Comprehension is one of the common features of the 11+ selective school assessment and it can vary depending on where the test is taking place and the school to which that is being applied. Comprehension is designed to test the participant on how they can take relevant information from a passage of writing when asked to, and in both CEM and GL assessments, it usually includes a passage of text (fiction or non-fiction) for the child to read and answer questions on.
In order to improve 11 Plus comprehension skills, the best thing children can do is read as much as possible. If your child is reading a lot, then they will naturally get better at understanding different kinds of information which will make them better at comprehension tasks. It also helps to expand your child’s vocabulary which enhances understanding of structure and speech. We supply a reading list as a part of our course on comprehension for the 11+ examination which is specifically designed to get your child into a routine of reading regularly using a range of vocabulary and engaging subject matter.
11 Plus Comprehension
11 Plus Comprehension exam will be presented as a passage of text, either fiction or non-fiction. The child will be asked to read the text in full before answering a set of multiple choice questions about it to show that they have understood the information that they have read.
There are two kinds of multiple choice questions that the child will be faced with:
Retrieving key information from the text such as the name of a place or person, a date or some kind of numerical information.
Using reasoning skills to identify the meaning of something, such as the emotions of a character or the context of a conversation.
Timing is the key thing to practice when it comes to comprehension, so it is vital that your child is able to read at a good speed and extract information with efficiency too.