The Safe Concentration and Attention Test - SCAAT

Before I attend the Assessment Centre, which, incidentally, is being set up at a rather nice hotel, I have to practice the exercises, or, at least find out what's going to be presented to me.

Helpfully, each Train Operating Company will provide a series of practice assessments, 99% of the time these have been created by a company called OPC Assessment. 

I am of the belief that practicing these exercises makes little difference to how you will actually perform on the day. Your ability to:

a) Concentrate;
b) Get to grips with mathematics and;
c) Understand and answer questions about a passage of text

...will probably NOT dramatically improve in the time scale you are facing. For example, if you're hopeless at maths, can you really change that within 1-2 weeks? In my opinion, for a potential trainee conductor, it is probably a good idea that you have these basic skills BEFORE applying. You can only sit (and subsequently fail) these series of tests TWICE, without exception. 

On a more positive note, they DO, however, allow you to become familiar with the format and nature of the exercises, and will make you feel a lot more at ease on the day.

You will usually have to sit a series of 3 assessments.

The Concentration Test, (20-30 minutes).
In my case, this will be tested using SCAAT. Some TOCs prefer to use the "dot" test, also known as the "Group Bourdon" assessment. Both are of a similar difficulty, and are not too dissimilar from each other.
SCAAT requires you to identify a specific shape, symbol or letter in a large grid. There are several pages of these grids, and the difficulty increases with each. Eventually, you end up having to search for more than one symbol. The below examples are similar to what will be presented to you, but the real exam will not use letters. It will be a series of similar shapes.

Click here to download a practice test (for printing)
e.g. cross out all of the "<"

You should NOT usually reach the end of the page in the short time provided If you do, something has went wrong. Whilst the "pass" boundaries are not known, you will normally pass if you complete at least 40-50% of each page with accuracy somewhere between 75% and 100%.

WORK AS QUICKLY AND ACCURATELY AS YOU CAN. 

WORK RIGHT TO LEFT.

FOCUS ONLY ON THE LINE YOU ARE UP TO, FORGET ABOUT THE PREVIOUS ONES