Fact Finding in the 11+ — Questions, Worked Answers and Practice Papers
Retrieving information that is stated in the passage — the accuracy foundation of 11+ comprehension.
121Papers
3.5Avg Qs / paper
2.43Typical marks
2.3 minTarget time
What examiners actually ask
Fact Finding appears in 121 of our 338 ready papers (420 tagged questions). It averages 3.5 questions a paper worth about 2.43 marks each. The typical question allows around 2.3 min. It appears in 4 CSSE papers we hold.
Fact-finding questions look easy and still lose marks when children skim. They ask for a name, a detail, a reason stated in the text, or a piece of information to locate precisely. Independent and grammar papers both use them to reward careful reading before harder inference. Children who answer from memory of the first skim, or who mix up similar characters and places, underperform. Practise scanning with a pencil, underlining the exact phrase, and checking the question words (who, when, where, how many) before writing. Teach children to resist “nearly right” answers that come from the wrong paragraph. A ten-second re-read of the asked detail after writing often saves the mark on what should have been the easiest question in the set.
Worked example
A real tagged question from our catalogue — method included, not paywalled.
Arthur notices the vastness of the sea. He calls it the 'wide, wide sea' and is fascinated by the wideness of the sea and the sky. He said he felt surrounded by them both.
Arthur saw seabirds skimming the waves. He was impressed that they were always there flying high or skimming low in any weather.
He saw an albatross and was amazed by it saying would never forget the experience and that it was 'best of all.'. The albatross flew over him and stared down into his eyes I think this added to Artur's fascination with the albatross.
Method
In this question, you are directed to certain lines and asked to identify 3 features of the natural world that Arthur notices and also say why he is impressed by them. Read carefully through the lines and highlight the natural features.
There is 1 mark for each feature, up to 3. You could choose:
- 'mountainous waves'
- ' dancing dolphins'
- 'wide, wide sea'
- 'seabirds skimming the waves'
- 'millions of stars'
- 'albatross'
For each one, you need to comment on why it would be memorable for him. These comments are each worth 1 mark, up to 3.
Some examples of comments are noted in the Answer.
Make sure you can find and include the reason Arthur finds the feature interesting. For example, when he talks of the vastness of the sea he refers to its wideness and likens it to the wideness of the sky and how it feels as if they both surround us.
Common mistakes
Answering from memory of the passage instead of checking the exact line.
Picking a detail from the wrong paragraph when names or places repeat.
Over-answering with inference when the question only asked for a stated fact.
Misreading quantity words (how many / which two) and giving a partial list.
Papers with the most Fact Finding questions
Ranked from our tagged catalogue — open a paper to practise the questions that actually test this topic.
Not sure whether fact finding is the problem? Mark any past paper on 11plusSolved and the report tells you which topics are costing marks — and how many.
