Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Identification, Testing & Assessment California Achievement Test

DS(6) just scored in the 96th percentile on the California Achievement Test for 3rd grade (he would only be half way through first grade by age), his lowest grade equivalency was 5.4 and his highest was post high school. This is his first real test and we home school, is this test just easier than most tests?

My kids took that test last year. I think I can help you interpret the scores.

The results don't mean that your son is performing AT a fifth grade level or a 13th grade level. What they mean is that a 5th grade student who was four months into the school year would be expected to get the same score that your son did.

My eldest scored at a mid-12th grade level on the math portion of one of those tests last year. He was barely 9, and he definitely wasn't doing calculus yet! He just got all the questions right, and the people who created the test had decided or found that his score would typically be expected from a 12th grader.

HTH.

Val

Thanks, that is very helpful! I'm wondering if I should have him take the fourth grade test based on these results? Or if it would be better to go with a different kind of test.

From what I've read, the CAT is one of the easier tests. The ITBS is supposed to be a bit more challenging and "if you really want to know what your DC knows" use the SAT/10. Now I put that in quotes b/c that is what someone said at the WTM boards. We may do the SAT/10 this year. I think I've seen the recommedation to keep testing up a level until child reaches 50th%.

There is also the WJIII or the MAP test. The MAP test covers K-2 and at the next level 3-9 I think. As far as I know. It keeps increasing in grade level until DC starts missing enough questions, then it backs down a bit to find the grade level your DC is performing at. That's what I've been told...someone correct me if I'm wrong. The Map test has to be done through an *agent* and most often those are schools who are using it and may let you test w/ them. Also homeschool co-ops may use it so you can check in your area. There is a company in Florida that will let you sign up from any state and test through them. You use your home computer. It's only a finite time....there is a deadline to register buy and there will be a small window in which you log on and take the test. You can call the MAP testing company (Forgetting the anacronyn) and ask what schools in your area are using MAP testing.

hth,
Dazey

Ahh, I didn't realize the WJIII was a test we could use for placement. DS is going to be tested by a psychologist soon and that is one of the tests he will be administering, so I will hold off on placement testing for now and see what happens there. Thanks so much for the test recommendations. I don't think we will be using the CAT again, it was far too easy and took way too long. (he took the complete battery).

Thanks again!

Well the WJIII can't be use for placement per se. It has too few questions per level. But it will give you a ballpark and then pursue further achievement testing after that. Isn't that correct Dottie? 8-)

The SAT/x was criticized in the 1988 Lake Woebegone effect report on how all 50 States score above the national average. As I remember from the paper, the test was normed once on a small, less than average group of students (in TX, I think). That test version and norms were then apparently used for almost a decade which nearly ensured any school district could come out above average. I don�t know how the current version is generally viewed by watchdogs today, but it is still favored by many school districts as the back-up achievement proof to state tests.
I think the ITBS is renormed continually and since it is used by private, homeschools and a good portion of public schools it should have fairly accurate percentile yields.

I think the ITBS that you can do in your own home, is not the current edition. I needed the version and year for our district paperwork and I recall the testing service saying something that that edition was the only one available to HSers. I thought the ITBS was an ok test but the way the test questions were worded was a bit tricky so I was glad I did some test prep. That was for 3rd grade so I don't know what the upper grades were like. I have a test prep book for the SAT/10 for 4th grade and 5th grade and my feeling is that it looks similar to the ITBS, but more straight forward. The SAT/10 is only a few years old.

I really think if you want placement information, something like the MAP test if it accomplishes what it purports to do, will give the info you need.

Thanks, I like the look of the MAP test and its affordable too.

MAP seems like a logical way to go. In the end though, trial and error is about the only way to know what a kid is ready to learn.

Yeah, I have been learning that the hard way, he started a beginning algebra course with EPGY and it has been going very slowly. He can do it, but its taking him 20 mins to do 5-8 questions, mostly because he still has to skip count to multiply. I've never been one to do drill with my kids and now I see where this might be an issue. I know his math ability is way beyond everything else, I'd just love to know where everything else is, so that I can bring in a tutor to help me out a little (homeschooling 3 kids).

The info on the SAT10 and ITBS here is interesting to me b/c I am going to be helping a good friend of mine with testing her dd on one of these two soon. You need at least a BA and some testing coursework to administer the SAT10 and at least a BA to administer the ITBS. Df has neither, so I am the one! Her kiddo is homeschooled.

In her instance, I believe that getting relatively higher scores is desired b/c she needs them to submit to the district to prove that her dd is making adequate progress. I don't think that she wants artificially inflated scores, but whichever of these two might give higher results might be desirable for her purposes. The concern we have with the ITBS is that it is more tightly timed and her dd has some anxiety with timed tests. Any thoughts on those two tests beyond what has been posted already?

How old is the child you'll be testing?

DS8 took the 1st grade and 2nd grade ITBS. These were not above-level testing. Speed is not his strength, but he finished the timed portions both years with no trouble.

The biggest complaints I had were that some of the questions were not well-written (so that more than one answer seemed possible, even to adults) and that some questions assumed a knowledge of things that a child might not have if not in a very particular school setting. I don't want to give details of the test, obviously, so please excuse me for speaking in such a cryptic way.

But even these problems weren't a big deal. It was a few questions. The timed portions were definitely not a problem.

HTH...

My kids have found that they can easily run out of time on the ITBS.

The school our kids attended until their 8th/6th grades switched to the ITBS from the TerraNova during their last year there. My daughter did not finish several of the language sections which yielded a very low for her score of 69th percentile. For comparison, her Explore English score, taken the same year, was at the 98th percentile.

My ds has earned a math composite of 99th percentile all three years he has taken the ITBS despite his not finishing several problems on the computation subsection this year.

Their previous TerraNova scores are quite comparable to their results on their ITBS achievement test. This is true of the school average too which generally falls around the 75th percentile overall.

She is almost 11 and a 5th grader.

My dds took the ITBS in 1st and 3rd grade at a charter they were attending that time. My oldest, who is also not a fast person (42nd percentile on the WISC as compared to 90s on all of the other indices), did poorly in the fall and really well in the spring. The difference was anxiety.

In the fall, her teacher stressed how important it was which left her so stressed that she came home at the end of the day physically shaking. She didn't finish so much of it that the report said that it couldn't give a core or composite score. In the spring, we convinced her that it didn't matter at all and she scored in the 99th percentile on the totals for reading, language, science, social studies, sources of info, core, and composite. She was in the 92nd for math.

This seemed like an accurate representation of her achievement at that time so my take was that it could be completed in the time gived even by a child whose strength is not speed unless there was a lot of stress or pressure involved. I'm sure that I won't stress my df's child, but I would rather go with the SAT10 if it is likely to work better for her in terms of time constraints, etc.

I don't have any experience with the SAT10, but my DS8 has a similar reaction to speed requirements. He gets so panicky that his brain pretty much shuts down. It's almost phobic. He had time to spare on the timed math section of the ITBS, so it wasn't a problem at all.

However, the time might become a bigger factor as they get older. I can't speak to that either since we only did early elementary level testing so far.