Eleven-Plus Preparation Specialists
This is another type of question that favours those who like logic puzzles. Your vocabulary is not being tested at all, just your reasoning.
In this type of question you will be given two sets of words, and asked to complete the third set in the same way as the first two. Each set of words features two words around a central word, which is in brackets. That central word has been made from the words around it. However, it’s up to you to figure out how the letters have been used. In other words, you need to find a pattern or rule and apply it. The simple example below should make this clear.
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lance (clod) rode , emote (tent) anti
Least (?) pawn
Answer: Slaw
The pattern is W1L4, W1L1, W2L2, W2L3
This question can seem difficult if you haven’t attempted it before. However, after practising and applying a simple process you should find it easier. We recommend that you take a straightforward approach, as follows:
Step 1: Write out each possibility in turn for word 1
Step 2: Write out each possibility in turn for word 2, and comprare.
Step 3: Use your pattern to find a solution
You must begin by writing out the possibilities for where each letter comes from. That means locating where each letter could come from in the words around it. It’s entirely possible – and likely – that some letters could come from either word around them. Therefore, you must write down both possibilities. You might end up with something like this:
W1L1 or W2L3, W2L2, W1L2, W2L4
Now, you should move on to the second set of words, and repeat the process. Write out where each letter must come from.Â
Finally, you can compare the two sets of results. Looking at the two patterns, you ought to be able to remove one possibility, and leave a certain answer. Looking at the example just above, you might remove ‘W1L1’ as a possibility for the starting letter, as you find that only W2L3 works at the start of the middle word.
That leaves you with a pattern to apply to the set of words with a missing middle word.
lance (clod) rode , emote (tent) anti
Least (?) pawn
We’ll use the first example for our worked solution. Here, you should begin by writing the pattern from looking at the first set of letters. This gives you W1L4, W1L1, W2L2, W2L3. Now, given that there is no confusion over where any letter comes from (as the two words around the central word in brackets do not share any letters) you don’t need to move onto the second set of words. However, we will, just to illustrate. You would get W1L4, W1L1 or W1L5, W2L2, W2L3. Note that we can immediately see that it can’t be W1L5, as that would not work with the first word – instead of spelling clod we’d be spelling ceod.
Now, we must take this pattern and apply it to the final set of two words. We therefore get
W1L4 = S
W1L1 = L
W2L2 = A
W2L3 = W
This gives us the answer of SLAW.
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