Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Identification, Testing & Assessment which WISC subtests to use for math

Hi - I would love some advice as to which subtests on the WISC-IV relate to math ability. The local middle school that my 4th grade daugther feeds into next year uses a rubric for math placement. There are two standard placements as well as potential for full subject acceleration.

The scores/data that they use are:

End of year test (98%)
Teacher nomination (all I know is that the report card comments were very positive)
Test results (CogAT Quantitative (93%) and Nonverbal(71%) , WKCE(state test 96%) and Map Scores (median of three 243))

My daughter has high scores on all of the above with the exception of the CogAt taken in 3rd grade.


The middle school coordinator is willing to substitute appropriate subtests from individual ig and achievement tests into the rubric in place of the CogAT. We do have the following data (we tested her when we tested her DYS brother).

WISC-IV

VCI 128-
PRI 127
WMI 123
PSI 103
FSIQ 127
GAI 132

Her subtest scores were:
BD 11
Similarities 16
Digit Span 14
Picture Concepts 15
Coding 12
Vocabulary 15
Letter-Number Sequencing 14
Matrix Reasoning 17
Comprehension 13
Symbol Search 9

She had the WIAT done at the same time

Word Reading 117
Reading Comprehension 125
Pseudoword Decoding 112
Numerical Operations 112
Math Reasoning 140
Spelling 111

Composites 124 Reading/131 Math

My basic question is which subtests would be comparable to the quantitative and nonverbal cogat? Thank you for you advice.

The PRI index is closest to a nonverbal index in that it looks at abstract reasoning, pattern recognition, visual spatial abilities, etc. There is no true quantitative subtest on the WISC, though. The PRI includes the Block Design, Matrix Reasoning, and Picture Concepts scores you have above.

Thank you Cricket and Dottie. It feels quite odd, actually, advocating for my daughter. In reality her life is so much smoother than her DYS brother. And, she isn't all tied-up in intellectual things all the time. But, at the same time, I want to do a good job for her. She is a fall birthday so is already old for her grade, and I worry sometimes that she just cruises. She wants it both ways also. She doesn't want to be her "geeky" brother, but she still wants to be regarded as "smart". Thanks for the input.

I thought I read somewhere that the reasoning in the VCI actually did play somewhat into math also. So, Dottie, I don't think that you're crazy at all.