Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Identification, Testing & Assessment About to pick up Cogat Scores UPDATED :(

My school uses the OLsat as a screen. Of course DS didn't score high enough. Not sure how the Cogat works but with the Olsat the question is only read once and not repeated at all. No way my DS could score super well under conditions like that especially with his processing speed issues. If the child does not get a qualifying score on the OLSAT then the school does not test the child with the WISC IV for ATP. But one can get their child tested privately and use qualifying WISC scores to get into the ATP. The Olsat doesn't get a child in, it only gets the school to test the child with the WISC to see if the child qualifies. Perhaps, it works the same in your school with the Cogat being a screen? I would look into it if I were you!

The good news is they will accept private testing. For k-2nd grade they have to be in 99% so she wouldn't make it with the 88% quant. score. The SAS was 119. I can only imagine what the (very nice) principal thinks of my request for eval. for acceleration last year in light of these scores. I hate feeling like I am crazy! GAAAH! Thanks for the feedback.

Hey- atleast they will take outside testing! Get her tested. I bet your feeling about her is right and will show:)

You're not crazy--it's just a bad test. You know your kid best. Hopefully when you get a real test it will all get sorted out.

I'm so sorry to hear this and I totally understand your frustration! With my one ds, his scores in 1st grade were abysmal (much, much worse than your dd... under the 20th%-ile on the non-verbal portion of the OLSAT). We knew it was NOT representative of his abilities, but of course, I felt like an idiot because I had definitely pushed for some acceleration (and yes, I knew it wasn't about me, but I did take it very personally, no matter how ridiculous that was... sigh). Anyway, through some talks with him, we eventually came to the conclusion that being read the questions was the issue (he said it was hard to hear them and hard to focus; he had some sensitivities to noise when he was younger). He read extremely fluently in first grade and I think he would have done much better with written instructions. He often "spaced out" in his thinking and was off in his own little world. Thank God they did a whole-school testing early in 2nd and he was immediately identified as gifted (only those recommended by parents or teachers were tested in first). He has never scored poorly on a standardized test again - he even rocked the SATs in 6th grade (given through his gifted program). But, I've never forgotten that abysmal test because it helps me remember to trust my OWN judgement.
And BTW, he was fine with not being identified in first. In some ways, I think it made him more empathetic - when his best friend, who was identified in first grade (one of only two kids), didn't qualify to continue the gifted in middle school, he immediately talked about the tests just being one factor and often not getting it right.
I think my experience is not that unusual. My oldest (PG) was initially id'd as gifted, but barely. My second was not only not id'd in the first two tests, but we were told with a clucking sympathy that these tests (not real IQ, just the school ones)were very accurate and the numbers did NOT change. My youngest (thank God, I was tired by then) was id'd immediately, and I have to admit, it's a whole lot easier when the school tests match up with what you know is correct, but don't let this discourage you too much. You KNOW your daughter and you KNOW that this test did not accurately reflect her knowledge and her intelligence!

It was a while back, but we (or I should say mostly I - lol) were posting some data about how the CogAT and other group tests did or did not accurately portray intelligence as compared to individual IQ tests here: http://giftedissues.davidsongifted.org/BB/ubbthreads.php/topics/158312/1.html

There is a movement to shift from schools identifying an individual as "gifted", to schools identifying pupils who would both:
1) need and/or benefit from "advanced academics" in a particular year,
2) be beneficial to the school's program for "advanced academics".

Rather than imparting a "gifted" label, programs of "advanced academics" may serve a flexible pool of students throughout the elementary-middle-high school experience. A new book, Beyond Gifted Education, Designing and Implementing Advanced Academic Programs by Peters, Matthews, McBee, and McCoach explores this concept. (link) Interested readers who view this link will find a free PDF sample from the book. One point examined in that PDF sample is that gifted services at some schools may currently consist largely or entirely of identifying "gifted" pupils via various tests and assessments, in other words, providing a "gifted" label. Therefore, an identification-focused program may provide little actual benefit to the students, their families, or the schools.

For parents interested in the "advanced academics" approach, this book may be worth reading and raising awareness of among other parents, teachers, and administrators in your local school.

I tutored in a school last year (different district) and the district used the Naglieri Nonverbal ability Test (not sure if I'm spelling that correctly). Anyway, I had some spare time on my hands and the gifted teacher gave me the kids score sheets and asked me to figure out exactly how old they were at the time they took the test. She had asked each kid to report their date of birth on the top of the test. Then, she was going to figure out their score by taking their age and looking in the score booklet. The tests were completely hand-scored. She had done about 20 or 30 ages on the tests already. She had one kid off by 2 years, putting him 2 years older than he actually was! There were several other discrepancies like that. It is very easy to make a mistake if you are looking at dozens of tests, and you are trying to score them in your free time with lots of interruptions. It requires a certain amount of intelligence on the part of the scorer. Say you know the date of the test was 2-13-2013 and the kids' date of birth 5-09-2005 so how many years, months and days old were they when they took the test? The test scorer's skill (or intelligence? :)) in "coding" and "arithmetic" (among other things, probably) is important in terms of figuring out which answers are right and wrong, marking it correctly, and then adding up the score. These were NOT computer generated score reports. I went through all of them that had already been done to make sure they had been done correctly in terms of calculating age, and made several changes (after computing and re-computing). When I showed the errors to the g/t lady and said she should double-check all the tests she just laughed--didn't seem too concerned.
I wondered about DD's CogAT score report and whether it was correct because she had been grade accelerated, so was the youngest in the grade, yet her age and grade percentiles were practically the same. But, I didn't want to look like a nut by questioning it, esp. if it HAD been scored correctly.

Interested readers may wish to help spread the word: There are free online programs which quickly provide these calculations. One is linked here- http://www.timeanddate.com/date/duration.html

I told her there was probably something online (I didn't have access to a computer to check). Hopefully this year she will do it right.