11 Plus & EQAO Practice — Maths, English, Verbal & Non-Verbal Reasoning
Free, no-sign-up practice for the UK 11 Plus (GL Assessment & CEM) and Canadian EQAO. Build the skills that win places at grammar schools and competitive programmes.
Preparing for the 11 Plus and EQAO: What Every Parent Needs to Know
Competitive and selective exams ask children to demonstrate more than what they have been taught in school. Whether your child is sitting the UK 11 Plus to gain a place at a grammar or independent school, or the EQAO provincial assessment in Canada, success depends on consistent, well-structured practice — across the right subjects, in the right format, well before exam day.
Omishaan UK and Omishaan Canada provide free practice resources for every core subject: Maths, English, Verbal Reasoning, and Non-Verbal Reasoning — the four subjects that make up the 11 Plus — alongside materials aligned to the EQAO framework. No account. No payment. No barrier between your child and the preparation they need.
What Is the 11 Plus?
The 11 Plus (11+) is a selective academic entrance examination taken by children in Year 6 in England (typically aged 10–11). It is used by grammar schools and many independent schools to assess academic ability and select pupils for entry. With 164 state grammar schools in England and fierce competition for places — often with ratios of 8 or more applicants per available seat — thorough preparation across all four subjects is not optional; it is essential.
The exam is administered by two main providers: GL Assessment and CEM (Centre for Evaluation and Monitoring at Durham University). Understanding which provider your target school uses is the first step, because the format, question style, and timing differ significantly between the two. Both, however, test children across the same four core domains.
GL Assessment vs CEM: What Is the Difference?
The two exam boards differ in structure, question style, pacing, and predictability. Understanding these differences shapes how your child should practise.
| Feature | GL Assessment | CEM (Durham University) |
|---|---|---|
| Subjects tested separately? | ✔ Yes — distinct papers per subject | Mixed — blended sections |
| Question format | Multiple choice (standardised) | Multiple choice + standard answer; less predictable |
| Verbal Reasoning style | 21 classic VR question types | Blended with English comprehension & vocabulary |
| Non-Verbal Reasoning | ✔ Tested as a dedicated section | ✔ Tested (sometimes combined with spatial) |
| Speed required | High — ~50–80 questions in 45–50 min | Very high — fast-paced mixed sections |
| Creative/continuous writing | Sometimes (region-dependent) | Rarely |
| Regions using this board | Kent, Essex, Hertfordshire, Bucks, many others | Birmingham, Coventry, NW England, parts of Bucks |
| Free practice at Omishaan UK | uk.omishaan.com | uk.omishaan.com |
The Four Core 11 Plus Subjects
Whether your child is preparing for GL Assessment or CEM, all four subjects below form the foundation of a winning 11 Plus performance. Omishaan UK provides free practice across every one of them.
Number, fractions, algebra, geometry, data handling — full KS2 curriculum and beyond. Speed and accuracy under time pressure.
Reading comprehension, vocabulary, grammar, punctuation, and (in some regions) creative writing. Wide reading is the best long-term strategy.
Word relationships, analogies, coded sequences, letter patterns, and language logic. Strong vocabulary is the single biggest predictor of VR performance.
Shape sequences, spatial patterns, odd-one-out, codes, reflections, and rotations — no words or numbers required. Tests pure logical thinking.
11 Plus Maths: Topics, Tips & Free Practice
Maths is one of the most structured sections of the 11 Plus, which makes it one of the most improvable with the right preparation. Unlike Verbal Reasoning — which depends heavily on vocabulary built up over years — Maths gaps can be closed relatively quickly with targeted, consistent practice.
Key Topics Tested
The 11 Plus Maths syllabus goes beyond the standard Year 6 curriculum. Children need to be confident with: place value and ordering; the four operations at speed; fractions, decimals, and percentages; ratio and proportion; simple algebra and number sequences; perimeter, area, and volume; angles and geometry; time, money, and measures; and data interpretation including mean, median, mode, and range.
The Speed Challenge
GL Assessment Maths papers typically contain 50 questions in 50 minutes — leaving roughly one minute per question. CEM papers move even faster, with mixed sections that offer no subject-specific pacing. Children who know the content but freeze under time pressure are at a serious disadvantage. Building speed through timed practice sessions — starting untimed, then gradually reducing allowed time — is the most effective approach.
Mental Arithmetic as the Foundation
Children who are fluent in mental calculation — times tables to 12×12, doubling and halving, percentage of amounts, fraction-to-decimal conversions — handle the Maths section far more comfortably. These should be drilled to automaticity before tackling full practice papers. Omishaan UK includes number fluency practice designed to build exactly this foundation.
11 Plus English: Comprehension, Vocabulary & Grammar
English in the 11 Plus goes well beyond what is tested in school SATs. Children are expected to read and analyse complex passages, infer meaning from context, identify authorial technique, understand nuanced vocabulary, and apply grammar and punctuation rules accurately — all under significant time pressure.
Reading Comprehension
Both GL and CEM English papers include at least one unseen reading comprehension passage. Questions range from straightforward retrieval ("What did the character say?") to demanding inference and evaluation questions ("What does the author's choice of the word 'crept' suggest about the character's state of mind?"). Children who read widely — fiction, non-fiction, newspapers, poetry — are significantly better equipped to handle unfamiliar passages under exam conditions.
Vocabulary
Vocabulary underpins both the English and Verbal Reasoning sections. Children with a broad reading vocabulary can decode unfamiliar question wording, understand the meaning of comprehension passages more readily, and complete vocabulary-in-context questions with confidence. For CEM in particular, where vocabulary questions appear frequently and in challenging forms, active vocabulary-building from Year 4 onwards is essential.
Grammar and Punctuation
GL Assessment English papers frequently include grammar, punctuation, and spelling questions presented in multiple-choice format. These cover topics from SPaG (Spelling, Punctuation, and Grammar): parts of speech, tense, sentence types, punctuation marks, and common spelling rules. These are highly teachable and respond well to structured, repeated practice.
Creative Writing (Where Required)
Some GL regions — particularly Kent and parts of Essex — include a continuous writing component worth a significant portion of marks. Children are asked to write a story or descriptive passage in 20–25 minutes. Quality, imagination, accurate spelling and punctuation, and varied sentence structure are all assessed. Practising creative writing regularly in Year 5 and Year 6 is important for these regions.
Verbal Reasoning: The 11 Plus Subject Most Parents Underestimate
Verbal Reasoning (VR) is often the subject families spend the least time on — and the one that causes the most surprises on exam day. It does not appear in the standard primary school curriculum at all, which means children encounter it for the first time during 11 Plus preparation. The good news is that it is highly learnable once children understand the question types.
The 21 GL Verbal Reasoning Question Types
GL Assessment VR is built around 21 established question types, including: finding the word that completes a sentence, identifying words with similar or opposite meanings, spotting the odd word out, solving letter and number codes, completing analogies, rearranging jumbled sentences, and finding hidden words. Each type has a learnable strategy. Children who have systematically worked through all 21 types are dramatically better positioned than those who have only done random mixed practice.
CEM Verbal Reasoning: A Different Challenge
CEM Verbal Reasoning is less predictable than GL. Rather than discrete question types, CEM blends VR with comprehension and vocabulary tasks in mixed sections. The pace is faster and the vocabulary demands are higher. Children preparing for CEM need to be extremely comfortable with vocabulary work and fast reading, in addition to the logical reasoning skills that underpin traditional VR.
Vocabulary Is the Root of VR Success
The single most consistent predictor of Verbal Reasoning performance is vocabulary breadth. Children who encounter a wider range of words in reading — including slightly unusual, formal, or literary vocabulary — perform significantly better on VR questions involving word meanings, analogies, and odd-one-out tasks. Begin building vocabulary actively from Year 4 using Omishaan UK's word-focused practice sets.
Non-Verbal Reasoning: Spatial Logic Without Words
Non-Verbal Reasoning (NVR) is unique among the four 11 Plus subjects: it requires no prior knowledge of language or number. Instead, it tests a child's ability to perceive spatial relationships, identify patterns, and apply logical rules to shapes and diagrams. For children who find words and numbers challenging, NVR can be a significant source of marks — but it requires its own form of preparation.
Core NVR Question Types
The main NVR question types include: odd one out (identifying which shape does not belong to a group); series and sequences (working out what comes next in a pattern of shapes); matrices (completing a 2×2 or 3×3 grid of shapes by identifying the logical rule); analogies (shape A is to shape B as shape C is to…?); reflection and rotation (identifying what a shape looks like when mirrored or turned); and codes (cracking a visual code applied to shapes).
Can NVR Be Improved with Practice?
Yes — significantly. While NVR is often described as testing "innate" spatial ability, research consistently shows that children who practise NVR question types become faster and more accurate. The key is learning to apply the right strategy to each question type: for example, checking for rotation before reflection, or looking at size, shading, shape, and number of sides in a set order when approaching odd-one-out questions.
NVR Under Time Pressure
NVR questions that are straightforward when untimed become challenging under the GL paper's pace. Regular timed practice using Omishaan UK resources helps children build the visual processing speed needed to work through questions within the time allowed.
The CEM Hub: Preparing for Centre for Evaluation and Monitoring Exams
CEM exams are administered in several regions of England including Birmingham, Coventry, Warwickshire, parts of Buckinghamshire, and areas of the North West. They are known for being harder to prepare for specifically because their format is less predictable — there are no published past papers from CEM itself, and the question style can change from year to year.
Effective CEM preparation focuses on building the underlying skills rather than drilling specific question types. Children who read widely, have strong vocabulary, are fluent in mental arithmetic, and can think logically at speed are well-positioned for CEM regardless of exactly what appears on the paper. This is why Omishaan UK's approach — building genuine subject mastery rather than pattern-matching to question formats — is particularly well-suited to CEM preparation.
CEM Paper Structure
A typical CEM exam consists of two papers, each approximately 45–50 minutes long, containing mixed sections. One paper may blend comprehension, spelling, and verbal reasoning. Another may combine numerical reasoning with non-verbal reasoning. Sections are timed within the overall paper, with a specific number of minutes allocated to each. Children must move through the paper steadily — spending too long on one question is the most common time management error in CEM exams.
The GL Assessment Hub: Preparing for Grammar School Entrance
GL Assessment is used by the majority of grammar schools in England and is the most widely sat 11 Plus format. GL papers are published by GL Assessment (a commercial educational publisher) and follow a consistent structure year on year — which makes them more predictable and therefore more amenable to structured preparation.
Each GL subject is tested in a separate, timed paper. Children sit between two and four papers depending on their target school's requirements. The question format throughout GL papers is multiple choice, with answers marked on an answer sheet. Familiarity with this answer format matters: children who have not practised with multiple-choice answer grids can lose marks through errors in transferring answers.
GL Assessment Regions
GL Assessment is used in Kent, Essex, Hertfordshire, Lincolnshire, Slough, parts of Buckinghamshire (for the SET — Secondary Transfer Test), and many individual selective schools across England. If you are in one of these regions and targeting a grammar school, GL Assessment preparation at Omishaan UK should be your primary focus.
EQAO Practice for Canadian Students — Omishaan Canada
For families in Canada — particularly in Ontario — the EQAO (Education Quality and Accountability Office) assessment is the equivalent provincial standardised exam. EQAO tests students in Grades 3, 6, and 9 across Reading, Writing, and Mathematics, assessing performance against Ontario curriculum expectations.
Omishaan Canada at ca.omishaan.com provides free practice resources aligned to EQAO expectations, supporting students in Grades 3–9 to build the academic skills assessed in the provincial test. Like the UK edition, Omishaan Canada requires no registration and is completely free.
What EQAO Tests
The EQAO Primary Division assessment (Grade 3) and Junior Division assessment (Grade 6) each cover Reading, Writing, and Mathematics in two booklets completed over two days. The Grade 9 EQAO assessment focuses specifically on Mathematics. Questions assess understanding, application, and communication of mathematical and literacy skills as defined by the Ontario curriculum.
Why EQAO Practice Matters Beyond the Test
EQAO results contribute to a school's public accountability profile and are used by boards to identify where additional support is needed. For individual students, strong EQAO performance builds the academic confidence and curriculum mastery that feeds into success in subsequent years — and, for Grade 6 students, positions them well for competitive secondary school application programmes in Ontario.
Competitive Academic Programmes in Canada
Beyond EQAO, Canadian families — particularly in Ontario, British Columbia, and Alberta — are increasingly focused on competitive academic entrance assessments for enrichment programmes, gifted streams, and selective secondary schools. The strong Maths and English foundations built through Omishaan Canada practice are directly applicable to these competitive pathways.
Omishaan's Two Regional Platforms for Exam Preparation
A Practical 11 Plus Study Plan by Year Group
Effective 11 Plus preparation is not a sprint — it is a structured, multi-year build. Here is how to approach each stage of preparation using Omishaan UK:
Year 4 (Age 8–9): Foundation Building
In Year 4, the focus should be on building the underlying skills that the 11 Plus will test — not on exam papers themselves. For Maths: rapid times tables recall, mental arithmetic, and core KS2 concepts. For English: reading widely every day, active vocabulary building, and basic grammar. For Verbal Reasoning: introduction to the concept and the first few question types. Non-Verbal Reasoning: spatial puzzles, pattern spotting, and shape recognition activities. Sessions of 20–30 minutes, three to four times per week, are plenty at this stage.
Year 5 (Age 9–10): Structured Practice
Year 5 is the core preparation year. By now, children should be working systematically through all VR and NVR question types, completing regular timed Maths practice, reading challenging texts including classic literature, and tackling comprehension passages with varied question styles. Introduce first practice papers in the second half of Year 5. Review every wrong answer in detail. Use Omishaan UK to fill identified gaps before returning to full papers.
Year 6 (Age 10–11): Exam-Ready Refinement
In Year 6, the priority is speed, accuracy, and exam technique — not learning new content. Children should be completing regular timed papers under exam conditions, reviewing errors, and working on time management strategies. Mock exams are invaluable at this stage for building resilience and familiarity with the pressure of exam conditions. Continue using Omishaan UK for targeted subject practice between mock sittings.
Why Free, Accessible Practice Matters for Every Family
Private 11 Plus tutoring in the UK costs between £40 and £120 per hour. Full preparation programmes from specialist tutoring companies can run to thousands of pounds over two years. Practice paper packs from publishers add further cost. For families without significant disposable income, this creates a significant and unfair barrier to grammar school access.
Omishaan was built on a single conviction: every child deserves access to the resources that help them compete fairly, regardless of their family's financial circumstances. That is why uk.omishaan.com and ca.omishaan.com are, and will remain, completely free. No subscription. No locked content. No premium tier.
If you have found Omishaan useful and want to help us improve it, the most valuable thing you can do is share your feedback at contact@omishaan.com. Tell us which subjects your child is finding hardest, which question types are most confusing, and what resources would help most. Your feedback directly shapes what we build next.
Frequently Asked Questions
What subjects does the 11 Plus exam cover?
The 11 Plus typically covers four subjects: Maths, English, Verbal Reasoning, and Non-Verbal Reasoning. The exact subjects depend on your exam board — GL Assessment usually tests all four in separate papers, while CEM blends them into mixed sections. Omishaan UK covers all four for both GL and CEM.
What is the difference between GL Assessment and CEM?
GL Assessment uses standardised, separate papers per subject with predictable multiple-choice question formats — easier to prepare for specifically. CEM blends comprehension, vocabulary, and reasoning into fast-paced mixed sections that are less predictable. Knowing which your target school uses should drive your entire preparation approach. See our comparison table above for a full breakdown.
What is Verbal Reasoning and why is it important?
Verbal Reasoning tests a child's ability to understand and manipulate language logically — through word analogies, coded sequences, letter patterns, and similar question types. It does not appear in the standard primary curriculum, so children encounter it fresh during 11 Plus preparation. Strong vocabulary and systematic practice by question type are the two keys to improvement. Practise for free at uk.omishaan.com.
What is Non-Verbal Reasoning?
Non-Verbal Reasoning tests spatial and logical thinking using shapes, patterns, and diagrams — no words or numbers involved. Children are asked to spot sequences, complete matrices, identify the odd one out, and work with codes. It responds well to practice: children who work through NVR question types systematically become significantly faster and more accurate.
When should my child start preparing for the 11 Plus?
Most families start in Year 4 (age 8–9) with foundation building, moving to structured practice in Year 5 and exam-focused preparation in Year 6. Starting in Year 4 avoids the stress of last-minute preparation and gives time to build vocabulary, number fluency, and reasoning skills gradually. Omishaan UK has resources suitable from Year 4 onwards.
What is the EQAO exam?
EQAO (Education Quality and Accountability Office) is Ontario's provincial standardised assessment, taken in Grades 3, 6, and 9. It tests Reading, Writing, and Mathematics against Ontario curriculum expectations. Free EQAO-aligned practice is available at ca.omishaan.com.
Is Omishaan's practice really free?
Yes — completely free. No subscription, no registration, no hidden premium tier. uk.omishaan.com for UK 11 Plus and ca.omishaan.com for EQAO/Canada. Visit either site and start practising immediately.
How is 11 Plus Maths different from school Maths?
11 Plus Maths extends beyond the Year 6 curriculum, covering more advanced algebra, ratio, and data handling topics, and demands a much higher speed of working than classroom Maths. It also tests mental arithmetic fluency at a level that most children need to specifically develop. Regular timed practice is essential to build the pace required.
What is the difference between Omishaan UK and Omishaan Canada?
Omishaan UK (uk.omishaan.com) is focused on the 11 Plus exam — GL Assessment and CEM — covering Maths, English, Verbal Reasoning, and Non-Verbal Reasoning. Omishaan Canada (ca.omishaan.com) covers the EQAO provincial assessment and competitive Canadian academic programmes. Both are free and require no account.
How do I contact Omishaan to suggest new resources?
Email contact@omishaan.com or visit the Contact Us page. We actively use parent and teacher feedback to prioritise new practice sets, question types, and subject areas.
Start Free 11 Plus & EQAO Practice Today
Your child's preparation for competitive and selective exams starts here — and it starts for free. Whether you are targeting a grammar school in Kent, Birmingham, Hertfordshire, or Buckinghamshire, or preparing for EQAO in Ontario, Omishaan has the free practice resources you need.
Visit uk.omishaan.com to start 11 Plus practice across Maths, English, Verbal Reasoning, and Non-Verbal Reasoning. Visit ca.omishaan.com for EQAO and Canadian competitive exam preparation. No sign-up. No payment. Just practice.
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