Knowing the content is half of it. The other half is how your child works the paper — when to eliminate, when to guess, when to abandon a question, and how each of the five sections rewards a different approach. These are the EduTest exam strategies that separate similar students.
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Two facts drive almost every good EduTest exam strategy. First, nothing is deducted for a wrong answer, so a blank can only score zero while a guess always has a chance. Second, every question in a section is worth the same, so a hard question is worth exactly what an easy one is — and costs far more time.
Together those two facts produce one method: two passes, a hard per-question ceiling, and never a blank. Bank every easy mark first, flag anything that resists, then return with whatever time is left. Elimination and educated guessing are what turn the flagged questions into marks rather than zeroes.
The rest of this page is that method applied section by section, because reading, verbal reasoning, numerical reasoning, mathematics and writing each reward a different approach. If you also need the preparation plan behind it, see our EduTest preparation guide.
Before any section-specific tactic, these four decide most of the marks. They are also the easiest things to rehearse, because they do not depend on content at all.
First pass: answer everything that resolves quickly and flag the rest. Second pass: return to the flagged items in order of how close they felt. Most students find 60–70% of a section falls into the first pass.
Around 20 seconds on the first pass, 40 at the absolute most. When the ceiling hits, eliminate what you can, commit to an answer, flag it and move. The ceiling is a rule, not a judgement call.
EduTest awards marks for correct answers and deducts nothing for incorrect ones. An unanswered question is a guaranteed zero. Before time is called, every box should have something in it.
Each section is timed and standardised separately, and all five carry equal weight. One bad section does not sink a result — but carrying it into the next one can. Close the door and start fresh.
Why the two-pass method works: question order is not guaranteed to run easy to hard. A student who works strictly in order can spend four minutes on question seven and never reach twelve easy marks at the end of the section. The first pass exists to make sure those marks are never lost to a question that was never going to be solved anyway.
Most students hunt for the right answer. Strong scorers remove wrong ones. It is faster, it is more reliable under pressure, and on a four-option multiple-choice paper it changes the arithmetic completely.
Chance of a correct answer on a four-option question, before and after ruling options out.
Take a student who genuinely cannot solve ten questions in a section. If they leave those blank, they score zero on all ten. If they guess blind, they gain about two or three. If they eliminate two options on each and then guess, they gain around five.
That is a swing of five marks in one section, from a skill that requires no additional content knowledge whatsoever — and the same swing is available in all four multiple-choice sections.
Elimination is the cheapest score improvement available to a candidate. It is also the one most families never explicitly teach.
Options containing always, never, all, none or every are usually wrong, because passages and problems rarely support absolutes. Strike them first.
In reading, any option describing something the passage never mentions. In maths, any answer in the wrong order of magnitude. Both can be removed without solving anything.
In sentence-completion and verbal items, an option that does not fit the sentence grammatically is out, whatever its meaning. Read the sentence with each option in place.
In numerical work, a rough estimate usually kills two of the four options in seconds. "About 20 × 4" removes anything not near 80 without a single calculation.
An option that repeats words from the passage but rearranges the meaning is a designed distractor. Familiar wording is not evidence of a correct answer.
Once two options are gone, choose between the survivors and move. Deliberating between two options for another 40 seconds costs more than the mark is worth.
The habit to build: practise crossing options out physically, or mentally saying "not that, not that". Children who only ever look for the right answer freeze when they cannot find it. Children trained to eliminate always have a next move, which is worth as much for composure as it is for marks.
EduTest does not penalise wrong answers, which makes guessing not just permitted but mathematically correct on any question your child cannot finish. The skill is deciding when — quickly, and without agonising.
If yes, answer it and move on. This is the first pass, and most of the section should resolve here.
Yes → answer, move onIf yes, eliminate as many as you can, choose between the survivors, flag the question, and move on. You now have 33–50% odds instead of 25%.
Yes → eliminate, commit, flagChoose an option anyway — the same letter every time is fine — flag it, and move on immediately. Never spend a second more on a question you cannot start.
No → pick, flag, moveReturn to flagged questions, closest-feeling first. Change an answer only if you can articulate a concrete reason — first instincts are right more often than students expect.
Yes → second passStop working and sweep. Check that no question is unanswered. Filling five blanks in the last minute is worth more than solving one more question properly.
Always → blank sweepGive your child a default letter. Deciding which option to guess costs time and creates hesitation. Agreeing in advance that unresolvable questions get, say, a C removes the decision entirely. The odds are identical, and the seconds saved are real.
The universal method sets the frame. Inside it, each section rewards a different first move — and getting that first move wrong costs more than any individual question.
Practise all five sections under exam conditions, with worked solutions and section-by-section reporting.
On a paper this fast, careless losses are usually larger than knowledge gaps. The good news is that they are the most fixable category of all — they respond to habits, not study.
| Error | What it looks like | The habit that fixes it |
|---|---|---|
| Misread command word | Answering a different question — missing a "not", "except" or "least" | Underline the command word in every question for two weeks. This bucket shrinks fast. |
| Unit mismatch | Answer correct in centimetres when the question wanted metres | Circle the unit in the question and the unit in the answer before committing. |
| Transcription slip | Solving correctly, then selecting the option next to the intended one | A ten-second self-check: say the answer, then confirm the letter matches. |
| Half-solved | Finding an intermediate value and stopping, when the question wanted the final one | Re-read the question stem after computing, not before. |
| Sign or order flip | Reversing a subtraction, or reading a sequence backwards | Estimate first. If the answer contradicts the estimate, something flipped. |
| Pattern assumption | Assuming a number series is arithmetic when it alternates or squares | Run the full pattern checklist rather than stopping at the first idea. |
| Left blank | Running out of time with unanswered questions | The final-minute blank sweep. There is no penalty, so a blank is a wasted mark. |
The diagnostic that matters: after every practice paper, sort mistakes into four buckets — didn't know it, misread it, ran out of time, careless slip. If the careless bucket is the biggest, the fix is habits and pacing, not more content. Most families discover this only after months of drilling the wrong thing.
Pacing is not a feeling. It is a set of checkpoints, rehearsed until they are automatic, so a student can self-correct before a section runs away from them.
Ten seconds to see how many questions there are and whether passages come first. Begin the first pass immediately — do not read the whole section before starting.
If fewer than a third of the questions are answered, the ceiling is not being enforced. Speed up deliberately and start flagging sooner.
If behind here, switch to elimination-and-commit on everything remaining rather than trying to solve. Banking partial-odds answers beats reaching fewer questions.
Closest-feeling items first. Change an answer only with a reason you could explain out loud.
Stop solving. Scan for anything unanswered and fill every one. Five filled blanks are worth more than one more solved question.
Rehearse the checkpoints, not just the section. A student who has never practised looking at the clock at ten and twenty minutes will not do it under pressure. Build it into every timed drill until it happens without prompting.
Every tactic on this page assumes a clear head. Test anxiety costs marks in exactly the places strategy is supposed to save them — the first pass, the ceiling, the blank sweep.
The most effective anxiety reduction is having sat the format enough times that nothing on the day is new. Ten to fifteen full mocks does more than any amount of encouragement.
All five sections are weighted equally and standardised separately. Tell your child this explicitly before the day — students who believe one bad section has ended it often make it two.
Three slow breaths between sections settles the physical response faster than trying to think positively. Practise it during timed drills so it is automatic.
Error log only, no new material, early nights. Nothing learned in the final week survives exam pressure, but arriving rested measurably helps.
No calculator, no dictionary, no scrap beyond what is provided. Meeting a restriction for the first time on the day is an avoidable shock.
Venue, start time, ID requirements and what to bring, checked with the school in the week before. Logistics stress spends attention that the first section needs.
The strategy questions families ask us most often.
Yes. EduTest awards marks for correct answers and deducts nothing for incorrect ones, so an unanswered question can only score zero while a guess always has a chance. Every box should be filled before time is called. Guess quickly rather than agonising — the decision itself should take seconds.
On a four-option question a blind guess is 25%. Eliminating one option lifts it to 33%, two options to 50%. Across ten unsolvable questions in a section, that is the difference between gaining two or three marks and gaining around five — without any additional content knowledge.
On the first pass your child answers everything that resolves quickly and flags anything that resists, applying a hard ceiling of about 20 seconds per question. On the second pass they return to the flagged items with whatever time remains. It exists because question order is not guaranteed easy-to-hard, so working strictly in order risks never reaching easy marks at the end.
About 20 seconds on the first pass, 40 at the absolute maximum. When the ceiling hits, eliminate what you can, commit to an answer, flag it and move. Making this a rule rather than a judgement call is what makes it work under pressure.
For factual and persuasive passages, yes — skim the questions, then read once with targets in mind. For literary passages, no: narrative meaning builds across the extract, so scanning for keywords fails. Switching mode by text type is one of the highest-value reading habits.
Name the relationship before looking at the options — synonym, antonym, part-to-whole, cause and effect, degree. Naming it first prevents surface-level word matching, which is what most distractors are built to exploit. And never spend 90 seconds on one unknown word when every question is worth the same.
Sort every practice error into four buckets: didn't know it, misread it, ran out of time, careless slip. If the careless bucket is largest, the fix is habits, not content — underline command words, circle units, and add a ten-second self-check before committing. Track the rate week to week; it should visibly fall.
Three to five minutes planning, the bulk of the section writing, two minutes proofreading. Answer the prompt as given rather than adapting a memorised piece — markers see hundreds of pre-written stories and mark them down on relevance. And always finish: an unfinished piece loses on structure whatever the opening was like.
Yes, at fixed checkpoints rather than constantly. In a 30-minute section, check at ten minutes and twenty minutes. If behind at either, switch to elimination-and-commit rather than trying to solve. Rehearse the checkpoints in practice or they will not happen on the day.
No. All five sections are weighted equally and standardised separately, then averaged. One weak section lowers the average but does not end the attempt. Telling your child this before the day matters, because students who believe otherwise often turn one bad section into two.
No. Students work mentally or on the scrap paper provided, in both Mathematics and Numerical Reasoning. This is why arithmetic fluency is a strategy issue as much as a content one — hesitation over times tables taxes every second question.
Rehearse them in timed drills until they are automatic. Set a visible timer, enforce the 20-second ceiling out loud at first, practise the blank sweep in the final minute of every drill, and review by bucket afterwards. Strategies read the night before do not survive exam pressure; strategies rehearsed for months do.
Reading this page changes nothing on its own. Rehearsing the ceiling, the elimination cues and the blank sweep in timed practice, week after week, is what turns them into marks.
