Thanks for all the help! I love this group!
Just one correction, Trinity: I don't actually expect this one test to answer all my schooling questions. But I still maintain that it IS an important piece of evidence. And we REALLY need more evidence right now!
I am a firm believer that you have to go into testing with specific questions that you are trying to answer. Just wanting to know my child better isn't specific enough for me. We have two basic questions we're trying to answer with the help of this test: 1) Is DS6 eligible for YSP?, and 2) What educational options are going to be better/worse choices for him?
It seems to me that there's a big difference between how you approach the education of a level 2 or 3 GT kid--which is where I THOUGHT he was--and a level 4 or 5 kid--which is where his achievement test scores are leading us. If he's a level 4 or 5, we're probably not going to even try to go back to the public schools with him. I just don't think our local schools (probably level 2 or a low 3) could give him what he needs if he's at level 4-5. If he's a level 2 or 3, then my attitude might be different there. Different set of circumstances entirely.
I guess I'm seeing this test as a sort of tie-breaker between what I thought and what the WJ-III seems to be telling me. We had been assuming that while public school wouldn't always be ideal for DS, he wouldn't require significant differentiation. Then we got his WJ-III scores, and we had no choice but to re-examine our apparently faulty assumptions and do some research into gifted education. I read Dr. Ruf's book for the first time about 6 weeks ago. (That's how new all of this is for us!) The book and his scores showed me that he's at least a level 3, more probably a level 4, and he could well be as high as a level 5 (he doesn't do all of the things that "all level 5s" did, but he did many things several months earlier than the level 4s, and the test scores indicate level 4-5 for sure). Surprise! So at which level is he? And what does that mean for how we approach his education? Thus the "tiebreaker" test!
So that's why I say that I don't think I really need the "you're an expert on your child" talk. I already KNOW that I've been wrong about him and wrong about his needs. I have not been the expert I thought I was. I still had books for 4-year-olds on his shelves, and he was ready to read books for 9-year-olds! (When I bought harder books, he said, "Thanks, mom. I've been needing more of a challenge." Doh!!) We hadn't really been doing any math work with him whatsoever, and he's just as advanced in math as he is verbally. I had no idea! So I'm trying to figure out just how wrong I was, and what does that mean for his education.
What's stressing me out more than anything is the fact that I was so wrong about my child and that our whole plan for the next 11-1/2 years has had to go out the window. Now we need to come up with a new plan. (Albeit one not so far-reaching! We're now taking things one day at a time instead!) I'm actually hoping this test will UNstress me somewhat by telling us more clearly what he's capable of. We could use a little more clarity as we sit down to make decisions about what to do next year.
And if the test gets him in to YSP, with its free educational consulting, so much the better!
Again, thanks for all the words of wisdom, support, concern, help, etc. Even just writing about it here has helped me to feel a little less nervous about this whole process and all the decisions we have to make in DS's future.
