Hello,
This is my first time posting and i wanted to ask about test results and grade skipping. My son has just skipped from grade 1 to grade 3. We are in Australia so he has only stared in his new class about 2 weeks ago and is in a trial phase (so we will assess at the end of term one). We based the grade skip on the school's WISC testing of our son and his achievement tests in class. During this decision i have been trying to look at the evidence for grade skipping and most of it uses terms like moderately, highly etc gifted. I could care less what level of giftedness my son has but i would like to know when i look at these studies which group he falls into. We were never 'allowed' to have the school results and only had graphs showing where he was on the bell curve. As a scientist i found this very difficult. I like to know numbers it is in my nature. What did come from the school testing was that he scored very high on the verbal comprehension (at least top 0.1%) and in the top percent or couple of percent for all the others. Based on this i guess i thought perhaps (but only really guessing) he was highly gifted and thus in most studies this makes him a candidate for acceleration. From what i have seen it is the highly gifted students that are often good candidates for grade acceleration. Is that correct?
To try and help us make a decision we decided to have him tested independently and the testers used the SB-5. We had preliminary results which supported our decision but now have the full results. I am trying to understand what they mean and for my purposes of understanding the best educational approaches for him, what group he might fit into.
This is where is gets very confusing. As suggested here, i have gone to the Hoagies site where they have a useful comparison table for the different tests and based on this he would be highly gifted but on the Gifted minds site he would be gifted. Can anyone give me any guidance on how i should think about this? The SB5 test seems to produce a lower number than many of the other tests so i am not sure whether it is useful for me to look at sites where they don't specify the test but will divide up into levels of giftedness based on IQ number.
I guess the results make me worry that perhaps it was unnecessary to accelerate him (perhaps i am also thinking this as he is still struggling a little to fit in socially). As i said i am scientist and i want to look at the evidence and this confusion makes it difficult.
I have posted the results below in case any one has some thoughts about them and what they might mean for what he needs educationally.
Thanks in advance for any thoughts,
E.
Percentile Rank
Fluid Reasoning 135 99th
Knowledge 143 99.8th
Quantitative Reasoning 125 95th
Visual-Spatial Processing 126 96th
Working Memory 123 94th
DOMAIN
Nonverbal IQ 132 98th
Verbal IQ 135 99th
Full Scale IQ 135 99th



Nonverbal Tests Scaled score (1-19) Verbal Tests Scaled score (1-19)
Fluid Reasoning (routing) 15 Fluid Reasoning 17*
Knowledge 19* Knowledge (routing) 16*
Quantitative Reasoning 14 Quantitative Reasoning 15
Visual-Spatial Processing 13 Visual-Spatial Processing 16*
Working Memory 14 Working Memory 14
NVFR (matrices ss15)
Verbal Knowledge (vocab ss 16).

Hi,
Thank you for responding.
What i have found frustrating is that in many cases they do not explicitly state their criteria they are using.
I hope that the one year skip suits him.
I will take a look at the Iowa acceleration scale.
Thank you.

hhbella - I really think that the hoagies chart is off in this regard and you should consider the Gifted minds chart as accurate. Like Gifted Minds, the DYS program also considers the SB5 and WISC to be equivalent (ie 145+/99.9%+ is required on either test).

With regard to his WISC scores - do you have percentiles? If you post the percentile ranks here for the FSIQ or the various indexes, chances are that someone will be able to convert them to numbers for you with reasonable accuracy. The Australian norms are slightly different to US norms but not dramatically. It's common practice in Australia, not just in schools, to only provide parents with percentiles and it drives me mad too.

With regard to the grade skip - my own DD is skipped, it was clearly the right choice for her, though we are now entering her second year it's already "not enough" and I am not sure school are aware that they need to step up and start extending... Anyway, the point is that I am definitely open to skipping. The only caution I would give you is that to my inexpert eyes your DS strongest area is Knowledge. Roughly speaking the Knowledge section tests what he has learned (and a score that high reflects what a gifted child in a rich environment can learn). His Fluid Reasoning is high and solidly gifted (optimally gifted you might even say), I would not hesitate to skip him if school is seeing what you are seeing (which it sounds like they are) - but it is possible that he stands out more now as a young child than he will a little later on. Or he may continue to stand out, he may always have knowledge as his strength, this can in part be related to personality - if he's gifted and has a personality driven to collect knowledge/information/data/ideas then he will likely always be strong in this area. Again, I'm NOT a psychologist or expert, take it with a grain of salt...

My own DDs weakest area was QR, which is also quite influenced by acquired knowledge/exposure to content. The tester felt her slightly lower score in QR could be accurate, and that she had a relative weakness in this area, or could easily reflect that at 5 she simply hadn't developed an interest in math or had much exposure (she hadn't had any really) and that her QR score might shift over time.

Hi Mum of Three,
I have been thinking about your response quite a bit- particularly the part about whether his very high knowledge was due to environment. Perhaps that is so in which case it really means that he is not the different to many other kids. I guess i have been thinking about this because i am still unsure about the grade-skip. We met with the school last week and they are adamant that he needs to be in the higher grade but they don't know the whole child like i do.
I need to keep working on the school for the WISC data. We have very little from them.
This has made me think about getting the IOwa Acceleration Scale (should have done it before but didn't). I will ask in general section but wondered whether you or anyone else knows whether you what is sold on ebay- as manual, is all you need or do you also need the forms . On the site that produces it it is substantially more expensive but is called a complete kit. I don;t want to only get part of what i need.
Thanks

Hi,
I am here again as i now have more information about the test results from the wisciv my son did with the school pysch.
I am again looking for some guidance about the scores- there is a big discrepancy between some of them. Which made me wonder about calculating the GAI- if it is appropriate and how to do it.
His results were:
Verbal comp:
similarities 19
vocabulary 19
comprehension 16
perceptual reasoning
block design 15
picture concepts 14
picture completion 14
(comment that he had trouble concentrating here due to returning after lunch)
working memory
digit span 11
letter-number sequence 15
Processing speed
coding 11
symbol search 12
The calculations are:
vci 99.9
pri 96
wmi 86
processing speed index 73
full scale score 99

If someone could help me with the GAI calculation i would appreciate it. Also if anyone had any comments about differences in the wisc versus sb5 (first post) i would appreciate them.
THanks,
hhbella.

Summing the Verbal Comp and Perceptual Reasoning scores gives a total of 97.

I believe that yields a GAI of 146 (99.9%)

Here's a link to the table:

http://tinyurl.com/cndkstz

Hhbella - if school recommend the skip and he's tested high MG to HG+, on two tests, different tests, different testers, then I really think its unlikely to be a mistake. You've got a clear verbal strength and no major weaknesses. Schools don't randomly offer skips!! Also skips can be undone... You're looking for least worst for right now....

BTW - here is the link to some of the stuff that MoT mentioned over at gifted minds:-

http://www.giftedminds.com.au/main/page_resources.html

A real trove of good stuff here - thanks MoT!

Not sure whether I should make new topic or continue this one but will see how it goes.
So we skipped my son (discussed above) and he had a terrible year last year. Nasty teacher that made him feel very unsafe. Didn't work very much and behavior was silly. Never had any behavior problems before. This year he is in a year 5 and year 6 composite where they have collected the highest achieving students from both years. He is much happier and has had no behavior issues at all. But .... he is very disengaged from school, does bare minimum in class and at home and teacher is unsure what is going on. We met with her at the teaching support meeting - that he is supposed to have as part of his year skip, and she said she sees no sign of him having high ability at all. She suggested we have him retested as she thinks that the original tests have way overestimated his potential ability. I don't think so but I am not sure how to try and get him to open up and try at school. I said that even if the tests overestimated by 20 points he should still be achieving better than he is. Also, if he was trying and not achieving then is would seem like lower ability rather than something else. The teacher had a conversation with him to try and encourage him and was going to try and find out more about how to encourage him.
I feel very worried that we stuffed up with the year skip but maybe this would have been then same in his original year too.
Do you think we should retest?
Does anyone have any suggestions to try and help him enjoy school more?
His dad said he was the same- couldn't see the point of anything until he was doing something real. This was his PhD at 22!!!! Teacher and I were not keen to wait that long.
He will have the same teacher this year and next. I think she is used to bright, driven children. Not the bright undriven ones.

Any thoughts, ideas appreciated.
Thanks.
HHBella

This recent thread may be of interest, as a few of the points posted are similar.

The similarity you mention between DH & DS, brings to mind Stephanie Tolan's Is it a cheetah? Just as a cheetah needs an antelope to provide motivation to run at a good pace, a gifted kid needs an academic/intellectual challenge worthy of his/her potential to avoid underachievement. A child without sufficient academic/intellectual challenge may be academically misplaced.

The you-tube video on Misdiagnosis and Dual Diagnoses of Gifted Children touches on myths about gifted kids, academic misplacement, and context of behavior issues, among other concepts.

You might also wish to have your child's vision tested... sometimes children underperform because they cannot see well.

The first item that stands out to me is the fairly sizable difference between his VCI (which probably should have had extended norms, with two subtests at SS 19) and his PSI, as well as, to a lesser extent, WMI. Although the gap could just be the GAI/CPI difference often found in GT individuals, it is also possible that it represents some kind of 2e. The relative weaknesses on his WISC-IV are often ones that affect or reflect weaknesses in automaticity, which often manifests in academics as, for example, delays in memorizing math facts, or attaining fluent handwriting/spelling/written expression. With year 5/6 demands, teachers are expecting complete fluency in basic skills, so that mental energy is freed up entirely for higher level problem solving and expression. If he happens to be still struggling with making these skills automatic, the pace and volume of school work will be much more challenging, not because he is conceptually unable to master it, but because he has to "waste" time and energy on nuts and bolts.

Retesting might be a good idea, but not for the reasons the teacher suggested. You may wish to spend some time observing him, especially his basic skills, and any avoidance or other clinically-significant behaviors (e.g., preferentially avoiding extended writing, while readily explaining knowledge orally; going to great lengths to avoid showing work on math problems; requiring a lot of time to complete tasks, but coming up with deep results). Formal assessment may be more informative if it includes in-depth achievement and process measures, in addition to updated cognitive assessment, such as in a learning disabilities or neuropsychological evaluation.

Year 4 is often the year that classroom emphases transition from basic skills development to fluency, preparatory to higher-level problem solving and application. It is possible that this also fed into his difficult year last year.

With two different IQ tests showing a highly gifted child I would rule out any concept of overestimation. I would consider that one grade skip may not have been enough. This happened to our DD in year 4. She lost interest and stopped reading. She was in no way challenged. It was only part of the problem in a difficult year but it is hard to come back from that. With a supportive teacher and a better environment it will but just make sure he is actually being challenged.

There are some good books on underachievement that may be useful to review to see if they fit your situation. I read them when we had the same issue. They are all available on Amazon Kindle.

Why Bright Kids get Poor Grades by Sylvia Rimm
The Underachieving Gifted Child by Del Siegle
When Gifted Kids Don't Have All the Answers by Galbraith and Delisle

We also checked for vision problems, general causes of fatigue, 2 E issues etc.

The things that worked for us were a full time gifted class initially and a second grade skip. We now have a very happy DD soon to start year 12.

We also redid the SB V and it came out even higher than when she was initially tested so by all means retest. It may help you advocate with the teacher if that helps her understand his needs. She might also benefit from looking at some of the above books, if you think she might be receptive, so she can see that gifted kids may not look gifted if the challenge level isn't there.

Sounds like your DH may have had similar issues at school!

My (2E) DS12 has similar difference between his GAI and PSI on (old) FSIQ testing. During the follow-up meeting, following assessment, the psychologist explained that the "silly" behavior could be essentially "reaching for the low-hanging fruit" in a desire to amuse (and therefore, fit in) with his classmates, socially.

He explained that the difference between his reasoning ability and speed could cause frustration. He is able to manage sophisticated concepts, cognitively, but not able to respond quickly to performance demands. I'm probably not explaining that very well, but maybe it is similar to what your DS experiences?

I remember DS telling me about that time, that he had an argument with a classmate that went like this:

Classmate: You're odd!
DS: I'm not odd, you're odd!

I wonder sometimes if the class-clowning behavior began as an attempt to appear less odd. If you make people laugh, they are more likely to overlook the "odd" behaviors, maybe.

edit: My DS' PSI was at 50th percentile (although psych said might be affected by anxiety)--yours is quite a bit higher. I don't know how much difference that makes. His other scores were similar to your son's profile (though not as high, if I recall)--fairly even gifted range. FWIW, there's never been any question about his ability to do high level work. I wouldn't question your DS' ability so much as looking for possible learning challenge or poor environmental fit.

Thank you everyone so much for your thoughts. I really appreciate them and they have given me a lot of food for thought.
Indigo: i think you are right that he really wants a real challenge. How you make things 'real' before they are is quite challenging. I teach at a university and i struggle to do if for my undergrads- so not sure how you do it for 10 year olds. I particularly felt he needed more interesting work before he was in the class he is in now. He now come home and is excited about some of the the things they are working on. But still he can't seem to do much with this excitement.
Aeh: some of your comments really ring true with some of his teachers comments. She commented that he is very engage during class discussions and comes up with some unusual ideas. However, when it come to writing it down he doesn't do much. I guess as a frustrated mum i have felt like he isn't 'trying' but maybe he is struggling because the basics are not there.

I am wondering what the best approach is the best approach from here to see if this is what is going on.
We have had his eye-sight tested. Just a normal eye test at the optometrist. Not sure if we should do anything else?
Who would do the sort of testing of in-depth achievement and process measures? Would it be the psych who did the iq testing? What sort of 2E issue could it be?
If we think from observation or testing are there resources or approaches to help him with increasing his automation?

NDW: thank you for the suggestions of the eye test and for the books. I will take a look at them. Thanks for telling me about your daughter-I am glad the double skip helped her to get interested.

Eco: did you find anything that helped your son to deal with the differences in his GAI and PSI?

Wanted to say again- thank you.
HHBella.

For a comprehensive evaluation, a good place to start would be the psychologist who did the cognitive testing. School psychologists, clinical psychologists, and neuropsychologists are all qualified to do this kind of evaluation; their facility with 2e evals is primarily dependent on their individual training and clinical skills, rather than their specific licensure. You could have such an evaluation done at no cost to you by your local public school, or done privately at out-of-pocket cost (depending on your insurance, you may be able to receive partial or full reimbursement by seeking prior authorization through your primary care physician). Some families have good experiences with this route, while others find that the goals and perspective of a private evaluator are more suited to their needs. (Full disclosure: I'm employed as a school psych. I've certainly seen the full range of quality in evals from both school-based and private psychs.)

It's best to start from a referral question that emphasizes his functional needs, rather than searching for (dis)confirmation of a diagnostic hypothesis. However, some exceptionalities that can affect written expression include dysgraphia, motor coordination delays, executive function deficits (e.g., attention, planning, organization), vision (acuity, tracking/convergence), expressive language delays (this can be very subtle, with inconsistent performance often depending on the topic or the nature of language expression demands), or anxiety.

Now this might seem like a really stupid- i was looking at these results again to include in a school application and i became a bit confused. There are 10 subtests reported for my DS. How do you get from these tests to the fullscale IQ- is it just adding them up? In this case his iq would be 146 but his percentile is just listed as 99 (very superior) rather than 99.9??? It may seem a strange thing to ask this long after the testing but i didn't add the numbers up at the time.
I have tried looking to see if you have to do something else to calculate the full scale iq but i can't see anything.
I would love to hear from anyone about how i do calculate this number.
Thanks in advance,
Elena.

The FSIQ is derived from the sum of the scaled scores for the 10 WISC-IV subtests, but is not equal to the sum. You take the sum and use norm tables to obtain the actual FSIQ.

Do you need an FSIQ? Most schools should be okay with the percentile.

Thanks Aeh.