Last Updated 9th April 2025
12:40pm GMT

How to Prepare for the ISEB PreTest?
Advice from a Tutor

If you’re a parent or tutor helping your child/student with entrance exams into UK private schools, you’ve probably heard the growing noise around the ISEB Pre-Tests—and more recently, the protests.

The ISEB Pre-Tests were originally designed to streamline a messy, stressful process: instead of sitting multiple exams for every senior school on your list, your child could take one set of online, standardised tests in Year 6 or 7, and those scores could be shared across schools. On paper, it sounds efficient. Fairer, even. But in reality? It’s not that simple.

The Problem

Parents and educators are pushing back because, despite claims that “no preparation is necessary,” the stakes for these tests have become sky-high. Schools are using ISEB scores to shortlist for interviews and scholarships. Some children are taking these tests with little warning, others after months of targeted prep. And since the tests are adaptive—getting harder as your child performs better—it’s not always clear what a “good score” even means.

My Thoughts as a Tutor

I’ve worked with many students preparing for the ISEB Pre-Tests, and I’ll be honest with you: they are hard. Not necessarily because the content is impossible—it’s mostly Key Stage 2 material, wrapped in tricky reasoning questions—but because they require stamina, speed, and confidence under pressure.

For example, Non-Verbal Reasoning requires a lot of revision, even for extremely bright students, because you need to get used to the question types—it has a kind of funny logic to it. This can only be learnt through doing lots and lots of past papers, and having a tutor at hand to give tricks and tips for spotting the right answers.

Preparation does make a difference—a lot of difference, in fact. The ISEB exam needs to be revised in order to do well, and now schools such as Westminster and St Paul’s expect students to achieve over 90% across all subjects just to be invited for interview.

If your child or student is a complete bookworm or a maths whizz, then you’re at a big advantage, and it won’t take them long to start scoring well. The ISEB tests reward students with a high reading level, as most of the English and Verbal Reasoning questions centre around vocabulary.

But if your child is strong in Maths but weaker in English, the process of revising vocabulary takes time. I recommend learning a few new words a day and staying consistent. I strongly suggest starting practice in Year 4 to give your child time to develop their reading level.

1. Don’t panic—but don’t ignore the test either.

If you are aiming for the super-competitive schools, start revision in Year 4. Depending on your schedule, doing 15 minutes every morning before school, or one hour at the weekend, can work wonders.

You can’t cram for cognitive reasoning. But you can build logic, reading fluency, mental maths, and problem-solving over time. Reading every day and revising vocabulary helps enormously.

2. Key Resources

Atom Learning: This website offers tailored 11+ practice for students, including ISEB Pre-Test prep. The site is brightly coloured and ‘fun’, so students enjoy using it. You can earn ‘coins’ through practice and dress your character up with the coins you earn—sufficiently gamified for the new generation!

The best part about Atom Learning is the practice papers—you get unlimited access with a full subscription.

TIP: Make use of the Custom Exercises section rather than the general Atom Learning Islands, as this lets you set specific topics based on your student’s problem areas. With Atom Learning Island, you have no control over what is studied. As a private tutor, I usually set around five custom exercises a week, each around ten minutes long.

PreTest Plus: Another website offering ISEB Pre-Test mock exams. I use this when students need a break from Atom Learning, usually a few weeks before the exam. The pros? The mock exams are harder, which is great for practice. The cons? It’s expensive (you pay per mock exam rather than via subscription), and it’s not ideal for students without a tutor, as the corrections lack sufficient explanations and don’t offer follow-up practice.

3. The importance of mindset and learning from mistakes.

This is huge. I always work on helping students trust themselves and not worry if they don’t know the answer—after all, it’s multiple choice, and most of the time you can use logical deduction. Adaptive tests are designed to feel hard. That’s not a sign of failure—it means the test is doing its job.

Teach your child to keep going, guess when needed, and not catastrophise one tricky section. If your child gets disappointed with a result, encourage them to see getting questions wrong as a good thing—it means there’s something to learn. What matters most is learning from the mistake, not avoiding it.

4. Remember: it’s just one part of the process.

Even the most selective schools consider more than just the ISEB. Interviews, references, your child’s personality and attitude—these all matter. If your child doesn’t perform as well as hoped, it’s not the end of the road. Truly.

Final Thoughts on the ISEB Pre-Test

There are pros and cons to the online ISEB Pre-Test, and that’s why many schools include a second written exam in the process. Personally, I believe written exams are better for students’ long-term development, as they learn how to practically apply their grammar and punctuation knowledge to their own writing. But while the system exists as it is, my goal is to help students feel as calm and capable as possible. I’ve been blown away by the level of vocabulary, grammar, and punctuation knowledge a student can gain after a year of focused revision for the ISEB Pre-Test. I’ve had students reach reading levels of 16+!

It’s easy to get swept up in timelines, rankings, and forums—but the most important thing is helping your child feel supported, curious, and resilient.