Ask what the writer wants the reader to do or think, then check each part against that.
Practice test 1 is free. No card needed.
Author's purpose questions ask why a writer wrote a text, or why one part sits where it does. Children in Year 7 now meet them in Year 8, in the exam expected in June 2027.
Checked by the SelectiveReady team on 12 October 2026 · Updated 3 November 2026 · How we check facts
Independent. Not affiliated with the Victorian Department of Education or ACER.
ACER says Reading tests finding information in texts, and linking, interpreting, reflecting on and judging their ideas. A purpose question asks your child to step back and reflect: what is the writer trying to do, and how does each part help?
The questions below are ours and share one passage, Counting the Ordinary, about counting the birds in your backyard. Each one shows the answer and the working, so read them together. For each wrong option, ask what the writer wants the reader to do by the end, and test the option against that.
Last spring, a Year 7 student named Lucia sat on her back step for twenty minutes and wrote down every bird she saw. There were eleven noisy miners, three magpies, a pair of rainbow lorikeets and one willie wagtail that would not stop dancing along the fence. It was not, she admitted, an exciting list. It was also exactly the kind of list that scientists need.
Researchers who study birds cannot be everywhere at once. A team of experts might survey a national park in detail, but they will never visit every backyard, school oval and street tree in a city. Yet that is where many birds actually live, and where changes in their numbers often show up first. When thousands of ordinary people count the birds in ordinary places, those small lists add up to a picture that no single research team could draw.
It is tempting to think that only rare birds are worth recording. In fact, the common ones can matter more. If a species that was once seen in nearly every garden slowly becomes harder to find, that change may be the first sign that something in its surroundings is shifting: fewer insects, fewer flowering shrubs, fewer safe places to nest. A rare bird going missing is noticed quickly. A common bird thinning out can go unnoticed for years, unless someone is counting.
Taking part is simpler than most people expect. You need no binoculars and no expert knowledge, only a quiet spot, a notebook and a little patience. Many counts provide picture guides so that beginners can tell a magpie from a currawong, and they ask you to record only the birds you are sure of.
So the next time a bird count is announced in your area, consider spending twenty minutes on your own back step. You may not see anything remarkable. That is rather the point.
What is the main purpose of the passage?
Answer: D
Answer: D
Look at how the passage ends: 'consider spending twenty minutes on your own back step'. Everything before it gives reasons to join a count and shows that it is easy. Option C misreads the third paragraph, which says common birds can matter more, not that rare birds are unimportant.
Why does the writer begin with the story of Lucia?
Answer: A
Answer: A
Ask how the opening connects to the writer's point. The paragraph ends: it was 'not an exciting list' but 'exactly the kind of list that scientists need'. That is the idea the rest of the passage explains. Option B treats one backyard's count as a national fact, which the passage never claims.
Why does the writer place the paragraph about common birds before the paragraph explaining how to take part?
Answer: C
Answer: C
Think about the order of a persuasive piece: reasons first, then an easy next step. The third paragraph shows why counting common birds matters; only then does the fourth make joining sound simple. Option D overstates the text, which says a decline 'may be' a sign of change, not that birds are vanishing. Option A misreads the point about rare birds.
Name the job of the whole text first, then the job of each part. A part only makes sense once you know what the whole is for.
These steps are ours, drawn from the working in the answers above.
In this passage, the last paragraph tells the reader what to do. An ending is a good place to look for the writer's aim.
Is it telling a story, explaining, persuading or giving instructions? That narrows the options fast.
For a question about one part, ask how it helps the writer's point. Here the opening story sets up the idea.
In this piece the reasons come first and the easy next step comes last. Ask why the writer chose that order.
If the text says something 'may be' a sign, an option that says it is certain goes too far.
Each trap below is a wrong option from the questions above. Go through them together. For each, the check is the same: does the option match what the writer is trying to do, or only something the text mentions?
When you see an ad, a sign or a note from school, ask your child, "What does the writer want us to do?"
Read the first and last paragraphs of an article together and guess its purpose. Then check the middle to see if you were right.
Ask why a story starts where it does. What would be lost if the opening paragraph were cut?
Reading shares one 55-minute sitting with Verbal Reasoning, and purpose questions come with the rest. ACER offers a set of sample questions to download, for the style and format of the exam questions: use them to see its style, not to judge how ready your child is.
Three questions show the method; a full sitting shows whether your child still steps back to the whole text when the clock is running. Start with Practice test 1: one full practice test with results, with a free account. Afterwards you'll see results by skill, so you know whether purpose or detail costs more marks.
For more passages with worked answers, see VIC selective entry reading questions, or the guide to VIC main idea questions.
Practice test 1 marks every answer and shows results by skill: what your child already does well and the three skills to work on next.
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