Start where the clue is tightest
The Short Answer
These questions give two, three or four clues about how often a letter appears in various words, and ask which letter fits all of them. The clues are not equally useful: a clue saying three times usually leaves one candidate, while a clue saying once can leave nine. Work the tightest clue first, get down to one or two letters, then use the loose clues only to cross out.
Tally, test, cross out
The routine does not change. What changes as the questions get harder is the words: they get long, and the repeated letters get spread out.
Look at OCCURRENCE. What jumps out is the double C at the front — two Cs sitting together are very hard to miss.
But tally it properly. O once. C — one, two, and then a third one, on its own near the end. U once. R twice. E twice.
Three Cs, and the third is invisible unless you count. A word this long cannot be done by eye.
The big idea: start where the clue is tightest
A clue set gives you two, three, sometimes four parts, and they are not equally useful.
Three times in X is a demanding thing to ask. Usually only one letter in the whole word manages it. That clue hands you your answer.
Once in Y, in a word where most letters appear once, leaves you holding eight or nine possibilities — all of which you then carry through the rest of the question.
Big numbers narrow. Small numbers confirm. Same answer either way, but one route is four times the work and four times the chances to slip.
The 'but not in' clue does the most work
A clue that tells you where the letter is not removes whole groups at once.
Once in PLANET, once in PLANTER, but not in PLANNER.
Those three words are almost identical, and that is entirely deliberate.
Letters appearing once in PLANET: P, L, A, N, E, T — all six. No help. Same for PLANTER, so you are still holding six.
Now the negative clue. PLANNER contains P, L, A, N and E. Cross all five out. What is left?
T.
Where do pupils lose marks?
Starting with the loosest clue and carrying nine candidates through a question that could have been finished in one step.
Presence instead of count. The letter is in the word, so it gets accepted — without checking whether it is there once or four times. Once means once exactly.
Missing a scattered repeat, like the third C in OCCURRENCE.
Leaving the 'not in' clue till last.
Assuming E wins. On a 'most often' question, E gets guessed out of habit — and examiners pick words like ASSESSMENT precisely to punish that.
Try it yourself
Tally each word letter by letter. Decide which clue to start with before you start counting.
- Which letter occurs most often in ASSESSMENT?
- Which letter occurs three times in OCCURRENCE?
- Which letter occurs twice in COMMITTEE and three times in TEMPERATURE?
- Which letter occurs once in EXPERIENCE, once in TRANSFERRED, but not in SUCCESSFUL?
- Which letter occurs twice in MILLENNIUM, three times in MAINTENANCE and once in OCCASIONALLY?
- S, with four. If you answered E — it does appear twice, and it is the commonest letter in English, but it is not the commonest letter in this word. That guess is exactly what a word like ASSESSMENT is chosen to punish.
- C. O once, C three times, U once, R twice, E twice, N once. R and E are both repeats, but neither reaches three. The third C sits near the end, on its own, and is invisible unless you tally.
- E. Start with the three: TEMPERATURE has three Es and that is the only letter that does, so you have one candidate immediately. Confirm against COMMITTEE, where E appears twice. T is twice in COMMITTEE but only once in TEMPERATURE.
- N — once in EXPERIENCE, once in TRANSFERRED, and there is no N in SUCCESSFUL. Watch E here: it is in both of the first two words, but EXPERIENCE has four of them, so it never qualified at all.
- N. MILLENNIUM has two, MAINTENANCE has three, OCCASIONALLY has one. Start with the 'three times' clue — it is the tightest of the three.
How much practice does this type need at home?
Ten minutes a week, and the useful instruction is not "do these" but "which clue are you starting with, and why?" Asked before any counting happens, that question is the whole lesson.
Long words from anything being read at the time work perfectly as raw material — pick one, tally it together, and see who spots the scattered repeat first.
Free: a Verbal Reasoning workbook
Questions across the Verbal Reasoning question types, with the method printed at the top and full answers at the back. One workbook for the whole strand, not a sheet per question type.
Frequently Asked Questions
Which clue should my child start with?
The one asking for the biggest number. 'Three times in this word' is a demanding thing to ask — usually only one letter manages it, sometimes two — so it hands you the answer almost immediately. 'Once in this word' can leave nine possibilities to carry through the rest of the question. Big numbers narrow, small numbers confirm. Same answer either way, but one route is four times the work.
What is a 'but not in' clue and why use it early?
It tells you where the letter is not, and it eliminates faster than anything else on the page. Take 'once in PLANET, once in PLANTER, but not in PLANNER'. The first two clues each leave six letters. The negative clue removes P, L, A, N and E in one go, leaving T. Saving it for last means carrying six candidates through a question that could have been over in a step.
Why does my child keep missing a repeated letter?
Because it is scattered rather than doubled. In OCCURRENCE the double C at the front is impossible to miss, and the third C sitting on its own near the end is nearly invisible. A word that long simply cannot be done by eye — it has to be tallied, letter by letter, every time.
Is E usually the answer?
It is the commonest letter in English, which is exactly why it is not usually the answer here. Examiners choose words like ASSESSMENT and MAINTENANCE precisely because a child who guesses E out of habit will get them wrong. Count the word in front of you rather than the language as a whole.
Sources
- GL Assessment — 11+ familiarisation materials and question type descriptions Published 2025.
- Clever Clogs Academy — our own Year 4 and Year 5 lesson records, Winslow Published September 2025 to July 2026.
We are not affiliated with, endorsed by or connected to GL Assessment or Buckinghamshire Council. Test arrangements change; always check the council's own pages for the current year's dates.
We Teach This Method Every Week in Winslow
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