Mental Math students ace 11-Plus exam

Three of the students who represented Christ Church Girls School in this year’s Mental Maths Competition received top marks in the Common Entrance Examination.

Arianne Blade, top female student at the Water Street, Christ Church institution received 240.99 and an A in Composition, early sitter Janae Forde-Blenman received 240.79 and an A in Composition and their fellow teammate Taja Taylor received a perfect score in Mathematics.

Unfortunately, the trio will part ways as Blades and Forde-Blenman will head to Queen’s College and Taylor will be attending the St Michael School.

The youngest of the trio, Forde-Blenman, shared that they often studied together. Though “excited” and “proud” of her accomplishment, she was reluctant to part ways with her closest friends; many of whom will be attending the St Michael’s School.

“I was happy, but I was also a bit upset because the rest of my friends are going to St Michael… but I have Arianne to keep me company,” she said with a shy smile.

The 10-year-old revealed that she put in the work to achieve 100 in Mathematics and 94 in English, having participated in after-school lessons and giving up on lunch sometimes to practise her questions.

“I studied a lot, and I stayed from lunch to practise and I did extra lessons… I would go home and go over the things I didn’t understand and I would also get my mummy and daddy to help me,” said the aspiring entrepreneur.

Sitting right next to Forde-Blenman was top student, Blades who was elated with her results. The 11-year-old told Barbados TODAY that she was a bundle of nerves on examination day, filled with anxiety and hoping that she didn’t “mess up”. She also recalled that preparations for the examinations were “very stressful” as she had to give up her technological devices like her prized tablet.

With the stress of examinations over, Blades said was looking forward to getting back her tablet and enjoying her summer vacation.

However, Taylor is looking forward to attending St Michael School. The deputy head girl said that she was going to miss her friends but was excited to go to the school she desperately wanted to attend.

“I am glad that I am going to get to be around some of my friends because you are going to miss them when they go to different schools,” said Taylor.

The 11-year-old was stunned that she received a perfect score. “It was too easy; I thought I made so many careless mistakes in it so I was not expecting to get 100 in Maths,” she said. She attributed her success in the examination to the encouragement from her teachers and parents.

“The teachers, they were pushing me and as soon as they saw me lacking, they would tell me… ‘you should be increasing not decreasing,’” she commented.

“My parents told me [anywhere] I go, they are going to be proud, and it doesn’t matter what school I go to, it is what I do when I get there,” Taylor added.

The principal of the Christ Church Girls School Orlaine Benn reported that the school was pleased with the results for Mathematics but sought to assess the performance in English for the next school year. “We will have to have a careful analysis to see where we are falling down and put systems in place to correct that going forward,” the principal said.