Have your child guess the word's meaning from its sentence before reading the options.
Practice test 1 is free. No card needed.
Word meaning questions ask what a word means in its sentence, which may not be its first dictionary meaning. 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 27 October 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 word meaning question is part of interpreting: the right meaning depends on the sentence, not on the first meaning in a dictionary.
The questions below are ours and share one passage, Two Halves of an Arch, about building the Sydney Harbour Bridge. Each one shows the answer and the working, so read them together. Put each wrong option back into the sentence and read it aloud; a wrong meaning makes the sentence sound odd.
For most of the 1920s, Sydney residents who wanted to cross the harbour between the city and the North Shore had to take a ferry or make a long journey around by road. A bridge had been proposed many times, but the distance was formidable, and the harbour had to remain open to tall ships.
The design finally chosen was a single steel arch. Its builders could not rest the arch on supports in the water while they worked, so they built it outward from both shores at once. Each half leaned out over the harbour like a reaching arm, held back by enormous steel cables anchored in tunnels cut into the rock behind it.
For two years the halves crept towards each other. Every new piece of steel had to be lifted by cranes that travelled along the top of the arch itself, and every piece made the cables bear a little more weight. Engineers checked the measurements constantly, because a small error at the base of each half would grow into a large one at the top.
By August 1930 the two tips were close, but they were not simply pushed together. The engineers slackened the cables a little at a time, lowering the halves gently towards each other. Heat made matters more delicate still: the steel expanded in the warmth of the day and shrank in the cool of the night, so the gap itself kept changing. When the halves were finally joined, the arch could stand on its own, and the cables that had held it for so long were no longer needed.
The deck that carries the road was then hung from the arch, and the bridge opened in 1932. Today it is so familiar that it is easy to forget that, for a time, it was two halves of a promise, each waiting for the other.
In the first paragraph, 'the distance was formidable'. In this sentence, formidable means
Answer: B
Answer: B
Read the sentence around the word. A bridge had been proposed 'many times' but not built, so the distance must have been a serious obstacle. That matches 'so great it was hard to overcome'. Nothing suggests the distance could not be measured, so C does not fit.
'Every piece made the cables bear a little more weight.' In this sentence, bear means
Answer: D
Answer: D
Picture what the cables were doing: they held each half of the arch back over the water, so each new piece of steel added load for them to carry. That is the 'support' meaning of bear. Option A is another common meaning, as in 'I can't bear it', but cables cannot be patient; the sentence is about weight.
The writer says that, for a time, the bridge 'was two halves of a promise, each waiting for the other'. What does promise suggest here?
Answer: C
Answer: C
A promise is something not yet done that others rely on. Until the halves met, the bridge was unfinished, yet the long-awaited crossing depended on its two sides being joined. Option D is tempting because the bridge had been 'proposed many times', but the passage shows the engineers working steadily, not doubting. Option A takes the word literally; no agreement is mentioned.
Guess first, then test. A meaning your child has put into their own words is easier to match than a list of options read cold.
These steps are ours, drawn from the working in the answers above.
Read the sentence the word is in, and the one before it. The clue can sit just outside the quoted words.
Ask your child to say what the word means here in their own words, then find the closest option.
Put each option in place of the word. The right one keeps the sentence making sense.
Cables holding up steel can't be patient, so bear must mean carry. A quick picture rules out a wrong meaning.
When a word is used as an image, like promise, ask what that idea adds to the sentence.
Each trap below is a wrong option from the questions above. Ask your child which one looked right at first, then swap the right meaning into the sentence to hear the difference.
When your child meets a new word, ask for a guess from the sentence before anyone looks it up. Then check together.
Collect words with more than one meaning, like bear, fair or current. Make a sentence for each meaning.
Victoria's Department says the knowledge needed in any section is no more than the Year 8 curriculum. So wide reading helps more than lists of rare words.
Because there's nothing to look up on the day: dictionaries stay at home. What your child brings into the room is the habit of reading a word in its sentence.
Reading shares 55 minutes with Verbal Reasoning. Three questions show the method; a full sitting shows whether your child still guesses from the sentence under time. Start with Practice test 1: one full practice test with results, with a free account.
Afterwards you'll see results by skill. For more passages with worked answers, see VIC selective entry reading questions, or read about VIC poetry questions, where words carry images.
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.
Practise for the real test
Practice test 1 is free. Then packs from A$109 for 12 months, or A$9 a week, per exam.