11 Plus Exams Forum

What is the best way to improve the VR speed for Sep-13 test. My DS can finish 50 to 60 questions only in the 50 minutes though he knows the answers for most of the VR questions.

Thanks for your advise.

Hi Goldenstar
i've read on the forum that the tests are designed in a way that it is impossible to complete all the questions and it sounds like your Ds is super speedy 50 to 60 questions in 50 mins sounds loke great speed ! have you thought about using an egg-timer or speed-reading? although he may start to make mistakes with speed-reading.

Your DS needs to practice under timed conditions to increase speed. With practice he will be able to do this. He also may need to find out some techniques for himself to quickly work out the answers for some types of questions.

Agree with Ahap looks as if your ds needs lots of timed practice. Have you any technique books as he may be taking a long route to get to each answers. There are shortcuts he could be helped with and this should speed up his time. My ds was slow but was by the end shooting through papers.

Catwoman, this is incorrect information. There will be lots of students in every VR exam paper who will get 100%. One of the reasons that QE and Latymer abandoned separate VR papers was because so many students were getting 100%. The Watford Consortium and Dame Alice Owen's use a Moray House paper which is 100 questions in 45 minutes and applicants are expected to finish the paper in the time and get a very high mark. At DAO if you don't got 115 out of 140 your English and Maths papers will not be marked. 8 of my students got 100% in both of these VR papers so doing 60 in 50 minutes would not get you anywhere near the pass mark. It is all preparation. I got to 100 in 22 minutes when I was preparing with my dd's yet when I started I could not manage to finish in 90 minutes. Goldenstar how many questions in what time is the exam you are preparing for? It sounds like you need to get some technuque training. Which types is he losing time on? DG

Thanks for your advise, find the pattern in numbers and pattern in the letter words takes some time, 20 minutes at least.

Can't really add anything to those posters who have said more practice and refine that exam technique because he really will need to finish all questions, or as many as he can.

If you haven't got a technique book then I can highly recommend the GL Assessment 11+ Verbal Reasoning Technique Explained available on this site at this link

http://www.elevenplusexams.co.uk/shop/9 ... oning.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

If you're a bit of a whiz at VR yourself, then why not go through a paper he's done with him? He can explain his rationale for why he's done a question a certain way and perhaps you can spot a short-cut: encouraging him to spot it himself is best We did this with Maths and English more than VR, as we were lucky that for the large part, DD2 got it.

goldenstar wrote:Thanks for your advise, find the pattern in numbers and pattern in the letter words takes some time, 20 minutes at least.

Can you please give us specific examples? Perhaps you can tell us the question numbers and details of the practice paper ie "GL Assessment, Pack 2 Paper x, Questions 21, 21, 23" etc.

Practice the ones that prove a problem.

Golden star you need to get a book on technique as 20 mins a question is far too long. Some questions may take a minute or two to decode but really you are looking at your ds needing fast responses or else they will not pass. We used the IPS method and technique book, which will be useful for going over areas he is struggling with. We also did their daily practice tests and as many other tests as we could find. In the end concentrating on the ones ds was slowest with and in the end he could finish and had time to go back over ones he was uncertain with.