Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Identification, Testing & Assessment GAI 153, Processing speed 94. New. Help please.

I am new here today and trying to make sense of scores we recently received for a 4th grader on WSIC-IV. They are all over the place high and low.

GAI - 153
Verbal Reasoning 148; Perceptual Reasoning 137; Working Memory 116; Processing Speed 94

Similarities 19
Vocabulary 19
Comprehension 16

Block design 12
Picture concepts 17
Matrix reasoning 19
Digit span 12

Letter-number sequencing 14

Coding 10
Symbol search 8

Any insights are welcome. I'm not sure how to take in the span of the results or what to do with this information. We had her tested privately since the school suspected ADD and she has been unable to complete timed tests in simple math at the rate of peers despite her ability in higher math and reasoning. Her reading speed/accuracy by contrast are at the 99.9 percentile.

Was the testing part of a neuropsych educational eval, or did it only include ability and achievement testing? Typically a neuropsych eval includes additional testing to determine the cause of large discrepancies in subtest scores. The first thing I"d want to do is understand what"s behind the discrepancies.

FWIW our ds has a similar spread in processing speed vs VIQ/PRI - in his case the spread is due to developmental coordination disorder, dysgraphia and an expressive language disorder. Our ds was also first suspected of having ADHD by his teachers before we had his neuropsych testing. He also has a huge split in testing between math concepts and timed math fluency tests. Once we knew what was behind the discrepancies we saw, we were able to put together accommodations and a game plan for school that is working relatively well, but understanding why was the first and most important step for us.

Best wishes,

polarbear

This was a full day evaluation by a neurospychologist. I'm not sure what is really important, but the report says that processing speed and working memory were significantly discrepant from other abilities. (note: working memory was still in the 86th percentile, up to 98th for story memory, but way lower for visual memory). The problems seem to stem from auditory divided attention (she can't listen to two things at once), vigilance and processing speed, and the suggestion was ADD at the mild end of the continuum - symptoms were "inconsistent." Some problems with "executive functions" too -- planning and retrival was a problem with rote, though not with meaningful tasks. The executive function scores ranged from 10-65th percentile.

She tests very low (max 10 percentile, with one score at less than the first percentile) for visual motor skills, with scores "meeting the criteria for dispraxia." The report says that these visual-motor problems can impact test taking. Almost all of her scores involving reproducing a picture of something were very low, down to under the first percentile. Visual organization and memory that didn't require motor skills seemed fine, and up to the 90+ percentile. She plays a stringed instrument well and her sight reading of music is great, so actual fine motor skills and some parts of the brain - fingers connection is clearly there and she has exceptional general balance (is great at balance sports), so I don't totally understand the dispraxia part.

WIAT-III scores are anywhere from 23 percentile (math fluency) to the 80s for math problem solving to 90s to 99.9 for verbal areas.

We plan to meet with the school to discuss next steps but I don't know what to do or expect. She is bored in school and her slow pace at basic multiplication and division puts her in the lowest math group where she knows that she doesn't belong. Her teachers complain that she doesn't pay attention and is slow to complete tasks. At every meeting over the past three years I mention that she has special abilities (earlier private testing showed achievement and intelligence tests in the 99.9 percentile) and I have a list of crazy interests and abilities like anyone else here to back it up, but the conversation turns immediately back to their list of what is wrong with her.