15.2 AQL Session Strategy
Key Takeaways
- AL and QL are separately timed inside one AQL sitting; leftover AL minutes do not become QL minutes.
- The FAQ states three hours of writing time per test; the Tests page states AQL writing time of three hours and five minutes — follow invigilator or on-screen instructions rather than inventing a third clock.
- The official 2023 Intake National Report publishes an AL/QL split of two hours five minutes and one hour for 75 and 50 items; because current live pages disagree on the AQL total, the clock issued for your sitting controls.
- No dictionary on AQL. Venue what-to-expect lists no scrap paper; online FAQ allows one piece of paper and a pen or pencil, with bathroom breaks under five minutes.
- MAT-booklet multiple-choice method also helps AL and QL: read the stem first, work, then match an option, watching misconception distractors.
Two clocks inside one morning paper
AQL is one multiple-choice sitting with two separately timed sections: Academic Literacy (AL) and Quantitative Literacy (QL). You cannot move leftover AL minutes into QL once the AL section has closed. The official FAQ says the timed sections total three hours of writing time, while the Tests page says AQL has three hours and five minutes' writing time. The official 2023 Intake National Report gives the detailed split behind the longer total: two hours five minutes for AL and one hour for QL. Because the current live pages still present different totals, follow the invigilator or the on-screen clock for your booked sitting; do not replace either official source with a blog's 90/90 or 120/60 guess.
Pace from the composition in the 2023 Intake National Report: AL = 75 questions and QL = 50. AL is the larger block of reading work. QL is shorter in item count but slower per item if you compute carefully without a calculator. AL and QL bands are reported separately, so abandoning QL to polish AL — or the reverse — is a placement risk, not a clever trade.
This section is independent OpenExamPrep session strategy. It is not CEA timing law. If the senior invigilator or the lockdown-browser screen states a clock, that clock is the one you sit.
Rehearse the published split, then obey the live clock
The 2023 report provides a concrete rehearsal baseline: 125 minutes for 75 AL items, followed by 60 minutes for 50 QL items. That is about 1 minute 40 seconds per AL item and 1 minute 12 seconds per QL item on average, but averages are not per-question limits. Since the current FAQ says three hours while the Tests page and that report say three hours five minutes, treat the report split as source-specific preparation and the clock issued for your sitting as final.
Habits that transfer:
- In AL, keep moving through passages. A brutal inference item is not worth three unread easier items later in the same section.
- Flag and return inside the open section. You cannot return to AL after QL has started.
- In QL, read axes, units, and whether the question asks for a rate, a difference, or a ratio before you compute. Wrong-quantity answers sit in the options.
- Estimate a reasonable size, then compute. No calculator means arithmetic errors are option-shaped.
- Rehearse AL and QL under separate clocks, beginning with the report's 2:05 and 1:00 split; switch to any different instructions issued for your actual sitting.
On pencil-paper sittings you mark an answer sheet. At check-in the sheet has your name and ID printed on the back; check that they are yours before the paper starts. Online, answers live on screen; a flagged item is useful only while that section is still open.
No dictionary, and two different paper rules
No dictionary in AL or QL, English or Afrikaans. Hard vocabulary is a context problem, not a look-up problem. If a word is unknown, use surrounding sentences, contrast markers, and what the option would do to the paragraph's claim.
Venue what-to-expect table: you may not use scrap paper, notebooks, calculators, dictionaries, or smart devices. Pack two sharpened pencils and an eraser. Be at check-in by 07:30; doors close at 08:30. Plan bathroom use before the writing session — venue what-to-expect states that bathroom breaks are not allowed during the sitting, and the writing session is hours long.
Online FAQ: you may have one piece of paper and a pen or pencil in the room. Books, phones, smart watches, and calculators invalidate the session. Bathroom breaks are permitted but must be under 5 minutes. Login by the published time (often 08:30) for the checklist; typical AQL start is 09:00 unless you are told otherwise. Follow on-screen instructions; the whole session is recorded. A second person walking through the room can invalidate the sitting.
Do not import the online paper rule into a venue, or the venue no-scrap rule into an online room. The difference is deliberate on nbt.ac.za; it is not a loophole you can mix.
Multiple-choice method that transfers from the MAT booklet
The MAT teachers' booklet's multiple-choice advice also helps AL and QL. Unless multiple-choice is already your default school format, walk this sequence on every item:
- Read the stem carefully without looking at the options.
- Work the question — for AL, decide what the paragraph actually does or supports; for QL, compute or reason to an answer on the allowed working surface for your mode.
- Then look at the options and see whether one matches what you already have.
- Stay critical: an option may encode a specific misconception (for QL, adding percentages that should multiply; for AL, an inference the passage never supports).
- If nothing matches, restart once. If still stuck, leave the item and move on. Every item has one intended option; do not stall on the theory that the paper is broken.
Do not reverse this order as a default. The MAT booklet states that items you can finish by substituting each option into an equation are deliberately avoided. AL and QL similarly punish writers who shop the options first and then hunt for a justifying sentence. Elimination still helps after you have a working answer: drop options that contradict a topic sentence, a graph axis, or an exact value you already hold. Elimination is not a substitute for reading the stem.
Energy, not just minutes
AL is a long reading block. Eat a normal breakfast. Sleep the night before is part of AL strategy: tired readers invent tone and skip contrast words such as however and in contrast. If you also write MAT, protect lunch for the afternoon — that is the next section — but do not spend the AQL morning rehearsing algebra in your head. The AL clock is still running.
Traps
- Replacing the official 2023 report split or your session clock with a blog's timing guess
- Treating FAQ 3 hours and Tests-page 3 hours 5 minutes as a conflict you must resolve yourself instead of obeying the session clock
- Bringing a dictionary "just for AL"
- Packing a venue notebook for QL working
- Taking an online bathroom break longer than five minutes
- Reading options before the stem on every item
- Letting one AL passage consume the whole AL section
The FAQ states three hours of writing time and the Tests page states an AQL writing time of three hours and five minutes. What should a writer do with that difference?
What AL/QL timing split does the official 2023 Intake National Report describe?
Which materials rule is stated correctly for AQL?