OLSAT Practice Test With Answers: 24 original questions (Level E)

What the OLSAT is, and what Level E means

The Otis-Lennon School Ability Test, Eighth Edition (OLSAT 8) is a Pearson test. Pearson says it "measures cognitive abilities that relate to a student’s academic success in school" and calls it "a general academic ability indicator that is not content specific". It is given to a whole group at once, on paper or online, and Pearson lists a maximum of 75 minutes, which varies by level. It has seven levels, one band of grades each.

That is Pearson's own Scope & Sequence chart. The board sources we read, from TCDSB and SCDSB, name no level, so "Grade 4 is Level E" is a mapping from Pearson. It is not a board statement. We wrote the questions below for Level E because the TCDSB brochure puts the test in Grade 4, and Pearson's chart puts Grade 4 at Level E.

Pearson groups the test's content into verbal, nonverbal and quantitative reasoning. On a sample parent report from Pearson, the score is split into a Verbal scale and a Nonverbal scale, and the report says the nonverbal scale uses "spatial and serial relationships among geometric shapes".

The 15 question types at Level E

Pearson publishes the names of the question types at each level. It also sells practice tests for Levels A to F, but only to buyers who hold the qualification level it requires, and we found no free sample questions from Pearson. At Level E there are 15 types. The table is Pearson's list, with the two questions of ours that match each type (one for the types with one).

Pearson's chart lists Level D (Grade 3) with the same types except two. Inference starts at Level E, and Figural Classification is on the Level D list but not the Level E one. So 22 of our 24 questions are in types a Grade 3 child also meets, and only Inference (questions 13 and 14) is new at Level E.

One caution about the table. Pearson's practice tests show the item formats, but Pearson sells them only to qualified buyers, and we have not seen one. So the right-hand description is our reading of each name. Ask the school whether it gives a practice test, and if it does, trust it over this page. SCDSB's parent letter says a child "will have the opportunity to participate in a practice test prior to the actual test".

Which Ontario boards use the OLSAT?

We could source two boards, and there is a general note after them.

The TCDSB source is a two-page giftedness brochure. The PDF's file data dates it to May 2023, and the page carries no date of its own. The board's current gifted programs page says TCDSB "administers a universal assessment to all grade four students" and does not name the test, so ask the school or the Special Services office which test it uses now. The SCDSB source is Administrative Procedures Memorandum A8540, last revised in April 2026.

Neither the brochure nor the memorandum names an OLSAT level. TCDSB says only that candidates who "meet the TCDSB criteria" move on, and its brochure publishes no number. SCDSB does publish one. Its memorandum says a student with an OLSAT total score of 130 or higher, and verbal and non-verbal scores of at least 115 each, is eligible for an Individual Education Plan (IEP) with program extensions and enrichment. The same score is one of the board's considerations for identifying a student as gifted. The other is whether the student "demonstrates a need for alternative programming related to giftedness". So the score alone does not identify a child. At SCDSB the path runs through that IEP, a review of it, and then, if the family or the school team believes the child is gifted, an IPRC.

Two older documents describe the wider picture in general terms. An Ottawa-Carleton report from November 2017 says universal screening is in place in "a few Ontario school districts", using tools such as the CCAT-7 and the Otis-Lennon. A 2019 Peel review says that "Many Ontario school boards use a form of group-based intellectual aptitude testing (e.g., CCAT, OLSAT) in Grade 3 or Grade 4". Neither names which board uses which, and we have not listed any board on their say-so.

We found no document from an Alberta or British Columbia board that names the OLSAT, so this page says nothing about those provinces. If your board is not on the table, ask the school's special education resource teacher which test it uses and in which grade.

How this differs from the CCAT

Many Ontario boards use the Canadian Cognitive Abilities Test (CCAT) instead. The CCAT is a different test from a different publisher: Nelson Education publishes it, and Pearson publishes the OLSAT. Our full guide to the CCAT covers it, and the Grade 3 and Grade 4 practice pages are the ones to use if your board gives the CCAT in those grades. We say nothing here about which test is harder, because no source we read compares them.

What a family gets back

At SCDSB, the parent letter says the school will share the results with you and place a copy in your child's Ontario Student Record. The board says the results help the teacher see a child's strengths and needs, and "Results may also be used to inform identification". At TCDSB, a child who meets the board's criteria is referred to an IPRC, the committee that decides whether a student is identified as gifted and where they are placed. Our guide to IEPs in Ontario covers the related paperwork.

Pearson's sample home report shows what the page looks like. It has a Total, a Verbal and a Nonverbal column. Each column has a raw score, a School Ability Index, a percentile rank and a stanine. The sample is for a Level F test and reads 42 out of 72 in total, which Pearson splits into 36 questions on each scale. That count is for Level F. We could not find a Pearson figure for Level E, and test-preparation sites disagree about it, so we do not print one.

Here is what the scores mean, in the words of the published guides:

• School Ability Index. A published score guide describes it as "an age-based, normalized standard score with a mean of 100 and a standard deviation of 16". Pearson's sample report says "Most scores will fall between 90 and 110, and scores in this range are considered to be average."
• Percentile rank. The share of children of the same age or grade who scored at or below your child. Pearson's sample says "Percentile Rank and Percent Correct have different meanings", so a percentile of 75 does not mean your child got 75 per cent of the questions right.
• Stanine. A nine-level score. A published guide gives it a mean of 5, and calls stanines 4 to 6 average and 7 to 9 above average.

The score guide for the School Ability Index comes from a school-materials publisher that reproduces Pearson's definitions, and we could not check it against Pearson's technical manual. Treat it as a definition, not a cut-off. The only OLSAT gifted cut-off we found is SCDSB's own rule, described above. Pearson marks its own sample report as sample data and says "Do not attempt to interpret scores". The same caution applies to a practice page.

Should a child practise for the OLSAT?

This page exists to show the formats. It does not claim to raise a score.

Pearson calls the test "not content specific". A test built that way has little to study, so seeing each format once is a reasonable amount. SCDSB makes a related point when it lets an educator read to some students on an IEP: "The OLSAT evaluates thinking and learning, not reading or math". SCDSB's own letter promises a practice test at school before the real one. The TCDSB brochure we read says nothing about preparation, so ask the school before you start.

Our suggestion is the kitchen-table version. Do the 24 questions once, untimed, over a few sittings. For each one, read the working together, whether the answer was right or not. Then put the page away.

The 24 practice questions

Every question below is original and was written for this article. None is reprinted or reworded from Pearson, a school board or a test-preparation site. The real test is built to show how a child reasons, so a copied item would defeat the point. If you want Pearson's own material, its overview brochure lists the types, and its sample home report shows what comes home.

The real nonverbal questions are pictures. Ours describe each picture in words, which makes them a little harder to read than the real thing. It is fine to sketch a question on paper first. Each of our questions has five choices. We have not confirmed how many choices Level E uses, so do not treat that as a feature of the real test.

The math stays in whole numbers a Grade 4 child works with. Answer all 24 before you look at the key.

Verbal comprehension

Question 1 (Antonyms). Choose the word that means the opposite of ancient.

• A. old
• B. broken
• C. dusty
• D. modern
• E. valuable

Question 2 (Antonyms). Choose the word that means the opposite of fragile.

• A. delicate
• B. light
• C. smooth
• D. clear
• E. sturdy

Question 3 (Sentence Completion). Choose the word that best completes the sentence. Although the sky looked threatening, the forecast was ______, so we left the umbrellas at home.

• A. gloomy
• B. uncertain
• C. favourable
• D. dangerous
• E. confusing

Question 4 (Sentence Arrangement). Put these words in order to make a sentence that begins with Every: every, evening, my, grandmother, reads, the, newspaper. Which word is the third word of the sentence?

• A. evening
• B. reads
• C. grandmother
• D. newspaper
• E. my

Question 5 (Sentence Arrangement). Put these words in order to make the most sensible sentence: soup, hot, the, cook, stirred, the. Which word is the last word of the sentence?

• A. hot
• B. soup
• C. cook
• D. stirred
• E. the

Verbal reasoning

Question 6 (Arithmetic Reasoning). A club buys 3 packs of pencils with 8 pencils in each pack. It then gives away 5 pencils. How many pencils does the club have left?

• A. 16
• B. 19
• C. 21
• D. 24
• E. 29

Question 7 (Arithmetic Reasoning). A baker puts 6 muffins in each box. The baker fills 7 boxes and has 4 muffins left over. How many muffins did the baker make?

• A. 42
• B. 44
• C. 48
• D. 46
• E. 52

Question 8 (Logical Selection). A recipe always has:

• A. ingredients
• B. a photograph
• C. an oven
• D. sugar
• E. a price

Question 9 (Word/Letter Matrix). A grid has three rows of letters. Row 1 is B, D, F. Row 2 is C, E, G. Row 3 is D, F, and an empty box. Which letter goes in the empty box?

• A. G
• B. I
• C. H
• D. J
• E. K

Question 10 (Verbal Analogies). wheel → car. wing → ?

• A. airplane
• B. feather
• C. sky
• D. pilot
• E. fly

Question 11 (Verbal Analogies). drizzle → downpour. breeze → ?

• A. cloud
• B. summer
• C. umbrella
• D. gale
• E. calm

Question 12 (Verbal Classification). Which word belongs with these three: hammer, screwdriver, wrench?

• A. nail
• B. board
• C. pliers
• D. glue
• E. paint

Question 13 (Inference). Every member of the chess club is in Grade 4 or Grade 5. A student is in the chess club and is not in Grade 4. Which statement must be true?

• A. The student is in Grade 3.
• B. The student is in Grade 5.
• C. The student is the best player in the club.
• D. The student is also in the art club.
• E. The student has played chess for years.

Question 14 (Inference). Some of the trees in a park are maples. All maples have leaves that turn red in the fall. Which statement must be true?

• A. All the trees in the park have leaves that turn red in the fall.
• B. The park has no pine trees.
• C. Maples are the tallest trees in the park.
• D. Some trees in the park have leaves that turn red in the fall.
• E. Most of the trees in the park are maples.

Figural reasoning

Question 15 (Figural Analogies). A large black square becomes a small black square. A large white circle becomes which figure?

• A. a small black circle
• B. a large white circle
• C. a small white square
• D. a large black circle
• E. a small white circle

Question 16 (Figural Analogies). An arrow pointing up becomes an arrow pointing right, as if it were turned a quarter turn clockwise. An arrow pointing left becomes which arrow?

• A. an arrow pointing down
• B. an arrow pointing right
• C. an arrow pointing up
• D. an arrow pointing left
• E. an arrow with a head at both ends

Question 17 (Pattern Matrix). A grid has two rows. Row 1 shows one white circle, then two white circles, then three white circles. Row 2 shows one black square, then two black squares, then an empty box. Which figure goes in the empty box?

• A. three white squares
• B. two black squares
• C. three black circles
• D. three black squares
• E. one black square

Question 18 (Pattern Matrix). A grid has three rows. Row 1 shows a small white circle, a medium white circle, then a large white circle. Row 2 shows a small white square, a medium white square, then a large white square. Row 3 shows a small white triangle, a medium white triangle, then an empty box. Which figure goes in the empty box?

• A. a small white triangle
• B. a large black triangle
• C. a large white square
• D. a medium white triangle
• E. a large white triangle

Question 19 (Figural Series). A series shows a square with one dot on it. In the first square the dot is at the top, in the second it is at the right side, and in the third it is at the bottom. Where is the dot in the fourth square?

• A. at the left side
• B. at the top
• C. at the centre
• D. at the top-left corner
• E. at the bottom

Question 20 (Figural Series). A series shows groups of triangles. The first group is one white triangle. The second is one white and one black triangle. The third is one white and two black triangles. What is the fourth group?

• A. two white and three black triangles
• B. one white and three black triangles
• C. one white and four black triangles
• D. three black triangles
• E. two white and two black triangles

Quantitative reasoning

Question 21 (Number Series). 3, 6, 5, 10, 9, 18, ? What number comes next?

• A. 16
• B. 19
• C. 20
• D. 36
• E. 17

Question 22 (Number Series). 1, 2, 4, 7, 11, ? What number comes next?

• A. 15
• B. 16
• C. 17
• D. 18
• E. 20

Question 23 (Numeric Inference). Each group of three numbers follows the same rule. 2, 3, 6. 4, 2, 8. 3, 3, 9. 5, 3, ? What number is missing?

• A. 8
• B. 13
• C. 9
• D. 15
• E. 18

Question 24 (Number Matrix). A grid has three rows. Row 1 is 2, 4, 8. Row 2 is 3, 6, 12. Row 3 is 5, 10, and an empty box. What number goes in the empty box?

• A. 20
• B. 15
• C. 25
• D. 30
• E. 40

Answer key, with the working

The working

Question 1. Ancient means very old, so the opposite is something new, and modern is the word that fits. Old means nearly the same, broken and dusty describe condition, and valuable describes worth.

Question 2. Fragile means easily broken. Sturdy means hard to break, so it is the opposite. Delicate means almost the same as fragile. Light, smooth and clear describe other qualities.

Question 3. The sentence turns on "although". The sky looks threatening, so you might expect rain, but the umbrellas stay at home. That fits a forecast that is favourable, meaning good. Gloomy, dangerous and confusing would all make you take the umbrellas. Uncertain would too, because you would not leave them behind without knowing.

Question 4. The natural sentence that begins with Every is Every evening my grandmother reads the newspaper. Counting the words, Every is first, evening second and my third.

Question 5. The sensible sentence is The cook stirred the hot soup, and the last word is soup. Putting hot before cook gives The hot cook stirred the soup, which is odd but still ends in soup. Ending in cook would need the soup to stir the cook, which is not sensible.

Question 6. Three packs of 8 pencils is 24 pencils, because 3 times 8 is 24. Giving away 5 leaves 24 minus 5, which is 19. Check: 19 plus 5 is 24.

Question 7. Seven boxes of 6 muffins is 42 muffins, because 7 times 6 is 42. Four more left over makes 42 plus 4, which is 46. Check: 46 minus 4 is 42, and 42 divided by 6 is 7.

Question 8. A recipe is a list of what you need and what to do with it, so every recipe has ingredients. Many recipes have a photograph or use sugar, but not all do. A salad recipe needs no oven, and a recipe in a family notebook has no price.

Question 9. Look across Row 1: B, D, F. Each letter is two steps on in the alphabet. Row 2 follows the same rule, C, E, G. Look down a column: B, C, D goes up by one each time. So Row 3 starts with D, then F, and the third letter is two steps after F, which is the letter after G. Check the last column: F, G and the new letter go up by one.

Question 10. A wheel is a part of a car, and a wing is a part of an airplane. A feather is a part of a wing, which is the wrong way round. The sky and the pilot are not parts of a wing, and fly is something an airplane does.

Question 11. A drizzle is a light rain and a downpour is a very heavy one, so the pair goes from mild to extreme. A breeze is a light wind, and a gale is a very strong one. A cloud, summer and an umbrella are not a kind of wind, and calm is the opposite of wind.

Question 12. A hammer, a screwdriver and a wrench are all tools. Pliers are a tool too. A nail, a board, glue and paint are things you use with tools, or materials, but they are not tools themselves.

Question 13. Every member of the club is in Grade 4 or Grade 5. This student is not in Grade 4, so the student must be in Grade 5. The other choices might be true, but nothing in the sentences tells us they are.

Question 14. Some trees in the park are maples, and every maple has leaves that turn red in the fall. So at least some trees in the park have leaves that turn red. We cannot say all of them do, because the sentences name only the maples. We are told nothing about pine trees, height or how many maples there are.

Question 15. The first figure changes only in size, from large to small, and stays black and a square. Do the same to the large white circle: it becomes small and stays white and a circle. A small white circle is the answer. The other choices change the colour or the shape, or do not shrink.

Question 16. A quarter turn clockwise moves up to right, then right to down, then down to left, then left to up. So an arrow pointing left becomes an arrow pointing up. A turn the other way, anticlockwise, would give down, so that is the choice that looks right and is wrong.

Question 17. Row 1 grows by one circle each step, from one to two to three, and every circle is white. Row 2 should do the same with black squares: one, two, then three. The answer is three black squares. Three white squares and three black circles each change something that should not change.

Question 18. Read across each row: the size grows from small to medium to large. Read down each column: the shape changes from circle to square to triangle, and the colour stays white. Row 3 is triangles, so the empty box is a large white triangle.

Question 19. The dot goes from the top to the right side to the bottom. That is clockwise, one side at a time. The next side clockwise is the left side. The top is the start of the next lap and the bottom is where it has just been.

Question 20. Each group keeps its one white triangle and adds one black triangle: none, then one, then two. The next group has three black triangles with the one white triangle. Two white triangles would change the part that stays the same, and four black triangles would skip a step.

Question 21. Look at the numbers in pairs. 3 doubles to 6, then 6 falls to 5, which is 1 less. 5 doubles to 10, then 10 falls to 9, which is 1 less. 9 doubles to 18, and the next step takes 1 away, so 18 becomes 17. Check: double, take away 1, double, take away 1, double, take away 1.

Question 22. The gaps are 1, 2, 3, 4, because 2 minus 1 is 1, 4 minus 2 is 2, 7 minus 4 is 3 and 11 minus 7 is 4. The next gap is 5, and 11 plus 5 is 16. Check: 16 minus 11 is 5.

Question 23. In each group, the first two numbers multiply to give the third: 2 times 3 is 6, 4 times 2 is 8, and 3 times 3 is 9. So the last group is 5 times 3, which is 15. Other rules fit one or two groups and then break. Adding 4 to the first number works for 2, 3, 6 and 4, 2, 8, but 3 plus 4 is 7, not 9. Adding the first two numbers fails straight away, because 2 plus 3 is 5, not 6. Adding 5 and 3 gives 8, which is choice A and the trap.

Question 24. In Row 1, 2 doubles to 4 and 4 doubles to 8. In Row 2, 3 doubles to 6 and 6 doubles to 12. So Row 3 does the same: 5 doubles to 10 and 10 doubles to 20. Check: 20 is twice 10.

What to do with your child's answers

Twenty-four questions cannot give a score. The real test compares a child with a large group of children, and a percentile only means something against that group. So do not count the right answers and read anything into the total.

What the answers can tell you is simpler. Look for a format your child did not understand at all, rather than one they got wrong. A child who could not work out what a matrix or an inference question was asking is the child who may lose time on it. A child who understood it and made a slip is fine.

If the reading and the arithmetic were the hard part, that is worth knowing for school in general, and Genie's math page lists certified teachers by grade for that. After that, stop. You have done what a practice page can do.