Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Identification, Testing & Assessment New to this and have score questions

I have a daughter in the 1st grade (7 years old)and her teacher suggested that she skip 2nd grade and go straight to 3rd. She also thought that it might be a good job to have an evaluation done, which we did. To give background my little girl loves school, she has friends and no behavioral issues and gets along well with others. Not sure what the results mean exactly but the psychologist that evaluated her did say that she was gifted. We are trying to decide if skipping a grade is a good idea? Any input is appreciated!
WISC-IV
VCI=149 PRI=136 WMI=116 and PSI=98 GAI=147 and FSIQ=133

Should I be concerned about the PSI score? It does say it is in the average range but seemed much lower than all of the rest.Also, her academic achievement was in the 120's (reading, writing and math).

Hopefully, someone will chime in with more details, but I believe that it could definitely mean that something's up. It's related to working memory and I think means that she just gets to the answers a bit more slowly.
The large difference is why they calculated a GAI and the GAI should be considered more indicative of her abilities.

psychland - pls see this articles - https://www.gifteddevelopment.com/PDF_files/WISC-IVIndices.pdf.
It gives a lot of color on what scores mean. Your daughter did well.

One thing that you may want to look at is the curriculum requirements for second grade. When I did this and compared them to first grade, there were few differences.

Another tool you can use is the IOWA acceleration scale. Ask your school if they have one.

130 is a gifted IQ score, 145 is often considered highly gifted. The psychologist should have explained to you that the GAI score is more indicative of your daughter's abilities than the FSIQ.

Can they bridge the gap now to make it easier for her by moving her into 2nd grade classes for part of the day so that when she goes to 3rd grade, she knows a lot more of the kids who would be classmates? Just a thought on that. They want us to do a grade skip for my 12 yo and she's taking at least one 8th grade class and one high school class a day, with the other two blocks being with age mates. We're hoping (fingers crossed) if opt for the skip that she'll have established some new friendships, which will make the transition easier.

Did the test adminstrator give you any feedback re why he/she thought the processing speed was lower? Sometimes test anxiety and/or perfectionism can lower scores on the processing speed. For other kids, it is a true road block where their brain is working much faster than they can output. If you have any concerns along these lines, you may want to cross post in the twice exceptional forum.

Information on her cognitive abilities is good to have, and here the results say she's definitely gifted, so she's a quick study.

But since the question before you is whether to skip 2nd grade, in your place I'd be more interested in things that tell me whether she's ready for 3rd grade, and the WISC-IV doesn't have any bearing on that. What are the skills an incoming 3rd-grader is expected to have mastered? Of those, which ones has she mastered, and which do she need to work on? What could be done to close any indicated gaps?

And then there are all the social issues to consider. I second the recommendation to get the Iowa scale. It'll help you look at the implications of a grade skip from all angles.

Yes, I'll add my agreement to the suggestion to use the Iowa Assessment Scale. That takes the whole child into consideration. Ability, achievement, personality, siblings, etc. So I would go to your school and ask if they're familiar with it and if they use it to make determinations.

An aside: my ds12 has a similar profile (the scores are different but the distribution is similar from greatest to least: VCI, PRI, WMI, PSI) and skipped 6th grade after the IAS and he's doing beautifully. Best decision for him.

My 8 year old also has a big gap with PSI being the lowest (in her case 94, I think). In her case, it's a problem because it is also reflected in her work in class. She is very slow with written work in class. The psych said that it is likely her ADHD but seemed mystified because her working memory index was in the 96th percentile. So obviously she is able to hold info in her mind and manipulate multiple pieces of info, which is something that usually those with ADHD have trouble with. Usually with ADHD, both processing speed and working memory are lower. So why high working memory and low processing speed in my DD's case? A different learning disability? He is going to do more testing to try to figure it out.

DD has a similar GAI (a little higher and her verbal and PRI scores are reversed from yours, with PRI being higher), and she did do a grade skip, in her case she went from second quarter of kindergarten to second quarter of first grade. It wasn't a problem and she's doing well in the next grade up, but a grade skip easier to do when kids are younger than older. You will want to look at achievement testing and what she knows, and make sure she wouldn't miss anything major by skipping a grade.

Honestly, she does not seem to work slowly but is very much a perfectionist. This seems to not only impact school work but also piano, art, dance etc.. That being said, she told me that she got in trouble the week before her testing for careless errors on a speed drill because she worked too quickly. I did emphasize that she should do her best on the testing so I wonder if she just sacrificed speed for accuracy. Also, speed has not been an issue that her teacher has noticed; the perfectionism is a different story;)! All of this is just a little new to me, I have never really thought of her as gifted but when I reflect on milestones some of them she did meet very early. Although, I am more concerned that she seems to be a different person at school. She won't discuss any of the things that she does very well at home with her friends. For instance, she knows more about animals than anyone I know but even when they were discussing animals in science she would not contribute information, so I think she may act differently to get along with peers.