11+ English
Word-based reasoning skills tested in some 11+ pathways — codes, connections, sequences and vocabulary logic.
Verbal Reasoning appears in 11 of our 338 ready papers (119 tagged questions). It averages 10.8 questions a paper worth about 1 mark each. The typical question allows around 36 sec. It appears in 4 CSSE papers we hold.
Verbal reasoning appears in some consortia and independent pathways alongside or instead of traditional comprehension. Questions may involve letter codes, word connections, odd-one-out, or vocabulary logic rather than a long passage. Children who only practise comprehension can feel blindsided. Teach pattern recognition and a calm eliminate-options routine. Because tagging is thinner than for comprehension, use the papers table here to find the VR-heavy papers we hold, then practise those formats deliberately. Timing matters: VR questions are often short but dense — a stuck code should be flagged and revisited. Link vocabulary hubs for meaning support, and keep a personal list of code types your child has seen.
A real tagged question from our catalogue — method included, not paywalled.
Ranked from our tagged catalogue — open a paper to practise the questions that actually test this topic.
Not sure whether verbal reasoning is the problem? Mark any past paper on 11plusSolved and the report tells you which topics are costing marks — and how many.
