eleven plus
See also: eleven-plus
English
[edit]Alternative forms
[edit]Etymology
[edit]From eleven + plus, eleven years being the minimum age of students taking the test.
Noun
[edit]eleven plus (plural eleven pluses)
- (UK) An examination formerly administered to all students in their final year of primary education, now used only in a few counties of England and Northern Ireland.
- 1967, Robert John Montgomery, Examinations: An Account of Their Evolution as Administrative Devices in England:
- The fact that late developers emerged, ripe for grammar school education, having 'failed' the eleven plus test, was embarrassing.
- 2007, Stephen Murdoch, IQ: A Smart History of a Failed Idea:
- As one vociferous eleven-plus critic put it, when Winston Churchill was a boy he produced nothing more than "a large blob of ink" on his entrance exam.