My son only took the WIAT the month he turned seven. Even though he has motor dyspraxia and sensory issues and took the without taking breaks, he did very well on the achievement test, scoring grade levels ahead of age mates even though he had only homeschooled for about two hours a day the year before he took the test. He did well enough on the achievement test that the tester told us that he did not get to the point where he missed enough questions to stop the test. The test was stopped because they ran out of time and our insurance would not pay for any more testing. The tester predicted the score he would make on an IQ test based on the achievement test, but he said to really find out how highly gifted he is, he needed to be tested over more than one day because of my son's fatigue issues. My son was even tested on spelling but he had to write the words, which I thought was strange considering that handwriting was one of his problems, but he managed to test slightly above grade level on that before his hands got too tired to continue. I believe that he was actually at a higher grade level in spelling than the test showed, especially now since he won a regional spelling bee at age 9. I most tests are set up for kids without motor disabilies, but he can compensate enough that he can do well on everything except things requiring visual motor integration. He is slow at 3D puzzles and I can't see that it has an adverse effect on achievement. I think he might score lower on an IQ test because of his lower than average visual motor integration, but I think what really counts is what he is able to achieve and he is able to achieve at a very high level if he is given the opportunity to learn the way he learns best.
I know that achievement tests like the WIAT only cover a small number of questions at each grade level, but I found that my son was able to skip a lot of the math curriculum and work at the grade level it showed on the achievement test because he picked up concepts very quickly, but we had to work around handwriting issues.
I think the test was more helpful than an IQ test would have been for me because we had homeschooled for a year and I wasn't sure what grade levels he was working at. We didn't use an actual curriculum and he did a lot of things online, playing educational games and of course, he read a lot but he chose to read things like his children's science encyclopedia and National Geographic Magazine. He just didn't have any interest in the books his public schooled friends, even his older gifted friends, were reading. He has always loved books with a rich vocabulary that make him think. I think because of what he chooses to read, he is able to use a higher level vocabulary in his speech and I think he probably comprehends at a higher level than than his public schooled gifted friends who are several years older, but if he were in our public school he would be held back from achieving at a high level partly because of his sensory and motor issues.
If I had to choose between an IQ test or another achievement test, I would choose an achievement test because on
www.livescience.com/health/070416_achievement_iq.html it says that scores on elementary school achievement tests have a lot to do with IQ and where kids end up later in life.
I am curious about his IQ, but I wonder if it would be affected by his visual motor integration difficulties. I just think an achievement test gives me more useful information. I would have liked for him to take the Explore test but I could not make him miss one of the most fun Cub Scout activities to do it. Hopefully, next year things will work out so that he can take it.
