One of the key sections that will come up in the 11 plus assessment is verbal reasoning, which is designed to test the vocabulary, reading and code-breaking skills of the child that is sitting the test. This means that the key skills that are needed for this part of the assessment are critical thinking and problem-solving.

One of the most important things to focus on for 11 Plus Verbal Reasoning is vocabulary, which will play a huge part in the success of this section. Furthermore, skills in deduction will prove very useful. It is about more than knowing what the words mean, so there should be a focus on being able to think about them in the context of a situation as well. What is included in the verbal reasoning section will differ depending on who is providing the examination, the region of the grammar school, and the individual grammar school itself.

CEM 11 Plus Verbal Reasoning

If your child is taking the CEM 11+ exam, then the verbal reasoning section may include:

• Synonyms and antonyms
• Close passages
• Close sentences
• Jumbled sentences

GL 11 Plus Verbal Reasoning

If your child is taking the GL 11+ exam, then the verbal reasoning section may include:

• Related words
• Hidden word
• Closest meaning
• Letter series
• Make a word
• Letter connections
• Opposite meaning
• Word number codes
• Same meaning

For more information on what will be specifically covered in your area, it is best to contact the local education authority for the grammar school or contact the school directly.

Practicing Verbal Reasoning

Verbal reasoning might be something that your child is naturally good at, or it could be something that requires some more work. While verbal reasoning is not as straightforward to revise as maths or English might be, it is possible for your child to improve through practicing the skills that are required for it and expanding their vocabulary. We provide a full course to improve skills in 11 Plus Verbal Reasoning for this purpose.

One of the key sections for the 11 plus examination as a part of the selection process for grammar schools is math. Math will feature as a part of every 11 plus exam, and the assessment will cover much of the content that is taught throughout year 6 as well as from Key Stage 2 as a whole. This means that a lot of the math covered in the exam might not have been taught at the time that the child sits it.

The reason for the content of the test being slightly ahead of the current level of teaching is because the selection process is supposed to determine whether a child is beyond their expected level or not. Candidates for grammar schools are to be those who can cope with an advanced level of mathematics, so it is important for your child to be ahead in terms of the content they are familiar with.

Topics Covered in 11 Plus Maths:

There are several topics covered in the mathematics assessment for the 11 plus exam, and not all of them will have been covered in the curriculum when the time of the test comes. The topics include:

• Algebra
• Speed, distance, time
• Ratios
• Multiplication and division
• Fractions
• Percentages
• Decimals
• Place value
• Problem-solving

Some of these questions will also be presented within worded problem-solving questions, which sometimes will have their own section. This means that as well as the child knowing how to do the maths, they also need to be able to figure out the question within a real-world context. The problem-solving questions tend to be based on real-life situations that feature characters or ask the participant to imagine that they are faced with the situation in question. For example,

• Asking a distance, speed, time question by asking the child to work out the end time of a journey based on the information given
• Asking a percentage question by posing that an item in a shop has been discounted and asking what the new price is.

Succeeding in 11 Plus Maths

The standard for being selected for a grammar school is high, so it is important that your child not only has knowledge of the maths but can also work out contextual problem solving questions in a timely manner and with accuracy.

The non-verbal reasoning section

The non-verbal reasoning section of the 11+ assessment can be a tricky one to prepare your child for, because it is not a case of revising what has been taught in the curriculum but enhancing their skills in problem-solving. This can be a challenge for young children when they are first introduced to it, so it’s important to begin practicing early on. It’s less about what they know for this section, and more about how they approach the question.

Non-verbal reasoning is a section that is aimed at testing spatial awareness and solving problems using reasoning skills. This might include image sequences or warped and rotated images that the child will have to make assessments of. The types of questions in non-verbal reasoning assessments vary depending on where the exam is being taken, but there are some kinds of questions that come up across the board:

• Reversing images and colour
• Analogies
• Hidden shapes
• Adding shapes or taking them away
• 3×3 grids

The styles of these questions can vary massively in order to test how the child is with taking information and answering a question about it. The questions might also vary depending on where the examination is being issued. To find out more about the specific style of questions your child might come into contact with, it is best to contact the grammar school or education authority directly.

Preparing For Non-Verbal Reasoning

Non-verbal reasoning might be more difficult for some children than others, but this doesn’t mean it’s impossible to improve. The best way to practice non-verbal reasoning is for the child to become familiar and confident with the kinds of questions that come up so that they get used to them. Using our non-verbal reasoning course, your child will have the opportunity to practise these kinds of questions and improve naturally in time for the exam.

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.

One of the key sections that will come up in the 11 plus assessment is verbal reasoning, which is designed to test the vocabulary, reading and code-breaking skills of the child that is sitting the test. This means that the key skills that are needed for this part of the assessment are critical thinking and problem-solving.

One of the most important things to focus on for 11 Plus Verbal Reasoning is vocabulary, which will play a huge part in the success of this section. Furthermore, skills in deduction will prove very useful. It is about more than knowing what the words mean, so there should be a focus on being able to think about them in the context of a situation as well. What is included in the verbal reasoning section will differ depending on who is providing the examination, the region of the grammar school, and the individual grammar school itself.

CEM 11 Plus Verbal Reasoning

If your child is taking the CEM 11+ exam, then the verbal reasoning section may include:

• Synonyms and antonyms
• Close passages
• Close sentences
• Jumbled sentences

GL 11 Plus Verbal Reasoning

If your child is taking the GL 11+ exam, then the verbal reasoning section may include:

• Related words
• Hidden word
• Closest meaning
• Letter series
• Make a word
• Letter connections
• Opposite meaning
• Word number codes
• Same meaning

For more information on what will be specifically covered in your area, it is best to contact the local education authority for the grammar school or contact the school directly.

Practicing Verbal Reasoning

Verbal reasoning might be something that your child is naturally good at, or it could be something that requires some more work. While verbal reasoning is not as straightforward to revise as maths or English might be, it is possible for your child to improve through practicing the skills that are required for it and expanding their vocabulary. We provide a full course to improve skills in 11 Plus Verbal Reasoning for this purpose.

The 11 plus refers to a series of examinations taken by children before they leave primary school, around the age of 10 or 11. The exams help to determine what kind of secondary school the child will go to and are taken when the child is beginning their final year of primary school. Up until the 1970s all children in England sat the exam before leaving school, but today the test is not compulsory – it’s optional. The 11 plus is now taken by children whose parents wish for them to go to grammar or selective schools, of which there are more than 160 in England.

The exams test the child’s academic skills and ability, thus determining which school they can attend next. The schools that are being competed for are known as ‘selective schools’ because they allow entrance based on selective academic criteria. Because there are a small number of spaces available, the outcome of the exams is of the utmost importance. This is why many parents opt to have additional tutoring for their children.

The 11 plus is made up of math, English, verbal reasoning and non-verbal reasoning, but some schools require additional sections such as creative writing too. The pass rate also varies depending on where you are taking it due to the fact that they are administered by different exam boards. The makeup of the test itself will also vary between schools, areas and exam boards, so the child may do all of these sections or varying combinations of them.

More selective grammar schools may also have more than one exam to sit, and the majority of 11 plus exams will be comprised of more than one paper. These papers might occur on the same day with a break between each one, or they might happen over the course of a few days. Some grammar schools have multiple exams in a selective process, where the child needs to be successful in the first exam before being able to move on to the next. If you are applying to multiple grammar schools then it’s likely that your child will need to sit multiple exams.

If you are in the midst of 11+ preparations for your child then you may find some abbreviations that you are not familiar with. One of the most common terms that may come up is GL, which is an abbreviation of Granada Learning. Granada Learning is one of the main providers of the 11+ examinations in England, meaning that it might be the provider for your child’s assessment.

The provider of your child’s 11+ exam is going to be dependent on the region of the grammar school you are applying to. The regions that use GL as a provider are as follows:

• Birmingham
• Warwickshire
• Buckinghamshire
• Dorset
• Kent
• Lancashire & Cumbria
• Lincolnshire
• Northern Ireland
• Plymouth
• Trafford (some schools)
• Wiltshire
• Yorkshire (some schools)

If you are looking for more information on the testing methods used in your region, the best thing to do is contact the grammar school directly or check the information on the local education authority’s website.

What is the format of the GL Assessment?

In the past, GL examinations have been made up of two papers which are timed at 40-45 minutes each. Each paper then consists of several sections which are all timed individually including maths, english, verbal reasoning, non-verbal reasoning and spatial awareness. However, each school can offer any combination of these topics and change the questions to fit with how they select students. The standard GL assessment has 21 Verbal Reasoning questions available and these can be in the exam in any combination. All 21 of these should be revised by the child before the test.

The GL assessment comes in the format of multiple choice questions, all of which are in timed sections. Once the time has run out for one section, the participant cannot go back to it. Answers are recorded on a separate sheet to the questions.