Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Identification, Testing & Assessment GATES-MacGinitie

What is this test??? And why is my 7 year old DYS not testing in the gifted range according to his school????? Please help!!!!

Looks like it's a Reading level test.

1) Kids can have off-days. They can feel sick, or tired, or angry with the teacher, etc.

2) Just because a child's IQ is high, doesn't automatically mean their achievement testing will also be high.

Here's the website I found - http://www.riversidepublishing.com/products/gmrt/index.html

It looks like it's a very long test. Is it possible your child got tired and didn't finish? An hour is a long time to test a 7yr old, IMO.

Is this a nationally normed test?

Yes, it appears to be.

Age 7, guessing first grade? Then they probably gave the beginning reading test. Like many higly gifted, I'd guess your kid learned to read themselves and has far less need for the specific decoding skills of teacher-taught beginning readers.

Here are the sections in that test:
•Subtest 1, Initial Consonants and Consonant Clusters
•Subtest 2, Final Consonants and Consonant Clusters
•Subtest 3, Vowels
•Subtest 4, Basic Story Words

So, a self-taught whole word reader might tank on the first three subtests. Even the next level (Early Reader) has a decoding focus.

Thanks@
Zen - he is in 2nd grade. In a private school. They skipped him. Now they are saying he isn't "high"...we were trying to apply for a public GATE program and needed the teacher to verify giftedness and she wrote me saying sorry - she can't. His scores on this test were:
Vocab 80%
Comprehension 77%
Total 81%

the public program needs 85%.

His broad reading and broad math on Woodcock were 99.99%.

I am astounding and frustrated!!!

Just for review, these are WJ achievement scores:

BRIEF ACH : 158
TOTAL ACH: 142 99.7
BROAD READING: 136 99
BROAD MATH: 143 99.8
BROAD WRITTEN LANGUAGE: 150 >99.9
BRIEF READING: 161
BRIEF MATH: 142
MATH CALC SKILLS : 136 99
BRIEF WRITING: 155
WRITTEN EXPRESSION: 142
ACADEMIC SKILLS: 161 >99.9
ACADEMIC FLUENCY: 135 99
ACADEMIC APPS: 151 >99.9
Letter Word ID: 159 > 99.9
Reading Fluency: 134 99
Calculation: 137 99
Math Fluency : 116 85
Spelling: 156 >99.9
Writing Fluency: 144 99.8
Passage Comprehension: 139 99.5
Applied Problems: 133 99
Writing Samples : 146 > 99.9

Does your state have defined criteria for gifted identification? In my state there are the tests that each district uses, but there is a list of other tests that the district must accept where appropriate. This is not something that our district readily acknowledges, but will grudgingly relent when reminded.

Lukemac, I am not familiar with this particular test, but I am familiar with attempting to navigate the gnarly road of advocating for kids using test scores Try to gather all you can about both the actual test and the circumstances that may have been an issue that could have explained the scores your ds got relative to his other tests. Then look at your options for advocating for entry into the program.

A few thoughts on the tests and scores:

1) The WJ-III subtests might not test exactly the same set of skills. I don't have time to look back at the WJ-III subtests this morning and make the comparison, but that's something you can easily google.

2) What age was your ds when he took the WJ-III achievement tests? It might be possible that part of what you're seeing in the "drop" in percentile scores is somewhat due to other young children's reading ability improving between 5-7 years old relative to each other. Not all kids are fluent readers at age 5-6, not even all EG kids, so there are going to be gifted kids out there who move up in percentile on reading achievement tests, which means other kids are perhaps going to move down. Nothing about that says your ds lost reading skills, just that the overall relative skills of the control group he's being normed against have come up.

3) How were the answers recorded? Did he have to fill in a bubble sheet or did he answer in the test booklet? At 7, I'm guessing he had to answer in the test booklet, but if he had a bubble sheet, it's possible he might have made errors in transferring the answers.

Re what to do next to advocate for placement in the GATE program: his teacher has said no, and chances are she's not the first teacher in your district who's said no for an obviously gifted student. This is one test and one teacher vs the bulk of evidence of giftedness you have for your ds (test results, work examples, your personal anecdotes of his giftedness). Take what you have as evidence to the staff of the GATE program and discuss the difficulties you've had getting the teacher's recommendation. An appeal to a different gate-keeper may be all you need. If that seems to be going south, it never hurts to *then* get frustrated and bring up the "You're denying gifted services to a kid with an ___ IQ????" (btdt lol).

Good luck!

polarbear

I have no idea.... I never even knew he was taking it and I have not seen a report.
I wonder if it aged normed or grade normed... He is grade skipped... I am so confused and so frustrated because it leave me no options.... I can't make them say something they don't believe. BTW - he is in a Private "school for gifted" and grade skipped and they are saying that he wouldn't qualify for a grade appropriate GATE program at a public school.