11+ Magic

King Arthur, or so the legend goes, had a round table. This meant that no one sat in a privileged position. The story goes that at every meeting King Arthur allowed his knights to sit in random places so that one knight was no more important than another.

One day five of the knights arrived early. Perhaps there had not been too much traffic along the way. They may even had taken one of the new toll roads. It was a long way ago - and our memories are weak.

They sat cheerfully at the round table and called for small beers. The knights were: Sir Agravain who was a handsome and capable fighter, Sir Bors was a fine knight, Sir Calogrenant was courteous and eloquent, Sir Daniel engaged in fantastic adventures while Sir Elyan was known as an excellent knight.

The middle knight sat between Sir Calogrenant and a knight. The first letter of his name was later in the alphabet that either Sir Calogrenant’s or his own. There was a large space between Sir Bors and Sir Elyan but the order was not alphabetical. Only one knight was in his correct place according to the first letter of his name.

This is a `easy’ 11+ question. All you have to do is to write down the positions and names of the five knight.

It is worth five marks - so you can’t spend more than three minutes on the exercise.

Naturally you will be able to strip the un-necessary words. We know we have to draw a plan and will need to sketch a `sector‘. (This leads to even more 11+ revision as a sector is a geometric figure bounded by two radii and the included arc of a circle.)

Use the hint about the large space.

King Arthur could call on Merlin for help and advice. Merlin was a wise magician and, as a your child looks to you for help, you will need to draw on your own magic.