Gloucestershire's seven grammars cluster around Cheltenham, Gloucester and Stroud, with Pate's Grammar in Cheltenham operating as the highest-performing super-selective.
The year in shape
The Gloucestershire test is CEM-style across all consortium schools, with Pate's super-selective top tier and distance-based ranking for the remaining schools.
Pate's catchment is in practice nationwide for the top scorers; the lower-tier consortium schools draw from local Gloucestershire postcodes.
Term-by-term plan
Autumn term. Through autumn of Year 5, decide whether you are aiming for Pate's super-selective or the wider consortium. The preparation rhythm differs.
Spring term. For Pate's super-selective: focus on top-end CEM accuracy. The cut-off is unusually high and incremental marks at the top matter.
Summer term & holiday. For consortium-level: standard CEM preparation across the year, with format-specific practice from late spring of Year 5.
Topics to prioritise
Highest-leverage Gloucestershire topics: CEM vocabulary, comprehension inference, hard maths word problems, and CEM-typical shuffled sentences.
Common mistakes parents make this year
The most common parent mistake is preparing only for Pate's and treating the lower-tier schools as backups. Each consortium school has its own distance criteria and a Pate's-only strategy can leave a child without a place.
Signs to look for
Signs the year is going well: child scores consistently in the upper range of CEM practice papers, has a clear target school, and approaches the September test calmly. If these signs are present, the year is going well; if they are absent, the issue is rarely intelligence — it is usually pacing, format unfamiliarity or the wrong tutoring relationship. Identify which and adjust deliberately.
Where to go next
Read the Gloucestershire county guide for the calendar; read the CEM format guide; consider a Pate's-specific mock if super-selective is the target. Read across the related guides on this site — the guides index groups them by category for easy navigation.