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Verbal Reasoning

Verbal Reasoning exams measure IQ (intelligence) and can be very demanding, especially when you realise that 80 questions have to be answered in 50 minutes! Most papers have multiple choice answer sheets, with children filling in a box next to what they judge to be the correct answer. These answer sheets are computed-marked and the totals are adjusted according to each child’s age. If one child achieves the same total as another who is six months older, the younger child will actually be given a higher IQ rating and final score! 

Roughly half of the questions in a Verbal Reasoning paper are vocabulary based. They can involve batches of 5 or more questions on opposites, odd one out, similarities, compound words and hidden words, to name but some. This Vocabulary area often poses problems as many of the words chosen are not those normally used by 10 and 11yr old children. (It is at this stage some children wish that they had read more! Knowing the names of the young of animals, collective nouns and names for the male and female of animals, people and titles is a definite asset.) 

Mechanical questions, which form most of the rest of the paper, involve batches of 5 or more questions to do with codes, series, the alphabet and number/letter substitutions (algebra), amongst others. Mechanical questions usually cause fewer problems - once the methods of solving them have been mastered, because vocabulary is not involved. 

There are also usually 2 x single questions that supply five or six pieces of information.  Children have to work out which of five answers must be true. These questions are usually quite time-consuming and only score one mark each. Exam technique might be useful here! 

Final thoughts….. 

The content of the exam varies from year to year, so, inevitably, some of the work prepared, expected or hoped for will not be examined. 

At the end of the day, it is often the timing constraints of the exam that causes the greatest problems and this is where the experience and practice that tuition in a competitive group situation provides can prove of enormous benefit.

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