Our CAT4 Quantitative Reasoning Skills Practice Test

Welcome to our CAT4 practice test.

Our CAT4 Practice Test

The Cognitive Ability Test: CAT4 is a standardised cognitive test. It provides insights into children’s ability to reason across 4 fields: verbal, non-verbal, mathematical and spatial as compared to the national average.

How are quantitative reasoning skills assessed by CAT4’s number series?

  • In the Number Series test, students have to work out the rule underlying the progression in the number series in each question.
  • Then to select the next number in the series from the five options presented.
  • This test assesses the same underlying basic reasoning processes and number facility as Number Analogies.

 

CAT4 Number Series. Computer code building an image

CAT4 Number Series test practice

[Rob WilliamsAsk ROB (expert practice CAT4 test developer) your questions by emailing passedpapers@gmail.com

An Associate Fellow of the British Psychological Society, Rob Williams is a Chartered Psychologist with over 25 years of experience working and designing tests.
Rob has worked for the school entrance test publishers ISEB and GL – as well as the leading global psychometric test publishers including SHL, Kenexa IBM, MBTI, CAPP and SOVA  Assessment.

Introduction to the Cognitive Abilities Test (CAT4)

CAT4 are essential in providing teachers with a rounded profile of a child, thus making it easier to decide about the progress of learners and offer appropriate support. Teachers use CAT4 to gauge strengths and weaknesses in four main aspects including verbal, non-verbal, spatial, and quantitative reasoning. CAT4 is statistically reliable since it is annually verified by analyzing 250,000 pupils and is standardized on 25,000 children. Therefore, it is a true reflection of pupils’ potential and effectively reveals factors that affect their performance.

GL assessment provides both group and individual reports that are easy to follow; thus, teachers can get a complete picture of the learning skills of the students. National performance records, including GCSE, KS2, and A-level indicators, provide the basis for evaluating CAT4. 3. The Eight Sections of the Cognitive Abilities Test Verbal classification test.

CAT4 test practice

What do CAT4 Number Series questions look like?

Number series questions are used to test ‘number logic’. The questions consist of a series of numbers with one number missing. You will then need to find the missing number. These question types assess logical thinking. For example: 4, 7, 12, 15, 20, ? Number analogy questions are presented to identify relationships, similarities or differences, and dissimilarities in a series or between groups of numbers.

Get children interested in learning to read

Reading is such a fundamental starting block for any learning. It is the main channel for learning in most schools or educational settings and a necessity for future academic achievement in mainstream education.  Children are however not always ready for the world of reading by the time they go to school. The reason for this is as important as the solution. Some of these reasons or causes for why they may not be susceptible to the world of reading are exactly what you need to identify in order to find the best solutions.

  • A younger sibling might feel intimidated by the reading ability of the older. Best solutions would include reading separately with the younger sibling to build their confidence. 
  • A child may not be developmentally ready for reading. Ways to help with this is to
    • Make sure your child knows their sounds. This can be tricky as English is not a phonetical language. Find games, whether on screen or paper to help them learn the rules. Teach Your Monster To Read has been a favourite for us. 
    • Start off with pictures, discussing the story told by these and developing a curiosity for the story and expressing themselves in language.
    • Follow your child’s reading with your finger to give them a point to focus on.
    • Find stories that interest them. Whether they are into dinosaurs, princesses or space. Topics that interest them is the key. 

      What do CAT4 Spatial Reasoning questions look like?

      Spatial Reasoning in CAT4 covers both Folding and Hidden Shapes.

      Folding

      Folding questions show us a sheet of paper that is first folder and then has a hole punched through it. The challenge is to select the answer which shows how the piece of paper will look when it is unfolded.

      When the sheet is unfolded, there will be two holes, one either side of the centre fold, so the answer is D.

      Things get a little trickier when there are multiple folds and/or different shaped holes:

      Here the sheet has been folded twice across a vertical fold, creating 4 columns (1 fold makes two, 2 fold makes 4).

      The shape has also been folded once across a horizontal fold, creating 2 rows (the same reasoning as above).

      We can see the circle is positioned above the heart in the top row. It is important to realise that the shapes will be mirrored in the bottom row, when the sheet is unfolded. The only answer that correctly displays this is E.

      What do CAT4 Hidden Shapes questions look like?

      The shape on the left is hidden inside on of the shapes on the right.

      The image on the left is never flipped or rotated. So although it does contain the shame shape, A cannot be the answer.

      The correct answer is D.

      B, C and D all look as though the could contain the shape.

      However, if we look carefully the only figure that contains an accurate reproduction of the image is figure D.

What are the types of Verbal Reasoning question in the CAT4?

This involves words. These appear in the form of verbal classifications & analogies.

Each CAT4 question contains three words that have the same meaning. Pupils are supposed to discover the concept linking the three words and then select one word that best fit with them from the list of other five words provided. It assesses word knowledge, verbal reasoning, and language development.

Rob WilliamsAsk ROB (expert test developer) your questions by emailing passedpapers@gmail.com

An Associate Fellow of the British Psychological Society, Rob Williams is a Chartered Psychologist with over 25 years of experience working and designing tests.
Rob has worked for the school entrance test publishers ISEB and GL – as well as the leading global psychometric test publishers including SHL, Kenexa IBM, MBTI, CAPP and SOVA  Assessment.

 

CAT4 Non-verbal Reasoning question types

These involve shapes and patterns. These appear in the form of figures & matrices.

CAT4 Maths question types

These involve numbers. These appear in the form of number analogies & series.

CAT4 Spatial Reasoning question types

These involve mentally generating and transforming visual images.  These appear in the form of figures.

 

Non-Verbal Reasoning Question examples for the CAT4

The CAT4’s non-Verbal Reasoning has 2 question types. These are called Figure Classification and Figure Matrices. Both are explained below wth a range of different CAT4 non-verbal reasoning questions for each type.

CAT4 Figure Classification question examples

spotting the rule in the original three images, and selecting the image that matches.

In the first three shapes, the hollow circle is inside the shape and the shaded circle is outside the shape.

Only option C follows this rule.

Thinking about the position of the circle inside the shape? Don’t, it’s a distraction.

Some shapes have obvious attributes that appear to form a rule, but are actually nothing to do with the answer. In this question, all of the first three images are a rotation of the same shape (the position of the circle doesn’t matter at all).

E by rotating the shapes in the first three images.

CAT4 Figure Matrices question examples

recognise the relationship between the different shapes and pick the answer that completes the set.
The example on the left hand side of the box shows the square moving inside the circle, or the top shape moving inside the lower shape.

On the right hand side we can see that the star is inside the hexagon. This tells us that, like the square, the star will originally have been above the hexagon. So the answer is C.

This time the relationship is moving horizontally. The heart has moved inside the square and the shading has reversed. Re. the hexagon and the star, this tells us that we are looking for a black shaded star and a hollow hexagon. The only option that matches this is C.

 

RECOMMENDED FREE test CAT4 Resources

We now focus on GL Assessment’s CAT4 test specifically:

 

Our own CAT4 Quantitative Reasoning Test.