Buckinghamshire 11+ English
Wide reading helps enormously, and it is not enough on its own. A great many marks turn on knowing precisely what a question is asking for.
English
21 posts on this. Written by Mat and Alicia, who prepare pupils for the Buckinghamshire Transfer Test every week in Winslow.
Finding it, not remembering it: retrieval questions in the 11+
Retrieval questions look like the easy ones until somebody starts a clock. The Scan and Check method we teach in Winslow, the small words that flip a question, and a passage to try.
Stated, implied, or neither: inference questions
The answer is not written down anywhere in the passage — you have to work it out. Point to the Proof, and the third pile of answers that sound sensible and are wrong.
Two jobs, one mark: apostrophes
An apostrophe does one of two entirely separate things, and mixing them up is where the marks go. Missing letters, belonging, and where the s sits.
A simile that runs on: imagery
Similes, metaphors and personification are the easy three. The fourth device has a comparing word in it too, and two little words spend their lives pretending.
The front leaves it alone, the end does not
A prefix never changes the root word. A suffix usually does. One difference decides most of these questions, and the prefix that changes shape catches the rest.
Can you lift it out? punctuation
By Year 5 you know the marks; what you need is an order to apply them in. Four questions, and the test that decides where a pair of commas belongs.
Which rule am I in? spelling patterns
By Year 5 the difficulty is not knowing the rules but knowing which one applies. Four questions in a fixed order, and the plurals that have to be learnt.
Meaning, swap, check: synonyms and antonyms
Four options, and every one of them put there for a reason. What each wrong answer is doing, and why the routine matters more than the vocabulary.
Effect, not meaning: why the writer chose that word
Nobody gets a mark for saying what a word means. The swap test that turns a definition into an effect, and what each paragraph is for.
When the spelling hides the sound
The definitions are worth no marks on their own. Every mark in this question type is in the words where the spelling and the sound disagree.
Sound cannot decide it: homophones
Words that sound identical and are spelled differently. Why the ear is the wrong tool, and the handful of pairs the 11+ returns to.
Has it got a verb? clauses and phrases
Two questions, asked in order, sort every group of words into phrase, main clause or subordinate clause — and once you can do that, sentence types follow for free.
What relationship is it showing? connectives
A connective joins two ideas and tells you how they relate. Choosing the right one is choosing the right relationship — and which kind you use decides the sentence type.
It sounds right is not a test: proofreading
A sentence with one deliberate error, and four places it could be. Where the errors are planted, and why reading it aloud is not enough on its own.
Count the main clauses: simple, compound, complex
Once clauses make sense, sentence types are counting. Why a comma does not make a compound sentence, and the trap in every one of these questions.
Passive is not past: verb tenses
The tense says when. The voice says who is doing it. Confusing the two is the trap in this question type, and a sentence can be present tense and passive at once.
Same word, different job: naming word classes
A list of nouns and a list of verbs will let your child down, because the same word does different jobs in different sentences. The Word Job Test, and three traps.
Six names, six tests: abbreviations, irony and idioms
In this part of the paper, knowing the right name is the mark. Initialism or acronym, idiom or proverb, verbal or situational irony — each has a test that settles it in seconds.
Read past the gap: cloze passages
A passage with words missing, and the answer is decided by what comes after the gap as often as by what comes before it. How to fill them without guessing.
Cross out the of-the-something: subject and verb agreement
The box of apples were left by the gate sounds fine to almost everybody. Why your ear grabs the wrong noun, and the pencil mark that fixes it.