Hi, Not to beat a dead horse but I wanted to share my daughter's subtest scores from the recent SB5. I was wondering if there is anything that seems like a red flag here. I don't think so but I don't know much....

Some background:
I posted last week because I was shocked that this FS came in at just 116. My dd seems to be fairly gifted to me. My oldest two children have been tested and fall right aboout 3sd above the mean so I was surprised by this score for my dd.

She took the WPPSI at age 4 1/2 and scored 114. She turns 5 next week and really seemed academically ready for K. So we had her tested with the SB5 to try to do early entrance. The tester is experienced in gifted.

My dd started reading easy readers about age 3 1/2 and is working about 1st grade level in Math. She teaches herself songs on the piano and learns them quickly by ear. Nothing too extreme but she taught herself the Star Wars theme in about an hour or so. She is extremely intense and very perceptive. She already has all the Kindergarten skills mastered and more.

I know that it's highly possible that she isn't gifted and that is fine because she's got many wonderful qualities. However, I just want to make sure we aren't missing a LD.

She had many many ear infections as an infant and has always had troubles with her intensity and behavior.

The tester seemed to think that because she had two tests in about the same range that this a good indication of her ability. However, she did say that Visual Spatial kids can make big leaps in development.

Anyway, enough rambling. Here are the subtests:

Non Verbal
Fluid Reasoning 14 91%
Knowledge 11 63%
Quantitative Reasoning 10 50% (tester noted inconsistant responses)
Visual Spatial Proc 17 99%
Working Memory 13 84%

Verbal
Fluid Reasoning 13 84%
Knowledge 13 84%
Quantitative Reasoning 12 75%
Visual Spatial Proc 9 37% (tester noted that daughter missed really easy questions here and was surprised by that)
Working Memory 12 75%

NV IQ 119 90%
Verbal IQ 111 77%
FSIQ 116 86%

To confuse matters more, the tester included all sorts of "gifted" resource recommendations for parents in her assessment letter. She also noted some types of "gifted programming" as something school could do down the road....I don't get it. According to these scores she doesn't look gifted. Was she just too young and maybe this could look different in a few years?

Thank you all
R

I think one of the keys here is that testing at 5 can be fraught with uncertainty. You probably don't have your "final answer" just yet (and many of us never do!) A more accurate picture of your daughter will come in time.

Were the siblings tested on the same test? Same tester?

Her fluid reasoning scores are some of her highest...and those do reflect a more cognitive aspect, at least in my opinion. Perhaps her fluid reasoning index is a better estimate?

The visual spatial spread (17/9) obviously stands out as unusual. The 13/14 level scores might be the accurate ones though, and she might just land in that "smart but not necessarily gifted" area. 13/14 level scores are pretty darn good! Kids at +1 standard deviation will stand out, and benefit from deeper/more/etc. FWIW, on the WISC anyway, straight 14's (really only at the 91st percentile on their own) will "composite" to a 130 (98th percentile).

Did she have any achievement testing done? 5 is young yet for that, but you might want to look there in the future, to help complete the picture. And if you still feel she is in that gifted range, perhaps she'll test there in a year or two.

Do the older children have achievement that is commensurate with their higher IQ scores?

Thanks Dottie. We haven't done achievemet testing on her since she is younger.

Both siblings were tested using the SB5 but with Dr. Ruf. We should have probably bucked up on the cost and taken this dd to her as well. If we do retesting down the road I'll go to Ruf.

My ds8 has ADHD and his achievement is close to his ability but slightly less. My dd6 1/2 has achievement far below her IQ. We are still considering if she's dsylexic or just perfectionism. She's opening up to learning more each week so I think things will look much better in a few years for her.

R