Welcome Irisheyes! It is wonderful to hear that your DD is in a good school situation. Is she in the gifted school that was the reason for your testing?

I don't really know a lot about the wppsi or testing under age 4. (We contacted our tester when our DS5 was 3 and she said that she didn't test kids until they were at least 4, and she used the SB-V.) There seem to be a couple of problems with testing earlier. One is that the kids may not cooperate very well. Another is that there are not many kids in the norming samples who tested very high, so the results might be skewed for early readers. (someone who knows something about testing please comment if i'm wrong!)

DYS also requires qualifying scores on an achievement test. Is the preschool your DD goes also part of an elementary school? Or do you have a kindergarten in mind for the fall? You might be able to get them to do achievement testing for you now. We went to the local public school this year and told them that we would be sending our DS there, and that his situation was a bit out of the ordinary. They ended up giving our DS achievement testing so they would know what he would need when he got to school in the fall, and they would be able to pick the best teacher ahead of time. (If you are lucky enough to get this, make sure you check to see if the school will use one of the tests accepted by DYS.)

If you get qualifying scores on achievement, you may be able to get by with using your WPPSI scores with a portfolio. I think I've heard of people with very close scores getting accepted with a portfolio. But since your DD's test was almost 2 years ago, i would guess they'd want a more recent qualifying IQ score. Maybe next year's school would do that too? I'm ever the optimist.

I'll see if I can track down a recent post comparing SB to WISC, and one discussing achievement tests. (All i know is that the SB does not have any timed components, which was good for my DS.)

I would love to hear more about your DD too. What are her interests?

Here's a link called "Best Tests"

Best Tests

Here's one on achievement testing:

http://giftedissues.davidsongifted....ch/true/Re_WIAT_or_WJ_III.html#Post37386

Oh - I should say - I have heard that probably age 6 or 7 is better for getting the best overall picture when testing. That said, we tested DS at age 4 on the SB-V because we were thinking of sending him to kindergarten a year early, and we needed the result. And then we go the WJ-III through the school when DS turned 5, so we have done things early here.

Last edited by st pauli girl; 03/09/09 12:10 PM.