back. A child who feels secure and well rested usually performs better than one who is over-prepared but exhausted.

Subject by subject: what to practise

Because the tested subjects for 2028 entry are not confirmed on the official sources reviewed, it would be wrong to list a fixed subject breakdown as if it were settled. Instead, use the official Buckinghamshire familiarisation materials as soon as they are published for your child’s cycle. In the meantime, these are the core areas most families sensibly strengthen for selective entry tests.

English and reading

Build reading stamina with a mix of modern fiction, classic children’s fiction and quality non-fiction. Practise retrieving information, inferring meaning, spotting tone, and using evidence from a passage. Vocabulary matters too: keep a notebook of new words, roots and prefixes, and revisit them regularly.

Useful habits include reading the question carefully, returning to the text for proof, and avoiding answers based only on general impression.

Mathematics

Prioritise secure arithmetic, place value, fractions, decimals, percentages, ratio basics, measures, geometry and multi-step problem solving. Encourage neat working and estimation so your child can sense when an answer looks wrong.

For many children, the biggest gains come from accuracy with straightforward methods before moving to harder problems under time pressure.

Reasoning and problem solving

If official materials later show that the test includes reasoning-style questions, practise pattern spotting, logical sequencing, coded information, relationships between words or numbers, and short multi-step puzzles. The main skill is not tricks but calm, systematic thinking.

Teach your child to mark tricky items, keep moving, and return if time allows.

Writing and communication

Even where an entrance test does not include a long written composition, strong writing helps across school assessments and interviews or induction work. Practise sentence control, punctuation, spelling, paragraphing and concise explanation.

A child who can explain clearly how they reached an answer often has a better grasp of the underlying skill.

Once official Buckinghamshire materials are available, adjust this section of your preparation so it matches the published content rather than general assumptions.

Practice papers and mock exams

Practice papers are most useful when they are used sparingly and diagnostically. The aim is not to race through as many as possible. It is to learn how your child thinks, where errors happen, and what needs revisiting.

Start with untimed work so your child learns the method without pressure.
Move to short timed sections before full papers.
After every paper, spend longer reviewing mistakes than sitting the paper itself.
Group mistakes into types: misunderstood question, knowledge gap, rushing, or weak checking.
Repeat a similar task later to make sure the lesson has stuck.

Mock exams can help with stamina and nerves, but only when they are introduced at the right point. If the official format is still unclear, there is little value in overdoing highly specific mocks too early. Build broad academic strength first, then increase realism once Buckinghamshire publishes familiarisation material for your child’s cycle.

Useful ElevenReady resources:

When using any third-party practice paper, compare it with the latest official Buckinghamshire information. If there is a mismatch, follow the official guidance.

On the day

Keep the morning predictable. Lay out clothes, water and any required items the night before. Aim to arrive with time to spare rather than cutting it fine.

Choose a normal breakfast your child knows suits them.
Avoid last-minute coaching in the car or at the gate.
Remind your child to listen carefully to instructions and ask if they do not understand what to do.
If they get stuck on a question, they should stay calm, move on and come back if time allows.
Checking matters: even thirty seconds at the end can catch a simple mistake.

The tone you set is important. Children take their cues from adults, so it helps to present the test as an opportunity, not a verdict. A calm child is more likely to show what they really know.

After the exam: results, allocation and appeals

For the latest cycle shown on the school’s admissions page, results were due on 9 October 2026, comfortably before the national secondary application deadline. Buckinghamshire Council’s testing information for that cycle matches this date and also states the school application deadline of 31 October 2026.

In practice, the sequence is usually:

your child sits the Buckinghamshire Secondary Transfer Test;
results are released in early October;
you submit or finalise your local authority secondary preferences by 31 October;
offers are made on National Offer Day the following spring through the co-ordinated admissions process.

If your child is qualified for grammar school, that does not guarantee a place at Chesham Grammar School. Offers still depend on the school’s published admission rules and how many higher-priority applicants apply.

If your child is not offered a place, parents can usually consider:

the waiting list, if the school operates one under its admission arrangements;
an admission appeal, using the formal process set out by the admission authority or local authority;
alternative preferences already listed on the application form.

For appeals and allocation, always use the current Buckinghamshire Council and school guidance for your child’s exact entry year, because procedures and deadlines are time-sensitive.

What has changed recently

From the official and reputable sources reviewed, there is no clearly announced recent change on Chesham Grammar School’s admissions page to the underlying use of the Buckinghamshire Secondary Transfer Test for Year 7 entry. The main newly published information visible for the latest cycle is the 2026 test timetable shown by the school and Buckinghamshire Council.

Chesham Grammar School’s admissions page now shows the dated timetable item Secondary Transfer Test 10 September 2026 and Results 9 October 2026.
The same page explicitly reminds out-of-county parents that they need to register earlier for the test via Buckinghamshire Council.
The page also notes that EHCP consultation for that cycle should start no earlier than 2 November 2026.

If Buckinghamshire Council or the school later announces a change to test format, admissions priority or catchment for 2028 entry, parents should rely on those official pages rather than older guides.

Frequently asked questions

Is Chesham Grammar School part of the Buckinghamshire 11+?

Yes. Chesham Grammar School uses the Buckinghamshire Secondary Transfer Test as part of the county grammar school admissions process.

Do I need to register for the test myself?

If your child is at a Buckinghamshire LA primary school, they are usually entered automatically unless you withdraw them. If your child is at an out-of-county, independent or some partner schools, you normally need to register through Buckinghamshire Council.

When is the Chesham Grammar School 11+ test usually held?

The latest published timetable on the school site shows the Secondary Transfer Test on 10 September 2026. If your child is applying for 2028 entry and new dates are not yet published, early September is the best guide from the latest official timetable.

Does Chesham Grammar School have a catchment area?

Yes. The school provides a catchment area map and directs parents to Buckinghamshire Council’s catchment checking tool to see whether an address is in catchment.

How many Year 7 places does Chesham Grammar School offer?

The school’s admissions page states a Published Admission Number of 180 for Year 7.

What score do you need for Chesham Grammar School?

Do not rely on unofficial figures. If the school or Buckinghamshire Council has not published a current qualifying score or cut-off for your child’s entry year, treat it as unknown and check the official admissions pages.

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Sources

Chesham Grammar School Admissions: Year 7 applications are handled as part of Buckinghamshire Council’s co-ordinated admissions scheme; school provides catchment area map; parents can check catchment with Buckinghamshire Council tool; Year 7 places are 180; latest published timetable shows Secondary Transfer Test 10 September 2026 an

Preparing for other schools in Buckinghamshire

Written by ElevenReady from the school's published information and reviewed by a person before publishing. Last reviewed 20 October 2026. Exam arrangements change. Check the school's admissions page for the current year.