My 5.5 year old took the WJ-III achievement test so we could apply for DYS. I just got back a summary of the scores from the psychologist. These are the subtest scores. Is there a quick way to calculate the Broad Reading/Math/Writing scores from these and see if any of them are higher than 145? She said she will get back to me in a couple of days with the information, but I'm really really curious


Letter-Word Identification 176
Reading Fluency 166
Calculation 160
Math Fluency 136
Spelling 145
Writing Fluency 123
Passage Comprehension 153
Applied Problems 127
Writing Samples 154

Thank you so much!

Off to look at the application now!

No, they *must* use the Normative Update software, which made some major changes, including some which may push the broad achievement clusters downwards. I've seen it happen, and went several rounds with the company and the test authors to figure out why it was happening. If it happens in this case, then the person writing the report needs to explain why that happened (have them contact me if they're not sure why it did) and make a thoughtful recommendation for how the scores should be interpreted.

I just heard from the tester, and the scores are:
Broad Reading: 172
Broad Math: 157
Broad Writing: 158

We're a little surprised because we always thought of N as a intuitively mathy kid who HATES to write.

A follow up question - can the age equivalents in the report be roughly interpreted as grade levels? For instance, if the Age Equivalent for Broad Reading is 10, would it be fair to say that DS is reading at a 4th/5th grade level? Our school doesnt know much about testing or gifted at the K level and I'm trying to translate the results for the teacher

Don't get crazy with the relative scores - the socres are only relative rareness in relation to other kids of his age - not relative to each other, SWIM?
So if you think he's an intuitively mathy kid who hates to write, he probably is - but it's that other kids his age probably hate to write even more!

I have no info about how the test relates to grade level - most achievement tests are terrible about this, but sometimes schools don't realize this and will use them. It's more logical to use whatever test they use for evaluating reading and see how far up your child goes until the child isn't not average - rather has a good bit of company at the top.

If you have a list of books that your child enjoys reading at home, you can google the book's title and 'Lexile' or whatever system your particular school uses to rate book levels, to see what grade level your child is reading at. Then one has to look at the actual children at the local school and see what grade-level books they are reading, as it could be much lower or much higher than 'grade-level' - and if that makes any sense at all, you have my sympathies!

((wink))
Grinity

She's sending the report directly to Davidson, and I'll let them sort it out between them Hopefully Broad Reading will still be above the 145 cut-off even with the new scoring.


This is really complicated! So if I understand it right, he did as well in this test as an average 10 year old would, but that does not mean he can read what is required of a 10 year old in 4th/5th grade?

In math, for instance, given the questions asked he did as well as a 7.5 year old would, but a 7.5 year old may know tons of things (or a 2nd grade curriculum may have many topics) that DS knows nothing about? I guess what I'm trying to figure out is how comprehensive is the test across basic grade level curriculum? If my son scores at 7.5 age equivalent in math, can I assume that he knows most of the things 6 year olds are taught in first grade?

Thank you! That clarifies things enormously.

DS is all over the place with his skills since he is largely self-taught, and that makes it hard to figure out the "right spot" for him. His teacher assessed him at 1st grade level (10 DRA) in reading because even though he can read anything, he can't (or won't) do an acceptable "retelling" of the 1st grade leveled reader. He absolutely can't (or won't) find any "personal connections" to the 1st grade leveled textbook. Its so frustrating!

Um... that's because 1st grade level text in DRA is boring and has no personal connection :-) What are they supposed to say? "I sat on a mat once too with my dog Spot!"

Been there done that... got them to bump my YS's DRA up to 44 and look, magically and suddenly there was all sorts of retelling and personal connections! Now, we are in a school that doesn't cut off the grade level on DRA. This is tricky because many say that a 1st grader cannot be allowed past 14 or 16 or whatever arbitrary level they stop at per grade.

That is the problem with 'school based' assesments - there is such an entrenched custom to 'only test up to x'or 'only test x levels in one sitting.'

Still, if you can get someone thinking outside the box, just a bit, you can figure out a place to start.
Flexibility all around is the name of the game!
Grinity