Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Identification, Testing & Assessment vocabulary

How many years/months ahead would a child have to score on a vocab assessment for the score to be within the gifted range? Assume said child is three years, six months (I'm assuming that makes a difference).

The word "gifted" has different meanings depending on the situation; for example different GT programs have different cutoffs. Some have cutoffs at the 99.9th percentile, some at the 90th.

Assuming a cutoff of a scaled test score of 130 for the "gifted" label, where that corresponds to two standard deviations from the mean, scores don't generally seem to be given in grade equivalents; instead grade equivalents are extrapolated loosely from scores, and the scores are the things that are most closely normalized to each other between different kinds of tests. That means that once you know what "gifted" means in a certain context (e.g. a scaled score of 130 or above on a particular test) the method that the test constructors use for grade equivalents, if there is one, would give your answer.

For this reason I think you would have to give the type of test and the gifted cutoff you're looking at for a full answer.

I'd caution using a vocabulary test as the only or primary means for assessing overall giftedness. Most vocabulary tests measure very discrete skills and or knowledge. A high score in the presence of high scores on other tests of cognition might indicate giftedness. But, a high score in isolation is not enough to determine overall intelligence or even speech and language/ verbal ability. There are so many factors that lead to giftedness.

It's pretty hard to tell if a 3 year old is gifted or not, but if you are asking the questions there has to be a reason.

Of course your neighbors may think the reason is a character problem on your part, but in my experience, the reason usually is that the child is unusual enough in their behavior that you would like some kind of reason to explain the unusuallness.

You might be interested in this:
TalentIgniter | Ruf Gifted Assessment
www.talentigniter.com/ -

Isn't it nice to finally have words to match the vauge feelings?

Read the other posts here and see if your child looks familiar...

Welcome,
Grinity

The test was the Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test. It is not in any way meant to test for giftedness. It was given as a part of a research study, and the tester gave the results in a year/month format. I was simply curious to know if there was an understood typical versus possibly gifted range for such a test. This correlation may not have been done though, because again, it wasn't meant to test for giftedness, for obvious reasons.

Thank you for your kind, encouraging words. Will there be much to learn from here if my child isn't pg?

1. At 3.5, and even with the well-established tests, it can be difficult to determine if your child is PG.

2. You may be in denial without knowing it.

3. This is a great place to learn, regardless of LOG/numbers.

Neither of my girls are PG - DD10 is a near-DYS kid and DD8 is bright but quirky. I've still found this site very useful.

Great, thanks!

I hope so!
((wink))