Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Twice Exceptional Cogat Testing

My 9 year old daughter is dyslexic and in 3rd grade. This year the school is having all the 3rd graders take the Cogat as an assessment. I'm concerned because they don't get the test read to them like the younger grades. Instead they work on their own.

We can opt out of having her take the test. I'm just wondering what the benefits are to having her take the test. If anything I worry that she will be hard on herself if she doesn't do well (for reasons due to her learning differences).

Does she have an IEP or 504 Plan? If she gets accommodations for other tests--extended time, a reader, a scribe, etc.--then she should get those same accommodations for the CogAT.

Would they keep her out of something if she simply doesn't take it? In our district, the CogAT is one of the tests for entrance to the gifted program.

DeeDee

In our school district they give CoGat to all second graders ostensibly to help teachers understand the kids' relative strengths and weaknesses. It is paid for out of the gt budget so I strongly suspect that they are searching for kids that didn't opt for the voluntary testing.

If it is being used as a gifted screener, you may want to call your district's gt department and explain your concerns. I vaguely remember a presentation by our gt department where a "slow" (speed-wise) kid only answered half of the questions but got them all correct. This triggered the department to recommend the kid for further testing with a different assessment, Ravens? KBIT? that might give better info than the CoGat.

No, she doesn't have a 504 or IEP.

They also use it for entrance to the G&T program. They wouldn't keep her out of something if she didn't take it. The principal said it would be good practice for the standardized testing that will happen later in the year.

I don't think it is being used as a gifted screener at this point (but I'm sure if a kid qualifies they can apply for the program). The principal said it is to see how the kids are doing. My concern is that she will not comprehend correctly the questions due to her dyslexia and get answers wrong b/c of it so it wouldn't be an accurate depiction of her ability. She also can work slowly and probably won't do as well if it is timed. And lastly, I have heard on here about how some don't like the cogat and their kids just don't do as well on it.

mountainmom2011, I would use this as motivation to request a 504 plan of your dd - if she needs questions read to her, extended time, answering on the test booklet - all typical accommodations for kids with dyslexia, now is the time to make the request. The # of standardized tests kids take in school districts starts increasing at 3rd grade (in many places). Even it you're told a test isn't going to keep her out of the gifted program or other programs, it's still a standardized test which will go on her record. Our dysgraphic ds has ons particular standardized test from 5th grade in which he wasn't given his accommodations and his score was significantly from what his other scores have been in the past (and were in the future). So he has this one randomly low score out there, which is meaningless, but we it's still on his record and it still pops up from time to time when lists of test results are pulled.

Best wishes,

polarbear

@Polarbear

Unfortunately, they won't even give us a 504. Their reasoning is that she doesn't need it since they already are open to making accommodations in the classroom without one (it's a magnet school that is more liberal than a traditional school). Granted the accommodations she gets in the class don't include having test questions read to her. They said that maybe when she gets to 5th or 6th, before middle school, they may decide she could benefit from one that would carry over to middle school where teachers/schools are less flexible.

Regardless of how accommodating they are in the classroom she won't have accommodations for tests like this one, or standardized tests. And while she is capable of reading her accuracy is very poor and affects her comprehension of what she is reading and what is being asked and as a result she gets the answers wrong. This is clear even when we do math homework at night. She will read the questions/directions and she doesn't understand them and needs us to read them to her. She could also benefit from being in a quiet room without noises, even coughs and rattling of papers is hard on her ears but I'm not sure if this is an option even with a 504.

I'm starting to think I will opt out of this cogat test. This year I will have her take the state standardized testing and see how she does. If she doesn't do very well and stresses out about it I will refuse to have her take it until they put a 504 in place so that she can have a fair chance to demonstrate what she knows.

That doesn't sound like they're quoting district policy, just making something up to suit themselves. You should check out your county, district,etc.'s actual written policy on whether they can deny creating a formal 504 or other plan for a child with dyslexia! I really doubt they'd have a leg to stand on.
best of luck.

I would get a copy of your district's 504 manual. It should be on the district website. Here is the verbiage from our district's manual re eligibility criteria. It's based on federal law so the same should apply to your daughter.

Students eligible for Section 504 accommodation plans must meet three criteria. The three criteria are (1) A mental or physical impairment, (2) which substantially limits, (3) one or more major life activities. It is important to understand that all three criteria must be present for a student to be eligible for a Section 504 accommodation plan. Equally important, this disability must be why the student cannot equally access or receive benefit from the school’s programs and services.

You should be able to argue that your DD's dyslexia substantially limits her ability to read therefore she cannot equally access the school's programs.

We went to our school after we did private testing and asked for a 504 in second grade. We had a similar response that didn't want to give her one and that she didn't need any more than what they were doing. I walked them through the qualifying criteria and then pointed out that I wanted them to document the accommodations that her teacher already had in place (no extra work for the teacher). We also pointed out that according to our report from the psychologist that DD should be given more time on CSAP/TCAP (I think that you are in CO too?). Our school did not argue with us about that one because they want the kids to score as high as possible.

I agree with you. I'm also confident if I were to push the issue I could even get her an IEP. I have heard our district likes to drag their feet, and I've especially heard that our particular school is not very welcoming to children who have LDs that require services. Problem is I want to still keep a good rapport (somewhat) with the school b/c it's small and I do see benefits to their educational philosophy - outside of LDs. I also feel that even if she were to get an IEP they wouldn't be able to help her much so I don't think it's worth even rocking the boat. The learning specialist has no idea how to help dd with her reversals/transposings and seems to think it's an issue with not understanding place value. They fail to see the bigger picture beyond the reversals and how dyslexia is affecting her in a multifaceted way.

@knute

Yes, we are in CO.

Question, how do you determine "substantially limits"? Part of their argument for not even providing an IEP is because dd#2 is progressing and not far enough behind so they feel she is accessing the curriculum in the classroom.

I don't trust their judgement at this point for a variety of reasons. First, dd's teacher last year came into the initial meeting concerned about dd's math abilities. However, after their testing and their determination that she didn't qualify for an IEP/504 I didn't hear any further about the teacher's concerns.

Secondly, prior to this same meeting in February her teacher had her assessed at a DRA level of 21. Then while the school did their own testing (in addition to the testing done by Children's who diagnosed her with dyslexia), the teacher retested her DRA at 28 (keeping in mind this was dd's second year in 2nd grade). I personally didn't see such a big jump in improvement from dd. I don't know how DRA assessments work but I question the testing. While dd can read, her comprehension is poor (especially when reading orally), she is not very accurate (skips words and lines), and the more words there are on the page the worse she does. If it is a long book/story she can seem to infer meaning fairly well. But when it's short sentences/directions in math she struggles. We usually have to read the directions and story problems on her math homework because when she reads them 'it doesn't make sense'.

Also, the school doesn't seem to want to acknowledge the results from Children's and are relying solely on their results.

I went to a district seminar on the differences between qualifying for an IEP versus a 504 and how that fits with the state's RTI document. I will see if I can find the handouts. Not sure if I kept them.

My understand is that the state has rules that you must fall below a certain percentile (12th?) in reading achievement to qualify for a dyslexia related IEP. There is no such requirement for a 504. We were seeing a lot of the same reading glitches that you are. We used the discrepancy between DD's IQ and achievement scores to argue that her reading/writing ability was impaired by her dyslexia and dysgraphia. On my DD's IQ test everything was 97th to 99.9th percentile but her achievement tests in language arts were low average with some individual subtests below the 10th percentile. I think that DD's obvious dysgraphia may have made our case easier.

Can you find out who is your district's 504 compliance officer? It might be worth giving that person a call and explaining your circumstances and your school's reluctance to offer accommodations. I know that the compliance officer in our district encourages people to call when they are getting stone-walled by the school. She acknowledges that not everyone at the building-level understands their legal obligations.