11 plus Letters for Numbers questions

What a Letters for Numbers question looks like

Letters for Numbers is a number reasoning question from the 11 plus verbal reasoning paper. Each one opens with a key: five letters, A to E, each given a number value. Underneath sits a short calculation written in those letters and ending in = (?). Your child swaps the letters for their values, works the sum out, then answers with the letter whose value matches the result.

The single most important thing about the type is that the key is new every question. A is worth 3 in one question and 12 in the next. The values do not always climb in letter order, so A can be worth more than B, C and D. The numbers stay small, roughly 1 to 27, and the calculation is usually three to five letters long, using add, take away, times and divide.

Example one: A = 3, B = 7, C = 12, D = 16, E = 19. C + B - A = (?)

The options are the letters A, B, C, D and E.

Write the values under the letters first: C is 12, B is 7, A is 3. Then work along the line. 12 + 7 = 19, and 19 - 3 = 16. The result is 16. Look back at the key for the letter worth 16. That is D, so the answer is D.

E is the tempting wrong option. 12 + 7 comes to 19, and E is worth 19, so a child who does the first step, glances up at the key and sees their number waiting there feels finished. The take away three was still to come. This happens a lot here: the running total and the key values are the same sort of size, so a half-finished sum often lands on a real letter.

Example two: A = 6, B = 2, C = 5, D = 4, E = 13. B x C - D = (?)

Values first: B is 2, C is 5, D is 4. Times before take away, so 2 x 5 = 10, then 10 - 4 = 6. The result is 6, and the letter worth 6 in this key is A. The answer is A.

This key is a good example of one that does not climb: A is worth more than B, C and D here. The wrong option that catches children is B. Ignore the key, use each letter’s place in the alphabet instead, and you get 2 x 3 - 4 = 2. The letter worth 2 in the key is B, so the slip lands neatly on an option and nothing feels wrong. The key at the top of the question is the only thing that says what a letter is worth.

Example three: A = 5, B = 4, C = 6, D = 3, E = 12. A + B - C ÷ D + A = (?)

A longer one, with four operations in it. Deal with the divide first: C ÷ D is 6 ÷ 3 = 2. The line now reads 5 + 4 - 2 + 5. Work along it: 5 + 4 = 9, then 9 - 2 = 7, then 7 + 5 = 12. The result is 12, and E is worth 12, so the answer is E.

The wrong option here is C. Read straight across without stopping to do the divide first and you get 5 + 4 = 9, then 9 - 6 = 3, then 3 ÷ 3 = 1, then 1 + 5 = 6. C is worth 6. Both routes finish on a letter that is sitting in the options, which is why this one is so easy to get wrong and feel sure about. Times and divide come before add and take away here, exactly as they do in maths.

How to answer it

1. Read the key before you read the sum, and read it as if you have never seen a key before. Nothing carries over from the last question.
2. Write the calculation out with the value under each letter. Doing it on paper rather than in your head stops the values getting swapped around.
3. Work the sum out. Do any times and divide steps first, then the add and take away steps, working left to right.
4. Take your result back up to the key and find the letter with that value.
5. Answer with the letter, not the number. Check the result matched one of the five values exactly. A fraction, a remainder or a number that is not in the key means something has gone wrong in the working.

Common mistakes

• Using the alphabet instead of the key. Treating A as 1 and B as 2 is a habit from other letter puzzles, and it produces a confident, tidy, wrong answer. The five values are given at the top of every question for a reason.
• Answering with the number. The result of the sum is a number, but the options are letters. Getting to 16 and then not making the last hop back to D loses the mark just as completely as getting the sum wrong.
• Stopping one step early. When the running total already matches a letter in the key, the question feels finished. Reading to the end of the line before looking at the options costs a second and saves a mark.
• Working straight along a line with a times or divide in it. In A + B - C ÷ D + A, doing the adding and taking away first changes the answer completely, and it usually changes it into a different letter that is also on offer.
• Assuming the values climb from A to E. Roughly half of these keys are jumbled, so A can be the second biggest number in the key.

How to practise 11 plus Letters for Numbers questions

The arithmetic in this type is well within what a Year 5 child can already do, so extra sums are not usually what is needed. What helps is the habit: read the key, write the values down, finish the line, hop back to a letter. A few in a mixed set beat a page of them in a row, because a page lets a child settle into one key and stop checking, which is the opposite of the skill being tested. It is one of around 25 verbal reasoning formats used in the eleven plus, and it repays being kept in rotation. 11+ Daily has a Letters for Numbers project that mixes climbing keys with jumbled ones and short sums with longer ones, and it sits alongside the other 11 plus verbal reasoning question types so your child keeps meeting it. Every question is original to 11+ Daily, nothing is a past paper, and the bank is re-checked in rounds. If you are working out how much time to give it, we have written about how much 11 plus practice a child needs each day.

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