Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Identification, Testing & Assessment New Here! Help me with these WJ-III Scores?

Our school system just got rid of "leveled math" until 6th grade...Ugh! But I know that 4th and 5th graders DO have math at the same time next year! SO Yay! 4th grade is at the middle school. They change classes and have lockers. So, as much as I hate the idea of sending my 9 year old to middle school, it may work in our favor!

Good luck next year! I don't think that very many teacher do well with differentiation. One of my daughter's teacher in second grade realized a need for harder work, so he gave her a package on Mexico. It was this tiny tiny printed out thing about drug cartells and the oil exchange rate. lol. I appreciate the effort, but my 7 year old didn't need to be reading about drugs and war. Lol.

Golly gee - I see a kid who really really wants harder work. Will someone else see it as 'causing trouble?'

Maybe - the question is 'is that a threat or a promise?'

I used to repeat over and over: 'If idle hands are the devil's playground, then what do you expect from my child's whole idle brain? The devil's amusement park?'

It didn't actually work as far as getting results, but I think it helped them be more understanding that 'yes' they had some power to alter the situation. So offen we got 'what a shame, but there's nothing we can do about it-that's just the way things are.' from the school.

Best Wishes,
Grinity

Thanx Grinty!

The mirror image was in cursive as well! I think it is kind of funny! lol..

lol..."Is that a threat or a promise?"

idle brain = divil's amusement park! love it!

I'd add the caveat to this quote of Dottie's that it depends on where you live and how your school district ids gifted. In our area, the majority of kids with a gifted id have any one score in the 95th percentile and none higher than that. For instance, if you get an SRI lexile (reading) score or a MAPS score for math, reading, or language arts, or a DORA reading score, or one score on any part of the ITBS (reading composite, science, social studies, math composite, etc.)... in the 95th, you are ided as gifted in that area. They, technically, need a score in another area (ability, etc.) in that same area in the 95th for the id, but that second score can often be a teacher rating scale, parent rating scale, or something else much less quantitative than qualitative. I've also known kids to be given the OLSAT and then the CogAT in quick succession and over and over to hit that 95th in one area for the second score.

Point being -- truly gifted kids (130+) do often look like Dottie mentions with spikes in the 99th+ and lower points that average out at 130. Both of my girls look like that with my oldest being more consistently high. However, b/c our community ids gifted so liberally and includes about 20% of the school populations, they don't have good company amongst GT ided age peers. My oldest has done well with a grade skip.

Cricket2 - So, you are saying that you agree that her scores indicate a gifted child? I'm wondering if you think that talking about her past teacher's comments is a waste of time to bring to the principal. I also want to make sure I bring my listening ears...I tend to want to present all my info and forget to listen to what they tell me. lol I'll bring a notebook too!

Absolutely! I was in no way mentioning the overidentification in my area to call into question your dd's scores. Her scores absolutely look like a gifted child. I am just meaning to point out that I wouldn't necessarily assume that optimally gifted (if that's where she turns out to be if you pursue IQ testing) indicates a child who will have good company in a grade level GT program. It totally depends on your community and how they fill those GT programs. Our community leans so much toward high achieving kids that it isn't easy even for MG kids to find peers in the GT classes. Sadly enough, I know of kids with 99th percentile WISC scores who aren't in the GT classes b/c they aren't consistent high achievers. I'd venture to guess that we have as many gifted kid without gifted ids as we have gifted kids with ids and I'd say with certainty that the large majority of the kids ided as gifted are high achievers, but not gifted.

Your dd's scores look like what I'd expect of a gifted kid. I'd put some time into figuring out what "gifted" means to your schools, though. If it is something significantly different than what gifted means in a psychometric sense, your dd may well need something significantly different than what they offer to the typical "gifted" kid and I wouldn't hesitate to push for more even if she isn't as far out there as some of the kids whose parents post here.

I want to wish you luck with your meeting. Some thoughts came to mind, reading thru this.

If you have her do Math over the summer, it would be wonderful to have a record of her progress to show to school. You might want to get her into a online course (some have scholarships) or Khan Academy(free). Sigapore Math there will offer a different kind of challenge than typical school Math.

I would also apply to Davidson with the examples you mentioned as portfolio. My quess is you will need their support.

It wouldn't hurt to bring them, but I don't know if I'd expect the principal to make major changes based upon the opinions of a teacher he doesn't know. Good luck!

Cricket2.

Oh, I see. Great! So, our school only Id's gifted kids..in 4th grade and only offers and accel..math class when the child is in 6th grade. Differentiation is how they "take care" of gifted children. They admit they are working on that. So I see my only option to be skipping in a subject. We are new to town and so I hesitate to do a full grade skip. She is tall, athletic, has been in a pre-profesional program in ballet for 2 years (by invitation) and super liked by her class-mates. I hope I can convince the school to let her do this. She wants to very badly!

Any chance you can get your hands on the Iowa Acceleration Scale manual, and fill out what information you have on the scoring sheet? It sounds like she would score as a strong candidate for at least subject acceleration, which is what you are asking for. (It might also indicate that she was a strong candidate for a whole grade skip, if your family is interested in pursuing that.) Having a nationally recognized instrument validating what you are saying might make the school a little more willing to go along, and possibly make them more willing to offer to go ahead and do ability testing "early".