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    #231322 05/31/16 04:09 PM
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    lmb123 Offline OP
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    We have a meeting at school to request a grade skip for DS8. He is finishing 2nd grade and will enter a 3rd-4th grade classroom next school year. The school teaches in a workshop model and groups children within the classroom by ability. I guess what we are really asking for is that he be allowed to rise to his actual learning potential and work with the 4th graders if/when appropriate (instead of the advanced 3rd graders), leaving us with the need for a plan for the following school year (hence the meeting).

    The school sent out DS' NWEA and SRI test results. My best guest is that they will argue they are serving him well with the current set up given his test scores (listed below) and that changes are not needed.

    I am hoping some of you can give me some insight that I can use for the meeting. He is the only 2nd grader taking these tests so we can't really compare to overall 2nd grade results. It seems to me that based on the RIT tables, except for math, he has lost ground. Does anything else jump out? How meaningful/accurate are these tests?

    Your thoughts are greatly appreciated. TIA!

    NWEA MAP:
    Math 220/216/242
    Reading 237/220/232(Winter retake)/228
    language 229/232/226

    SRI:1027/1228/1264

    Last edited by lmb123; 05/31/16 04:14 PM.
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    Which version of MAP is he taking? PMAP or 2-5 MAP??

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    lmb123 Offline OP
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    2-5 MAP.

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    DS has similar scores (math is a little bit higher) and the school is sending him to 6th grade for math and they are giving him 6th grade level books. He is in 3rd grade. It looks like your DS had a big jump for math in just a few months which makes me wonder how accurate that latest score is. Not sure how easy it is to score "too high" however, and do that well based on luck. In your position I would probably ask if they could do additional testing before deciding on a skip, for instance the Woodcock Johnson or WIAT and/or give him any district/school assessments for the next year up for math to see if there are any gaps. (DS was able to skip 3 years of math by scoring above 85 percent on pre-tests for those grades--I think they give the same test at the beginning and end of each year and and it tests the grade level standards).

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    lmb123 Offline OP
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    Originally Posted by blackcat
    DS has similar scores (math is a little bit higher) and the school is sending him to 6th grade for math and they are giving him 6th grade level books. He is in 3rd grade. It looks like your DS had a big jump for math in just a few months which makes me wonder how accurate that latest score is. Not sure how easy it is to score "too high" however, and do that well based on luck. In your position I would probably ask if they could do additional testing before deciding on a skip, for instance the Woodcock Johnson or WIAT and/or give him any district/school assessments for the next year up for math to see if there are any gaps. (DS was able to skip 3 years of math by scoring above 85 percent on pre-tests for those grades--I think they give the same test at the beginning and end of each year and and it tests the grade level standards).

    Blackcat, I am pretty sure additional testing is out of the question but I'll ask smile To be truthful, I think his fall and winter math scores are a little on the low side and the spring one a little high. We have not enriched outside of school at all so that boredom doesn't get worse. He has spent more time than usual on Dreambox and has finished 3rd grade, is 75% done with 4th grade, half done with 6th grade and has about 20% of 5th and 7th grades completed. I truly believe he is ready for much harder math in class and that's where school is lacking the most for him.
    You mentioned your son's similar scores (except for math) - were those his scores EOY in 3rd? Just trying to get a better picture if my expectations are realistic. Thanks!

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    Right--end of the year third grade. The school doesn't do lang. testing but for reading and math, I think he is at 99th percentile so your DS would be an even higher percentile for 2nd grade. If he is doing Dreambox, that is enrichment and probably accounts for the increase in math MAP. We aren't doing any enrichment since the school is now giving him work at the right level. I think his math MAP was around 235 last year at the end of second grade (after being accelerated for a few months) and then went up to 245 this year.

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    So in my experience, NWEA gives you a great place to start a conversation about a child's achievement and how well they seem to be learning. If the school uses them for placement, the scores may also be relevant to that conversation. I would also encourage you to be armed with additional data, however, as most schools are hesitant to place a student solely based on NWEA data. Has he taken any out-of-level or ability tests? These will help you show that the strong achievement scores are not just an accident.

    Those scores definitely should help you start the conversation. You will want to utilize the NWEA norms chart that illustrates that he may be showing growth indicating that he already grasps concepts several grades up - he is likely in the 99th percentile not just for 2nd grade, but probably even a couple of grades up: http://www.sowashco.org/files/department/rea/2015NormsReport_Reading.pdf. The RIT score will show where he fell in various grades on his testing. With my DC, those types of scores have never been a complete fluke. I would also be watching that NWEA math score closely. Will he score close to that again? My DD grew like that a couple of times and each time, the first time it happened, I assumed it COULD be a fluke and it could drop back down...except it didn't wink

    Could you ask to have your DS take the end of 3rd grade test? This would give everyone an idea of how well he knows next year's curriculum. At a minimum, it will allow teachers to have him focus next year on what he needs to learn next, but I am going to take a wild guess that your DS has already mastered 3rd grade curriculum and needs to work with a higher grade level in math. Also, it is helpful for a school to see where a student is within their curriculum.

    Is he older or younger for grade? Would it possibly just be easier to accelerate a whole grade?

    HTH!


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    Originally Posted by lmb123
    NWEA MAP:
    Math 220/216/242
    Reading 237/220/232(Winter retake)/228
    language 229/232/226

    SRI:1027/1228/1264

    Assuming those are in chronological order and all with the same test, that looks like no growth or negative in reading/LA. That seems like a good starting point to say that something is wrong, or that the current situation is not serving him well.


    Edit: Assuming I am reading the chart (linked above) correctly all of those spring scores are greater than the 99th percentile.

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    lmb123 Offline OP
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    Originally Posted by Loy58
    So in my experience, NWEA gives you a great place to start a conversation about a child's achievement and how well they seem to be learning. If the school uses them for placement, the scores may also be relevant to that conversation. I would also encourage you to be armed with additional data, however, as most schools are hesitant to place a student solely based on NWEA data. Has he taken any out-of-level or ability tests? These will help you show that the strong achievement scores are not just an accident.

    He has, Loy58. Part of the problem is that the school is not big on testing. The school has his full report with DYS qualifying scores both on the WISC-IV and on the WIAT-III. They've had that information for a couple of years but I feel a hesitation to take them to heart (perhaps because they were done by a private provider). He was also assessed with mandated district wide testing on the CogAT and Terra Nova with scoring mostly in the 99%. That seems to actually have hurt us as many kids score in the 94% and above (criteria for receiving high ability services in our school district) at DS school so the principal seems to think there about 20%-25% of the kids have a similar cognitive profile to my child not understanding that those tests have pretty low ceilings.

    DS has a January birthday. I believe a full grade acceleration would be for the best but I don't think the school will agree. I am trying to get what I can for him. The school has a great learning environment so if he could just be challenged a bit more academically, it would be pretty darn close to perfect!

    Thank you for your insight - I really appreciate it!




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    So if I'm reading the norms correctly, your DC was already right up in the 99th %ile range on the fall reading and language tests, which is probably why his scores fell slightly over the course of the year. MAP has item lockout, which prevents the same items from being re-administered within a certain time frame. There aren't that many very high level items in the 2-5 pool. I would imagine that he exhausted the pool early in the process, so the adaptive item selection started tossing him slightly easier items, as they were the highest ones remaining. If the school re-set the item pool on the winter reading retake, that might have allowed him to go back up at that point, and then fall again in spring, on the same item pool issue. His SRI/lexile puts him above the 75th %ile for 12th graders, which tends to support the test ceiling hypothesis. He did make significant gains as assessed by that measure.

    I wouldn't say that the data definitively show that he has lost ground in reading and language.

    BTW, his spring math scores are in the 99th %ile for end of 3rd grade, the 97th %ile for end of 4th grade, the 90th %ile for end of 5th grade, and well above the score at which entering 5th graders are supposed to be moved up to the MAP 6+ and considered for SSA in math, according to NWEA. You may not see much more MAP score growth in math until his testing is switched up to the 6+.


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