Free · Timed · 25 minutes · Years 6–8

Free Scholarship Practice Test — 30 Questions, 25 Minutes, Instant Results

A free, timed sample in the style of the ACER and Edutest scholarship papers: 30 multiple-choice questions across mathematics and reading and language, drawn from our Year 6, 7 and 8 banks at the stretch and challenge tiers, 25 minutes on the clock, marked instantly with a section breakdown. Part of RHZ Tutoring's 3,261 free practice questions. No sign-up.

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⏱ 25-minute countdown, auto-marked📊 Section breakdown: maths reasoning · reading & language📚 3,261 free practice questions

Free practice quizzes › Scholarship practice test · Selective Entry practice test

The practice test: 30 questions in 25 minutes

Two sections. Press Start the timer, answer every question you can, and press Mark my test before the clock runs out, or it will be marked automatically. Set 14853 · New set of questions →

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Section 1: Maths reasoning (15 questions)

Question 1
Maths reasoning · Pythagoras

A right-angled triangle has legs of length x cm and (x + 7) cm. Its hypotenuse is 13 cm. What is the value of x?

Question 2
Maths reasoning · Ratio & rates

A car travels at a constant speed. It covers 78 km in 1 hour and 18 minutes. At the same speed, how far will it travel in 2 hours and 30 minutes?

Question 3
Maths reasoning · Ratio & rates

Three friends share a prize in the ratio 2 : 3 : 5. The person with the largest share receives $80 more than the person with the smallest share. How much does the person with the middle share receive?

Question 4
Maths reasoning · Algebra & linear equations

The formula C = 5n + 20 gives the cost in dollars of printing n posters at Shop A. Shop B charges C = 8n − 4. A student says: 'Shop A is always cheaper than Shop B for any number of posters.' Is the student correct?

Question 5
Maths reasoning · Algebraic expressions

Two expressions are written on the board: Expression A = 2(3x + 4) − (x − 2) and Expression B = 5x + 10. A student says these two expressions are equivalent because when she substitutes x = 0 she gets the same value from both. Which statement is correct?

Question 6
Maths reasoning · Percentages & rates

A gym membership costs $600 per year. The gym increases the price by 10% at the start of Year 2, then increases the Year 2 price by a further 10% at the start of Year 3. A member claims the total increase over the two years is exactly 20% of the original price. A second member claims the Year 3 price equals the Year 1 price multiplied by 1.21. Which statement is correct?

Question 7
Maths reasoning · Fraction & decimal operations

Which of the following is exactly halfway between 3/8 and 3/4 on a number line?

Question 8
Maths reasoning · Fraction & decimal operations

A swimming pool is being filled by two pipes. Pipe A fills 2/5 of the pool each hour. Pipe B fills 1/4 of the pool each hour. Both pipes are turned on together, but after 1 hour Pipe B is turned off. How much of the pool still needs to be filled after that first hour?

Question 9
Maths reasoning · Ratios & rates

In a class, the ratio of students who walk to school to those who catch the bus is 3 : 2. There are 30 students in the class. If 3 bus students switch to walking, what percentage of the class now walks to school?

Question 10
Maths reasoning · Probability

A bag contains only red and yellow counters. A counter is drawn at random, its colour is noted, and it is replaced. This is done 3 times. The probability of getting exactly 2 red counters is 0.384. Given that P(red) = p, which equation is correct, and what is the value of p?

Question 11
Maths reasoning · Equations

A plumber charges a $45 call-out fee plus $60 per hour. An electrician charges a $75 call-out fee plus $50 per hour. For how many hours of work do they charge exactly the same total amount?

Question 12
Maths reasoning · Equations

Solve: 3x + 10 = 1.

Question 13
Maths reasoning · Algebra & linear equations

Which value of x makes both of these true at the same time? 3x + 1 > 10 AND 5x − 4 < 21

Question 14
Maths reasoning · Ratios & rates

Two quantities P and Q are in the ratio 4 : 9. Q is 63. What is P + Q?

Question 15
Maths reasoning · Percentages

Luca says: 'Increasing a price by 10% and then decreasing it by 10% gives you the original price.' Is Luca correct?

Section 2: Reading & language (15 questions)

Question 16
Reading & language · Phonics & spelling

How many syllables in 'responsibility'?

Question 17
Reading & language · Phonics & spelling

Which sentence contains a word where the suffix has been added INCORRECTLY, changing the meaning from what was intended?

Question 18
Reading & language · Comprehension

Read this passage. "The documentary followed three teenagers preparing for their first solo bushwalk. One had completed first-aid training. One had researched native plants. The third had spent weeks studying trail maps. The narrator closed with: 'In the end, only one of the three made it back before dark.'" What is the most likely effect of the narrator's closing line on the reader?

Question 19
Reading & language · Comprehension

Read this passage carefully. "Sixteen-year-old Priya had won the regional debating championship three years in a row. On the night of the state final, she sat backstage listening to the crowd settle. Her notes were perfect — she had read them so many times the paper had gone soft at the folds. When her name was called, she walked to the podium, placed her notes face-down, and began to speak." What does Priya placing her notes face-down most likely suggest about her?

Question 20
Reading & language · Persuasive & creative writing

A persuasive essay on reducing screen time for teenagers includes this paragraph: 'Of course, technology has brought enormous benefits to education. Interactive apps, online research, and video tutorials have transformed how students learn. Yet when the same screens that educate by day keep teenagers awake until midnight, the cost becomes too high to ignore.' What does the phrase 'Of course' at the start of this paragraph signal to the reader?

Question 21
Reading & language · Reading & comprehension

A story narrator says: 'I told Jess it was a great idea.' Later the narrator thinks: 'I had said what she needed to hear.' What does the second sentence reveal about the narrator that the first sentence hides?

Question 22
Reading & language · Text response & analysis

Read: "Layla had always been the loudest voice in the room. Now she sat with her hands folded, saying nothing, as her mother signed the papers." What does the contrast in this description most likely suggest?

Question 23
Reading & language · Phonics & spelling

Look at these four words: 'ceiling', 'deceive', 'species', 'caffeine'. A student claims: 'In every one of these words, the letters i and e appear together, and in every case they follow the rule: i before e except after c.' Is the student correct?

Question 24
Reading & language · Persuasive & creative writing

A student writes a short story with this final paragraph: 'She handed the trophy to her little sister without a word, then walked back out into the rain.' Her teacher says this ending is effective because it 'trusts the reader'. A classmate suggests adding: 'She felt a warm glow inside, knowing she had done the right thing.' Why would adding the classmate's sentence WEAKEN the ending?

Question 25
Reading & language · Persuasive & creative writing

A student is writing a horror story and wants to build tension in a scene where the main character hears a noise downstairs. She has written: 'There was a noise. Jake went to look. He was scared.' She revises it to: 'Something shifted in the kitchen — a soft drag, then silence. Jake's hand found the banister before he knew he was moving.' What does the revision do to build tension that the original does not?

Question 26
Reading & language · Vocabulary & grammar

A student writes the following sentence in a persuasive essay: 'Every person in this country, whether young or old, rich or poor, urban or rural, deserves clean water.' Her teacher says the series of paired contrasts does more than add detail — it performs a specific rhetorical and grammatical function. Which explanation BEST identifies both the grammatical feature and its persuasive effect?

Question 27
Reading & language · Persuasive & creative writing

A student is writing a narrative about a character who is nervous before a speech. She writes: 'Maya checked her notes for the third time. She checked them again. Her mouth was a desert.' How do the first two sentences work together with the third sentence to show Maya's anxiety?

Question 28
Reading & language · Writing & grammar

A student writes: 'The reason the experiment failed was because the temperature was not controlled.' A teacher underlines the phrase 'The reason…was because' and asks the student to correct it. The student changes it to: 'The reason the experiment failed was due to the temperature not being controlled.' Has the student fixed the problem? Why or why not?

Question 29
Reading & language · Comprehension

Read this passage, then answer the question. "Zara had trained for the debating competition every day for a month. On the morning of the final, her partner sent a message: 'Can't make it — sorry.' Zara stared at her phone for a full minute. Then she typed back: 'No problem. Good luck with everything.' She put the phone face-down on the table and went to make breakfast she didn't eat." The passage does not directly state how Zara feels after reading her partner's message. What does the sequence of her actions most strongly imply?

Question 30
Reading & language · Vocabulary & grammar

A student reads two descriptions of the same bushfire evacuation: Text 1: 'Residents were urged to leave their homes as a precaution.' Text 2: 'Families were forced to flee, abandoning everything they owned.' Which statement BEST explains how word choice reveals a difference in perspective between the two texts?

Your result

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Maths reasoning0 / 15
Reading & language0 / 15
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What this scholarship practice test contains

Thirty multiple-choice questions in two timed sections. Section 1, Maths reasoning, has fifteen questions drawn from our Year 6, Year 7 and Year 8 maths banks: number and algebra, ratio and rates, measurement, geometry, statistics and probability, with the stretch and challenge tiers preferred so most items sit above the year level a Year 6 student is used to. Section 2, Reading & language, has fifteen questions from the same three years of our English banks: comprehension of short literary and informative passages, inference, vocabulary in context, spelling, grammar and punctuation. Every set is seeded, so the link you are on shows the same questions each time and a new seed gives a fresh set. The clock is 25 minutes for the lot, which is deliberately tight: roughly fifty seconds a question, which is close to the pace of the real scholarship papers.

The answer key is not in the page. When you press Mark my test, or when the timer reaches zero, the browser asks our server for the key for this exact set, marks every question, shows the correct answer and an explanation with the year level of each item, and breaks the score down by section and by topic. Unanswered questions count as wrong, as they do in the real exam, so it is worth answering everything before the time runs out.

About the Victorian Selective Entry exam

Victoria has four selective-entry high schools: Melbourne High School (boys), Mac.Robertson Girls' High School (girls), Nossal High School in Berwick (co-educational) and Suzanne Cory High School in Werribee (co-educational). Entry is by a single competitive examination sat in Year 8 for Year 9 entry, usually in June, with a smaller number of places sometimes offered for later year levels. Students nominate their preferred schools on one application, and places are offered on the basis of exam results, with a proportion of places set aside under equity provisions. Suzanne Cory, in Werribee, draws heavily from Melbourne's west and is the school most families we work with are aiming for.

For students in Year 8 in 2027, school communications give the exam date as 20 June 2027, with applications typically opening early in the year and closing well before the exam. Dates, fees, eligibility rules and the exact test format are set by the Department of Education and can change from year to year, so confirm every detail on the VSEHS website before you plan around it. What has been consistent is the shape of the test: reading comprehension, mathematics, verbal reasoning, numerical reasoning and two short writing tasks (one creative, one persuasive or analytical), all under strict time limits and pitched above the Year 8 curriculum. The reasoning sections are the ones school programs rarely teach, and the writing tasks are marked for ideas, structure and control of language in a very short time, which is why students who are strong in class can still struggle on the day.

The multiple-choice sections of the real exam reward three things: secure knowledge a year or so ahead of the classroom, the habit of reading a question exactly, and pace. This practice test checks the first and the third. It does not check writing, and it does not include the pattern-based verbal and numerical reasoning puzzles, both of which need their own practice.

ACER and Edutest scholarship tests

Independent and Catholic schools in Melbourne offer academic scholarships through external testing agencies rather than their own papers. The two you will meet most often are ACER and Edutest, and they feel quite different. ACER's Cooperative Scholarship Testing Program (CSTP) is run at set levels: Level 1 for Year 7 entry (sat in Year 6), Level 2 for Year 9 entry and Level 3 for Year 11 entry. The papers are long and demanding: two written expression tasks, a humanities paper of reading comprehension and interpretation that includes poems, cartoons, tables and extracts, and a mathematics paper that leans on reasoning rather than recall. ACER tests are usually held on a single day in February or March, and one sitting can be used for several participating schools.

Edutest papers are shorter and broken into five sections, typically of about thirty minutes each: verbal reasoning, numerical reasoning, reading comprehension, mathematics and written expression. Most sections are multiple choice and the pace is brisk. Schools using Edutest often run the test on their own campus at their own date, so a family may sit two or three across a season. Because the sections are short, a student who loses a minute panicking on a hard question pays for it immediately, which is why timed practice matters so much for Edutest in particular.

This practice test is closer to the multiple-choice mathematics and reading sections of both formats than to the reasoning puzzles or the writing. If your child is preparing for a Year 7 scholarship, treat the Year 7 and Year 8 items here as the stretch they are; a Year 6 student who handles them comfortably is well placed.

A preparation timeline

  1. Twelve to nine months out (for Selective Entry 2027: Term 3 and 4 of Year 7). Diagnose first. Sit this test and the free Skills Check, and find out whether the gaps are knowledge (Year 8 maths not yet met), technique (never seen a reasoning question) or speed. Close the maths gaps with the Year 7 and Year 8 topic quizzes and start reading widely: non-fiction, opinion pieces and short fiction, not just novels.
  2. Nine to six months out (Term 1 of Year 8). Learn the question types. Work through each section of the exam separately with short timed sets, and begin a weekly timed writing task with feedback. Confirm the application window on the VSEHS website and lodge the application early.
  3. Six to three months out (Term 1 to 2). Full-length practice papers under exam conditions every fortnight, marked and reviewed by section. The review is where the marks come from: every error goes into a list and gets re-attempted a week later.
  4. The last eight weeks. Taper. One full paper a week, timed sets on the weakest section between them, and writing practice to a fixed plan. In the final week, sleep, a light set each day and nothing new.

For a Year 6 scholarship, compress the same sequence into the second half of Year 5 and the first term of Year 6, because ACER and most Edutest sittings fall between February and May of Year 6.

How to read your result

We do not report percentiles, because a thirty-question free sample cannot be normed against the real candidate pool and any percentile we invented would mislead you. What we can say is this. Selective-entry and scholarship tests are competitive, and the students who win places are typically answering above-level questions quickly and accurately. A score of 80% or more here, inside the time limit, suggests your child is ready for full-length timed practice papers and should move to those. A score between 50% and 80% usually means the content is mostly there and the work is in the hardest third of the questions and the clock; look at which section is weaker and drill it with timed sets. A score of 50% or less means the Year 6 and Year 7 foundations need attention before exam-style practice will pay off, which is common and fixable: start with the Year 6 and Year 7 topic quizzes, secure the weakest topics and come back to this test in a term.

Watch the time as well as the score. A high score with the clock expired is a pace problem; a low score with minutes to spare is a content problem. They need different fixes, and the results panel shows both.

What to do next

1. Free Skills Check

Fifteen minutes, every Year 7 topic at every tier including stretch and challenge, with a same-day topic-by-topic report and a tutor call to walk through it. It is the diagnostic we use to start every selective and scholarship program.

Start the free Skills Check →

2. Selective Entry 2027 program

Two sessions a week, maths and English with reasoning drills, a full timed practice test every fortnight, at our Truganina centre or online. First session free.

Selective Entry 2027 → Selective entry and scholarship tutoring →

3. Printable practice packs

Full-length selective and scholarship practice papers with worked answers, so a student can practise on paper under the clock the way the real test is sat.

Browse selective and scholarship packs →

Questions? Call 03 9509 3293 or book a free consultation. RHZ Tutoring, 17/47 Apex Drive, Truganina VIC 3029.

Frequently asked questions

When is the 2027 Victorian Selective Entry exam?

School communications give the date as 20 June 2027 for Year 8 students seeking Year 9 entry in 2028. Dates and application windows can move, so confirm on the Victorian Selective Entry High Schools (VSEHS) website before planning around it.

Which schools does the Selective Entry exam cover?

Melbourne High School (boys, South Yarra), Mac.Robertson Girls' High School (girls, Melbourne), Nossal High School (co-educational, Berwick) and Suzanne Cory High School (co-educational, Werribee). Students sit one exam and list the schools in order of preference.

Is this practice test the same as the real exam?

No. It is a 30-question, 25-minute multiple-choice sample drawn from our Year 6, 7 and 8 maths and English banks at the stretch and challenge tiers. The real ACER and Edutest scholarship tests include writing tasks and, for Edutest, separate verbal and numerical reasoning sections. Use this page to check readiness and pace, not to predict a result.

What score should my child be getting?

There is no official pass mark and we do not publish percentiles for a free sample. As a rule of thumb, 80% or more here suggests a student is ready for full-length timed practice; 50% or less suggests starting with the Year 6 and Year 7 topic quizzes to secure the foundations first.

Does the timer matter?

Yes. Both selective-entry and scholarship tests are speed tests as much as knowledge tests, and most students lose more marks to the clock than to the content. If the score is good but the time ran out, practise timed sets; if there was time to spare but the score was low, work on the content.

What is the difference between ACER and Edutest scholarship tests?

Both are used by independent schools for Year 7 entry (sat in Year 6) and some for Year 9 or Year 11 entry. ACER's Cooperative Scholarship Testing Program has longer papers in written expression, humanities (reading and interpretation) and mathematics. Edutest papers are shorter and include five sections: verbal reasoning, numerical reasoning, reading comprehension, mathematics and written expression. Check which test each school uses.

Is this free, and is anything collected?

It is free and there is no sign-up. Marking happens on our server and only an anonymous score event is recorded. The free Skills Check, which produces a full report, asks for a parent email so we can send it.

Build the foundations first

If the result points to a content gap, these free topic quizzes cover the ground the test draws on:

All 3,261 free practice questions, Prep to Year 12 →