aeh thank you for your response and insights. It's reassuring to know that most of the lowered scores might be explained by a simple motor delay. The wide spread in his subtest scores certainly made me wonder whether I should be acutely concerned.
The SP is not allowed to make any accommodations, as they would invalidate test scores (tests like this are the documentary basis of many accommodations).
My impression was that there might be subtest substitution in the case of pre-identified disabilities(?) I am not sure whether this applies only to tests for older children, e.g. the WISC-IV/V.
Your DS already has an IEP for motor skills, so it would not be surprising if the lower scores in the PSI were simply reflective of fine motor delays. Those same motor delays would affect the VSI tasks, as both of them are motor-involved, and include bonus points for speed (which, given his PSI, he probably didn't get many of, even if his designs were accurate). Curiously, he did better on the (mildly) motor-involved WMI task (Zoo Locations; involves placing a card, but isn't timed) than he did on the motor-free task (Picture Memory). The former is a visual-spatial memory task, and the latter a sequential memory task, for which either visual or verbal memory (though more visual, for most children) strategies can be used.
Interesting. I have no idea as to why he would do worse on a sequential memory task.
This answers your question about his mental processing speed vs the PSI: this is a fine-motor speed task, so a lower score may be due to mental processing speed, fine-motor speed, or something else (there is a long list of options, but since you've already documented fast mental processing speed and motor delays, it makes sense that the issue here is fine-motor speed).
Thanks.
And some of the FRI subtests aren't that high, either. I'd be quite interested to know if the evaluator probed for/commented on the rationale behind the responses he gave on Picture Concepts, as I've observed divergent thinkers scoring low on this one in particular, because they identified plausible, but non-standard, conceptual categories. Thereby receiving no credit for those items.
The evaluator did not comment on his answers to the Picture Concepts; my impression is that she does not often work with gifted children and would not have been likely to probe for divergent thinking. She did comment that in the Similarities (VC) subtest he had only one incorrect answer. I found it odd that he would perform so well in this subtest but not the Picture Concepts subtest.
I would agree that some of your numbers are odd (assuming these are US norms, and that he was assessed at age 5). The top score obtainable for a five-year-old on the WIAT-III ERS is 141 (and that's for a very young 5 yo). The max score for a mid-5 yo is 135, and for an old 5 yo, 130. A late 4 yo, OTOH, could max out at 145. That being said, the subtest scaled scores do not preclude the FRI and VSI being accurate numbers, as index scores are not straight averages.
The relatively low ceilings, BTW, are because the most difficult item on ERS requires matching two words to a picture. Any child who can read at all should be able to max out the subtest.
He was assessed a week before his fifth birthday. According to the school specialist at the debrief meeting, at the time he was reading at a 4th / 5th grade level. It sounds as though this subtest is not particularly illuminating due to its low ceiling.
It is not entirely clear how much of his math ability is not documented on the WPPSI, as his FRI and VSI (even with some likely score depression) are both plenty strong. His WIAT MPS score is very high, but also may reflect the extremely low expectations for PK and K level students. To score a 160, a 5 yo needs to be able to do simple arithmetic, and possibly some simple fractions, basic money, time, and calendar. Truly abstract mathematical thinking is so rare that it is not even assessed at this age. The kind of math skills he currently displays still have a strong language component to them (in the sense of the elementary vocabulary of math), which actually lines up fairly well with his exceptionally strong language reasoning.
He is phenomenally advanced in math, and while strongest in number theory (arithmetic) has a rapid and intuitive grasp of the abstract relationships underlying more advanced math. I have a math background and was in an undergrad cohort where every person who chose to sit the Putnam examination placed in the top 100. This child may be the most natural mathematical thinker I have met. It�s not clear if there's a moderation delay or my earlier comment will post, but the evaluator�s comment on his WIAT-III MPS was
�He was able to complete advanced problems including finding percentages, division and algebraic equations. He solved all the items on the Math Problem Solving test using mental math, including an item that required him to find the average of four numbers. He could order fractions in order, find perimeter, solve word problems, read graphs, find place value, measure objects and tell time. He solved a geometry problem that required him to rotate a triangle 90 degrees.�
At home he is self-taught and reads math books for fun, calculates in different number bases (e.g. binary, base 5, base 7, base 8) and hunts down ever-larger primes and squares. Methodically working his way up through squares both directly and by using binomials, he was calculating 125^2 at bedtime last night. Earlier he had told me that 121^2 = 11^4 = 14641, he noted that this mapped to the pattern in Pascal�s triangle and then generalized the relationship between the rows of Pascal�s triangle and the powers of 11. [Though I respond to him I avoid leading him: he made these connections completely on his own] At school he has been accelerated to 4th/5th grade math, the highest class available. While his language is certainly strong I would expect his mathematical/abstract reasoning to be at least as strong if not stronger.
To sum up: as to whether he has a disability being masked by his strengths, I believe he already has an identified disability, which generally appears to line up with the lower(ed) areas on this assessment. As to inconsistencies with his IRL academic presentation, I don't really see gross ones. And he is, of course, still very young, at an age when testing results can be easily affected by many small-child related factors. Generally, cognitive assessment numbers are not considered to be stable until around age 8 or 9.
Thanks for this reassurance. I�ve been most concerned that in addition to motor delays he has some kind of visual processing challenge. It�s possible that his twin - who is academically advanced but not jaw-droppingly so, and far less academically driven - may be phenomenally good at visual spatial problem solving so he appears to be lagging in comparison.
Thanks again for your very helpful insights and perspective.
