IPS Download paper

[NorthLondonDad2]

Has anyone else done this free download NVR paper?

Is it just us or are a lot of the questions badly formed and / or ambiguous? We found it very frustrating to have multiple equally valid answers.

Is this representative of their packs that you can buy?

[Complete Novice]

The IPS Verbal Reasoning papers are very good however I'm afraid that the Non- Verbal is nowhere near as reliable. There are several mistakes in the pack of 10 IPS Non Verbal which had the rather disasterous effect of making my son suspect a misprint everytime something was a bit tricky! That said, they resemble the Nfer papers so closely that I found if I did a paper myself first to identify the incorrect ones, and then just put a line through them, they still proved quite useful. It's irritating though that these have not been better edited.
Good luck!

CN

[stressed out mum]

is paper 1 section b question 8 one of the mistakes, i cannot reason an answer for this question pls help any one

[Complete Novice]

Hi Stressed Parent

I can't fathom this one either. I initially thought it could be either B or D (apparently correct answer) as the ball is always to the left of the base of the rectangle in the central column but as the ball is never in the same position as an adjacent square I think the answer must be B. I wish they would give explanations like the AE Tuition books do!

[NorthLondonDad2]

Hi Stressed Parent,

I agree with Complete Novice.

D does not look like the correct answer due to the ball position. On each row the ball is low, mid and high. In neither other row does the ball appear at the same level.

That leaves A, B, E. There are reasons why any one of these could be correct.

Clearly, the skill here is choosing the 'most likely correct answer' and that, sometimes can be open to interpretation and argument. But I do not believe that D is even 'a contender'.

The people who set the questions must ensure that not only is the answer able to be determined, but also that equally viable alternative or rogue answers do not exist.

I find lack of attention to this detail in IPS tests very poor. Not only does it invalidate the question that you have paid for but more importantly, it undermines the students confidence in the predictability of a correct answer. I feel that these IPS tests are very poor in terms of this quality assurance.

[yogkruti]

I'm worried about NVR in general as I feel the subject is fraught with ambiguity.

Now, I'm not saying that absolutely all of the questions in any paper are, but just that there are some questions (~4%) in most papers for which a completely logical explanation can be given as to why some other choice can be the answer too.

I have found this in some VR papers as well (eg: those of of the type which ask to pick "odd one out").

My problem at the moment is trying to convince my DC that answering "(a) or (d)" will not fetch him any marks inspite of having absolutely reasonable explanations for both! (yes.. he does seem to enjoy winding me up!)