Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Parenting and Advocacy What tests should we look for?

My son (8) has had a disastrous experience at his current school. We will be moving him from a very small private montessori program to the local public school in the fall. I do not trust the school to evaluate him in a timely manner much less in a way that allows him to test to his potential. I have called around and the only private tests in our area that I can find are the Wenchler (sp) series. From what I have read, these tests are not good indicators for the degree of gifted? Also from my reading, I am looking at the Woodcock Johnson acheivement series to get a sense of what does he know and the SB-5 for learning potential. Does this seem reasonable? If not what other options do you suggest? We are also trying to find a competent person to do the evaluations with experience in 2x gifted in the Mid Atlantic region.
Thanks

Which test you use should depend on 1) what you want to use it for,2) what your child's strengths are (different tests test different things) and 3)what the organizations that will be seeing the scores accept and what their cut-offs are. So do some research.

One caution about the SB5 is that the newer tests produce lower scores. See Hoagies http://www.hoagiesgifted.org/highly_profoundly.htm
Unfortunately, since these tests are new, it seems to be not totally clear how the scores correlate with the scores on the older tests. Some folks are suggesting that the cut-off's for gifted and highly gifted be moved downward for children assessed on the new tests. Here's our experience: DS took the SB5 and got a FSIQ that fell in the profoundly gifted range according to the Hoagies table (and Deborah Ruf's book, Losing our Minds) but under the 145 cut-off for highly gifted which was used for the older tests. We have found that some organizations continue to use the older cut-offs and are not readily willing to accept lower scores on the new test. DS's scores answered the questions we needed answered for our own purposes, but it has been a little more difficult to advocate with them. This is not a problem with the test itself, just that people are not totally used to it yet.

Here are a couple articles I wish had been available when we were making our decision: http://www.gifteddevelopment.com/About_GDC/newiqtests.htm and http://www.davidsongifted.org/db/Articles_id_10405.aspx

I hope this is helpful.

Our experience with the WISC IV helped us tremendously in determining our son's multiexceptionalities. That would probably be the Weschler I think you were refering to, ELH.

Really the best thing, imo, is to use several different practitioners and test to evaluate the child's true potential and needs. By going to a neuropsychologist who specializes in working with gifted children, your child can be evaluated in several domains including intelligence, behavioral/emotional and some medical (ie ADHD and dyspraxia).

Also, by writing to your school district and requesting (actually demanding in a nice way, because legally your child has a right to evaluation) an evaluation for special education services, SHOULD (they sometimes balk) yield a full educational evaluation including an intelligence test. However, you should not actually tell them you want an intelligence test for determining iq because that they can refuse to do. They must perform special education evaluations, though, and if there is any chance your child is 2E (twice exceptional with both high intelligence and learning disability, like my sons) then this is one step in the right direction in finding out what your child's needs may be.

good luck and keep us posted.

Wow! I am so glad you are all out there sharing your wealth of information. This last set of links from acs has been an eye-opener. We recently got back WISC results with a 40-point span in composite scores, and a lot of seemingly contradictory information from the school�s testing.

We have been mired in frustration with testing for the gifted program for our DS7. I�ve mentioned in earlier posts that DS7 told us well into the testing process that he didn�t like to be tested and sometimes just didn�t do it. I just got the official letter stating that he is not qualified for the program. I understand why, but I think they should more impressed by the fact that he managed to answer all of the questions on a few of the exams wrong. (Not blank, but actually wrong, on purpose. I'm trying to maintain my sense of humor through all of this. )

The district only accepts their testing, but for our peace of mind we also had a private WISC done. There was a 40-point percentile span in the composite scores and even wider spans in some subtests, for example, digit span of 50th percentile and arithmetic of 98th percentile. The tester, who is not a 2E specialist, says that he not sure how to interpret results like this, and has recommended a few people for possible follow-ups because he thinks the extreme score range may indicate some difficulties.

With all of the reading I�ve been doing, this last set of links really seems to pull some of the problems into a more understandable package. We seem to have an extremely visual-spatial child, who does not process auditory information very well. The handwriting problems, the frustration, and the fact that the school doesn�t think he is gifted are all starting to make sense. We�re now trying to decide how to proceed. The district seems to see below grade level achievement as necessary for intervention, so I�m not sure where to go with them, but the article from Gifted Development gives me a place to start with the WISC information.

Jill, Glad to be of help. Now I feel like some of that time I "wasted" surfing the net has gone to some use!

Regarding discrepancies on the WISC IV, my son had a very similar "problem" with a digit span percentile of 37 and WM/VCI disrepancy of >40 pts. The psychologist said that this could be a form of ADD. But when we later did the SB5, he hit the ceiling of Working Memory (99.9 percentile)--go figure! When I asked DS what happened, he said that the WISC WM tasks were really boring but the SB5 ones were fun. So like your son, he can do well, but only if he is engaged. After your description of his temperment, I would not be too surprised to find that your son also checked out on the working memory tasks because they just didn't engage his brain. Of course, I don't know that, but I think it is worth considering...

Good Luck.

Jill-
With a 98th%ile on the arithmetic is a gifted score. The verbal and arithmetic scales, according to the GDC, are the 2 highest indicators of intelligence. That means that either of those scores are pretty accurate predictors of ability. The perceptual reasoning scale is a close 3rd. A score of 98th%ile would transpose to 2 standard deviations above the mean, or about 130.

If there are discrepancies in the scales, and they are not from the kid goofing around, then the scores indicate learning disabilities. Further testing is warranted.

I'm curious which scale was the 40points lower one? If it was processing speed, imu, that's common in gifted kids.

My son scored in the 99th%ile on the VCI (verbal) scale, but in the 6th%ile in PSI (Processing Speed)!!! Further testing has shown he's quite bright, as the VCI indicates, but has pretty severe learning disabilties. We wanted to be thorough in understanding his needs and as such had him get a neuropsych. eval, a SIPT (sensory integration and praxis test) a trial of ADHD medication (because tests implied he had ADHD), a physical therapy evaluation and so on.

As far as getting the district to consider him for the gifted program, that's going to take some broad based advocating. You need to get that policy changed at the district level for ALL kids, imo. Have you connected with any gifted associations in your state?

Oh and the tester sounds poorly educated. Our school psychologist was also poorly informed regarding 2E. Perhaps you can educate your evaluator by sending him a link to the hoagiesgifted 2E page.

Have you been to hoagies yet? www.hoagiesgifted.org

Jill, you will note that Willa Gayle and I had very different experiences with what the sub score discrepancies meant. In her child's case it was a sign of his learning disabilities whereas in my son's case it was an artifact caused by his being bored with the task. Both are real possiblities and it is obviously important to figure out which it is in your son's case.

You may find this helpful as you sort it out http://www.davidsongifted.org/db/Articles_id_10226.aspx
This article helped me realize that you need more than just a test score to get a diagnosis!

I've been to Hoagies and the Davidson Gifted Database. Thanks to acs and willagayle for more links. Now that we have our testing information back, and we've finished the school's process, we are trying to decide how to move on. Here's some background information to put things in perspective.

SCHOOL: We are in a suburban district with an extreme emphasis on test scores. (Thank you No Child Left Behind.) Entrance to the gifted program is only through in-district testing. I�m not as familiar with the districts special needs programs, but I do know from a friend with an older child with mild dyslexia that most of her special ed focuses maintaining grade level skills. This child is quite bright, but because she is making �appropriate grade level progress� with little intervention, the district provides very minimal dyslexia support.

DS7: The arithmetic score on the WISC places him in the gifted range, but the full scale IQ does not because of the large spread in composite scores. And yes - the low was in processing speed. (That�s why that link from acs was so interesting to me.) After a lot of reading/research/internet surfing on my part, I think that DS7 is a highly visual-spatial learner with weak auditory-sequential capabilities. (http://www.visualspatial.org/ has been a great resource.) He�s also very sensitive and emotional in a stereotypically gifted sense. Although we need to pursue more testing for LD, right now he is burnt out on testing and we need to wait for a couple months before putting him through anything like that. I've found some research on WISC subscore variation and the relation to LD. I'm going to set aside time to read the reports this weekend. Our tester was clear that he doesn't have much experience in this area and didn't feel comfortable interpreting the test results for 2E issues, so I need to talk to someone else when we are ready to pursue LD testing.

SCHOOL ISSUE 1: DS7 has terrible handwriting, but it is legible enough to be considered low-end passable for a child his age. He regularly doesn�t finish writing assignments on time, often because he spends time drawing what he wants to write first. He gets things wrong because his use of upper and lower case is inconsistent. On the other hand, there is no actual handwriting practice or instruction in the curriculum, and he�s often given unlined paper for writing. For example, he will get a spelling word wrong because you can�t tell if he intended an upper or lower case P in the middle of a word, but he�s writing his spelling test on a blank sheet of paper. He brings home assignments that he has to rewrite, because they weren�t neat enough, but the last time he had any actual handwriting writing instruction was the first half of first grade, and he is now finishing 2nd. The bottom line is that he gets lots of negative feedback about how he writes, but no help improving it. We�ve had lots of suggestions from the school about working on his fine motor skills, because the consensus there is that fine motor skills are the root of the problem. (Along with an implication that he should just try harder to write neatly.) All the little finger exercises haven�t changed his handwriting a bit. The pediatrician says that his fine motor skills are just fine and I tend to agree with the doctor because of his ability to work with small objects such as Legos. We are going to start an OT-based handwriting program in a couple weeks and we�ve been working on keyboarding at home.

SCHOOL ISSUE 2: This one is a combination of learning style, boredom, and his response to frustration. As I�ve been trying to discover how to help address DS7�s frustrations, I�ve stumbled into some techniques that point strongly to his visual spatial tendencies. DS7 has had trouble with spelling. The visual spatial web site recommended a technique that involves drawing the word on a flashcard and then manipulating the picture of the word mentally. It was a major breakthrough. Unfortunately, his graded spelling homework involves standard drill-based techniques like writing sentences and copying the words. We�ve used a similar technique for math facts. The school�s philosophy is that if you practice your math facts enough you will eventually learn them. DS7 has not learned his facts this way because he needs a mental picture or a pattern, so he hates the drills and thinks he is stupid because he is frustrated. At the same time he is bored and frustrated because they �keep doing the same stupid problems again and again.� (If he sees a pattern, he knows the fact immediately. If not, he needs to find a mental picture to explain the fact.) DS7 has trouble with rote memorization, but he simply sees fairly sophisticated math concepts. He was asking about square roots recently, so I had him graph x squared and square root of x. He looked at the two pictures and said, �They are just rotated! They are opposite of each other! Look at the line of symmetry!�

The bottom line is that it seems like his school environment functions in direct opposition to the way he learns best. There is an emphasis on repetition, and the school is very proud of the way that writing is integrated into all aspects of the curriculum. All of this is leading to a frustrated 7 year old who hates school with a passion and is beginning to assume that anything the school asks of him is arbitrary and pointless.

I�m not sure anymore that advocating for my child within the local school system will be enough. I would need change the NCLB test-centric instructional environment because that drives a lot of the drill-based approach and the fact that grade level achievement is the most central concern for each child. The concept of being on target for grade level creates a dilemma � does a child really have a learning disability if he is working above grade level? (That was a rhetorical question. I suspect that my kid has something that interferes with his ability to learn, but that doesn�t mean the district will see it that way.)

I�m leaning more and more towards home schooling (my husband is not) because I can change his learning environment in a way the school probably cannot. I�m not sure an LD diagnosis will address the basic assumptions that underlie the entire curriculum.

For the math facts, have you tried "touchpoints"? This is a system where you imagine dots on the numbers, for instance a 3 has three dots on it, one on each tip of the three (this is hard to explain without drawing a picture ) For the larger numbers, like 6, you would count some of the dots twice. A 6 has a dot at the top, a dot at the bottom and a dot where the curvy part meets the left-hand side. You count the dots twice to make 6. This means you can count up (or down for subtraction) using your pencil to point to the imaginary dots as you count. You can get the answer pretty quickly this way. Visual kids may even learn to "see" the dots and just see the answer.

Cathy