Matthew Arnold Primary School

The Blue Coat School uses a two-phase, fully COMPUTER-BASED assessment (keyboard and mouse required — very different from the paper tests used in most grammar areas): Phase 1 (early July, end of Year 5) — an online adaptive test of about 1 hour 40 minutes: five 20-minute modules including reading (word recognition, decoding, comprehension) and other core skills, using CEM's Primary Insight platform. All registered children sit Phase 1. Phase 2 (mid-September of Year 6) — for children who pass Phase 1: verbal reasoning, numerical reasoning and non-verbal reasoning via the Cambridge Select Insight test. Results arrive in mid-October; qualifying children can then name the school on the Common Application Form by 31 October.