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    #91351 12/20/10 02:45 PM
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    My 6-year-old 1st grader qualified for gifted services, but I am mystified by her COGAT scores. I am thinking that I do not like group administered tests - or maybe they are just bad for my child.

    She scored in the 71st percentile Verbal, 83rd Quant., 98th Non-verbal. Now, I am a psychologist- and if I saw those scores for a child, I would think something was going on - maybe a reading/language weakness- something. But, as a parent, I know that verbal abilities are my daughter's strength! She taught herself to read at age 3, could write paragraphs in Kindergarten, and now writes full essays and reads many grade levels ahead. This is a kid who likes to make up analogies during car rides.

    I wonder what the heck she was doing during testing? I am reasonably certain that a 71 and 83 are well below what she should have scored. She isn't the most "attentive" child, I'll admit.

    Anyone have an idea? I probably should request to see her full test battery. I know very little about the COGAT- it isn't something I use.

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    One thing to keep in mind, is that at this age, the CogAT is READ to the child. Fluctuations or leading with a certain tone of voice can mislead a child, or the child. There are actually several areas of the test, though broken down into those 3 subtests. There is a vocab section, which is more along the lines of the teacher saying "Which one is a reptile" and there are 3-4 pictures to choose from and the child picks the correct picture. There is a section where they hear a story and then there are several pictures and then the child chooses the picture to draw conclusions from what they heard. There is an abstract shape section in the math portion, etc. So.... because a child is a good reader, having the test read to them, and using pictures and what not to choose answers may not be good for some children. If you go to the website, there is a pretty good description of the test. HTH!

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    Thanks!

    Having something read to her is always an issue. She is a daydreamer. If she is not dazzled by it, she tunes out.

    And I also think that she doesn't make "normal" interpretations of grade level material- which could also be a detriment on that test. A few weeks ago she came home from school with a paper from computer lab with all of these things marked wrong... she was supposed to categorize objects by beginning vowel sound. Something she could do in Pre-K. When I asked her about the check marks, she just said, "I'm right- I don't know why they are marked wrong." Sure enough, her responses were correct- she just gave higher level/more specific vocab words for the pictures than the teacher expected (she classified a picture of a tree under "P" - for "Pine" rather than "T", for example).

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    Oh boy! Well, that could certainly mess a kid up! Did your child tell the teacher what she called each picture (pine vs. tree). I would think they should give credit for that! YIKES! Most teachers and professionals don't put much stock into the 1st grade CogAT for the very reason that it is read to them. In 3rd grade, they start reading it themselves. Usually they take it every other year, so you should be safe. Hopefully your school uses another measure for acceptance into a GT program if that is a concern for you.


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    Oh boy! Well, that could certainly mess a kid up! Did your child tell the teacher what she called each picture (pine vs. tree). I would think they should give credit for that! YIKES! Most teachers and professionals don't put much stock into the 1st grade CogAT for the very reason that it is read to them. In 3rd grade, they start reading it themselves. Usually they take it every other year, so you should be safe. Hopefully your school uses another measure for acceptance into a GT program if that is a concern for you.


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    My dd10, whose IQ scores are rather high, didn't do that well on the CogAT either. Like your dd, her scores were above avg, but nowhere near her WISC-IV scores.

    For us, the timed aspect was an issue (it is only timed from 3rd grade on). Other issues included the testing circumstances (in a group with people having walked in and out of the classroom during the testing -- I was there waiting to go in and volunteer and saw parents going in an out and apologizing loudly to the teacher for having not seen the sign on the door) and that dd is very divergent in her approaches as others have mentioned.

    The CogAT is not an intelligence test. It bugs me to an extent that schools use it that way. The publisher clearly states that is is testing abilities kids have developed not their intelligence or innate ability. I realize that it is the best they can do due to cost constraints, but it doesn't do the best job narrowing down high achiever vs. gifted and doesn't work well for a certain segment of the gifted population.

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    Originally Posted by bh14
    Usually they take it every other year, so you should be safe.
    Our schools adminster it once in 3rd grade and that's it. They are of the opinion that scores are stable although data on that doesn't seem to support that notion.

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    bh14- No, the computer teacher didn't ask her. I sent the paper back to school with a note. Her classroom teacher understood and gave DD the credit. The classroom teacher "gets" DD to some degree- her other teachers really do not.

    Cricket2- they do the testing every other year. Luckily DD's one high score tagged her for more testing, and she scored very high on the other measures (achievement, creativity). I am with you on feelings about COGAT.

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    I am glad to hear she eventually got her credit. Things like that are so annoying to me. I find many teachers do NOT get my child either. Very rarely do I have one that does smile


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    My DD was 5.5 years old when she took the CogAT and had similar scores 71% Verbal, 87% Qualitative, and 95% Nonverbal. In her situation, the tests were given over three days (one test each day) in the order presented. This was the first "bubble in" test that the 1st Grade class took as a group. Based on test guidelines, the teacher was only allowed to read each question once. (The questions were not given in writing to the students, so children who can read well have no advantage.) So, if the kids were not paying attention, were "stuck" on answering a previous question, or were sitting next to a distracting kid, they were at a huge disadvantage. The scores were consistently better each day as my DD warmed up to the testing environment. I also looked up some of the sample questions online. One question asked which picture was upside down. The correct answer was a turtle lying on its back, but one of the other answers had an umbrella that was flipped inside out.

    I had DD tested with WISC-IV when she turned 6 due to the irregular scores. She is MG and also read when she was 3. One of the things the testing pulled out was that even though she could nail any word, sentence, book, etc. perfectly, she didn't fully understand what some of the words meant which would impact her interpretation of what she read. None of her teachers caught this and the PHD who tested her found it right away.

    You have to realize at this age, a lot of kids have not been exposed to the same things and they may have no reference point if they have not experienced something before. This is just the beginning of a series of tests and I suspect things will only get better from here.

    My DD is 7.5 now and she is at the top of her class even though she grade skipped once already. (The advanced academic counselor has even talked to me about another grade skip because of her achievement scores.)

    Good luck to you and your daughter! I suspect great things are in her future.

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