PSNI Recruitment - Stage 1 - The Initial Selection Test

Dannyboy1987

beca wrote: »

lol ill pm you

PM me to please

Fatony

You may post what you know out here Beca or youl be getting mauled by PMs lol..

beca

Fatony wrote: »

You may post what you know out here Beca or youl be getting mauled by PMs lol..

lol i just decided to PM robocop because i had been posting lots all day! didnt want to plaster the place with the cookie monster pic! when i found this place i trawled the threads for weeks to read it all so i just typed up a quick overview of the whole thing! was no great big secret it can all be found if you look for it, ill reword it and post tomorrow a big general one! what i sent him was basically all the information i have gleaned from boards and my strategy for the IST so he wouldnt have to trawl :pac::pac::pac: (<---i dont know why... i just love the pac man)

but feel free to PM if you want

gigity gigity

Hi Beca is this your second time applying? What did you think of last years ist?

beca

gigity gigity wrote: »

Hi Beca is this your second time applying? What did you think of last years ist?

yea this will be 2nd time for me. i liked the table last year... its something im familiar with so i felt more comfortable reading it but i hear its been used for quite a while now and may be nearing its expiry so i hope they dont give us a new one this year!! though data was ok ish. thought the t/f/ct was bad though!! i underestimated it totally last year but going by what iv been revising for this year im going in all guns blazing! :cool::cool: how about you? are you applying this year?

gigity gigity

Yep im in for this one, 2nd time as well. Turns out Im the complete opposite, thought the verbal was dead on, I got 38 in that so that should indicate just how tough I found the second bit. Have you been able to find anything remotely like the maths? or care to share your secrets?:)

beca

gigity gigity wrote: »

Yep im in for this one, 2nd time as well. Turns out Im the complete opposite, thought the verbal was dead on, I got 38 in that so that should indicate just how tough I found the second bit. Have you been able to find anything remotely like the maths? or care to share your secrets?:)

lol on the net nothing compares to the maths. either too hard or too easy in my experience. no point doing a easy test to put yourself in false confidence or a hard test because in hard test you cant keep yourself to a tight time limit if the question takes 7 mins to do the working out! aint got no secrets lol

get your mum or dad, someone good at maths (your pervy old school teacher that thinks hes in with a chance) to draw up a table, you can tell them the difficulty of it if you seen it last year and get them to make up questions or even just study the table yourself and work out things to get the cogs going again!

gazzabelfast

key stage 3 maths revison books would be more useful than gcse ones to be honest. The Gcse course goes into too much detail on trig and algebra which you dont need for the IST.

Carol Voderman used to always say its essential to know your times tables up to 17 to be successful, not just at countdown but in life...........i learnt the 18 times tables just to be sure lol

gigity gigity

Up to 18! must have taken a while. I see how it would be useful though!
How did you do in ist last time Gazza?

beca

Fatony wrote: »

You may post what you know out here Beca or youl be getting mauled by PMs lol..

Don’t leave anything out
Take a watch with you
Do not stress yourself out before hand
Don’t practise the night before
Learn your times tables off by heart
Anything that gets the mind working is great. Athletes exercise their bodies to prepare for sports, so you should start exercising the ol' grey matter to prepare for the IST. A crossword, puzzles, quizzes IQ tests etc
Set yourself time limits, so you get used to rushing through the questions

Numerical reasoning:
30q’s in 25 minutes. Data table provided with usually 7/8 different sections or information (very detailed)
- At the start, take time to study the table and become familiar with where information is
- Don’t get bogged down on one Q, all questions are equal so move on
- Answer all the questions and guess the ones you don’t know
- Some people answer the last 10 at the start randomly, as they know they won’t get them finished
- There are no trick questions; the info is all in the tables
- Instead of a stopwatch, use a countdown timer on a watch and instead of setting it for 25 mins, set it for 24 mins 30secs so you can see you have 30 secs left to fill in the questions you haven’t got done
There is no really hard maths with long division or multiplication. There will be big numbers like 990/45 but 45 goes into 90 twice and 45 goes into 900 twenty times so you can work out 22 easy enough. The numbers won’t be decimal usually.

Verbal reasoning:

48q’s in 20mins
- If it’s not in the passage its cant tell
- If it is in the passage it’s true or false... can’t be that hard to decide!!
- KISS Keep it simple son - don’t use your own knowledge... what the text says is gospel truth. If it says Barack Obama is in Westlife then he is. Don’t read into it too much, kids excel at verbal reasoning because they take things at face value and don’t consider them really deeply!
- Don’t go back, re read and change your answer, go with your guts. (Unless you actually made a mistake and put true by accident and you know it’s supposed to be false)


DISCLAIMER: this is all speculative and has been posted over boards before, so if you try it and it doesnt work for you dont try and sue me for loss of earning and career opportunity

Kirsty2010

well have my date for ist for march, already really brickin it! passed this stage last year and then failed the ac, not looking forward to having to repeat these.

Fatony

Great advise Beca!!

beca

Fatony wrote: »

Great advise Beca!!

no problem. its all in the thread if you look at it!

po64423y

Hey all,

Im new 2 this forum and i am a IST virgin...:D

Got my IST test next month in London & Im bricking it...

Ive got some gd tips from scanning these pages and fingers crossed they will help or if not i will be stuck here until the next Home Office Police Forces start recruiting.... Which will prob be 2020..:eek:

<mod snip>

Cheers

TC

Shield

Hello po64423y.

As per the forum charter, please do not mention names of for-profit companies who offer recruitment training or other similar services.

Your post has been edited accordingly.

Back on topic...

po64423y wrote: »

Hey all,

Im new 2 this forum and an IST virgin...:D

Got my IST test next month in London & Im bricking it...

Ive got some gd tips from scanning these pages and fingers crossed they will help or if not i will be stuck here until the next Home Office Police Forces start recruiting.... Which will prob be 2020..:eek:

<mod snip>

Cheers

TC

Fatony

Well just done my IST test today, challenging would be one word to describe it, tyhe maths parts was quite tricky, alot of tables to look over, but hey, give it a go anyway..

Lets see what the post man brings..

Fatony

Fatony wrote: »

Well just done my IST test today, challenging would be one word to describe it, tyhe maths parts was quite tricky, alot of tables to look over, but hey, give it a go anyway..

Lets see what the post man brings..

:eek: Is it actually that time already?? I really must get started doing some practice tests, seems like no time since i got my letter and youve just made me realise just how close it is now
How did you find the reasoning bit? I know I struggled with it last year, im just hoping now that I know what to expect I'll do a bit better with it this year.

Best of luck to all!

princess deity

Princess Deity is bricking it!!!!!!!!!!!!! :O( less then a week to prepare, OMG!!!!:eek: ANY HELP PLEASE???????????

Fatony

The maths bit was the bit that i found hard, there was just so much information to look over and ver limited time, i found the verbal reasoning grand.. It was a tough test IMO

roboturnip

Has anyone any idea how long it lasts? I think the letter says an hour and a half, but if the tests are only 20 and 25 minutes long i take it is will be over in about an hour?

Fatony

I was there all together 2 hours, thats countin the half and hour it advises to be there before registration. Time doesnt be long flying in tho..

roboturnip

Cheers for the reply. It just me leaving things to the last minute, forgot to take of work... Im feeling a cough coming on

Fatony

in all honestly all the preparation work i done for it didnt help any, I think its a test you cant prepare for.. Maybe studying just wake the brain up helped a bit..

Bifbert

In the words of gordon ramsay IST DONE!!! Same test as last year but that didn't help at all. I have no idea how well I have done I'm actually a bit worried!!! Got them all answered anyway so hopefully I have done enough!!!! Long time for results though IMO.

jonnym61

Did it for the 3rd time today (although am still in the running for a place in c15 - fingers crossed) and maybe its just me but i actually found it a bit harder this year!!

Bifbert

jonnym61 wrote: »

Did it for the 3rd time today (although am still in the running for a place in c15 - fingers crossed) and maybe its just me but i actually found it a bit harder this year!!

likewise I just found it difficult to concentrate on the maths questions. Fingers crossed!!!

grad10

I agree. Even tho same test as last year I found it more difficult this time round for some reason! Hope I've done enough, the waiting game continues..

B182

well im now crapping myself time flew in and i wish i hada practised alot more ! lol

HellHammer

jonnym61 wrote: »

Did it for the 3rd time today (although am still in the running for a place in c15 - fingers crossed) and maybe its just me but i actually found it a bit harder this year!!

Sorry but, what is c15??

fefe5

HellHammer wrote: »

Sorry but, what is c15??

Campaign 15 - that is last years application campaign that was run. This years one is C16.