Wednesday, August 27, 2008

Eleven Plus Cubes

Way back in palaeolithic times man drew on rocks.

We know that many early drawings were probably to do with magic, the hunter wanted good luck or a little bit of magic to be able to be a successful hunter.

Later drawings may have been used to keep records – or even send messages.

Today’s highway code shows us just how drawings are used to warn or direct traffic. Many of the common place signs are known universally.

To be able to draw a picture it must help if there is a strong artistic presence.

A graphic designer needs a different type of artistic temperament to a painter of landscapes – even though there must be a strong element of crossover. An architect requires different drawing skills to a portrait painter.

But the person who thought that working out cubes was a sign of intelligence (or of one aspect of non verbal ability) must have had a truly masochistic mind.

Moving the cube through 180˚is easy enough. When the cube is rotated as well as transformed, then we know that being able to provide an answer is around 35 seconds is a serious optimist.

I shared the extraordinary lengths that bright eleven years old are prepared to endure – just to solve a cube question.

For the non initiated cubes appear in certain non verbal reasoning papers. Some brains can work the answer out in seconds. Other brains never seem to find the solution.

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