Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Identification, Testing & Assessment Need Help with WISC-IV

Hello All!
I am new to this forum and would like to ask for help... My son is 8.5 years old and he has always been a very good student. But since K he has issues to "behave" during the class as he would finish his class work first and then he would be talking to all the other kids and disturb the class. Seemed that the subjects were quite "easy" for him. He seems to have lost interest in school and the activities but he still goes very well in school. We got him tested using the WISC-IV and the results were:

Verbal Comprehension: 121 Percentile Rank: 92
Perceptual Reasoning: 117 Percentile Rank: 87
Working Memory: 104 Percentile Rank: 61
Processing Speed: 106 Percentile Rank: 66
Full Scale IQ: 118 Percentile Rank: 88

I just got the report and the psychologist is travelling... I just cannot wait for him to come back! Can anybody help me with this? I see that some of his scores are high, but others seem to be quite "average". With these scores, would he require or would it be advisable to have extra curriculum activities or special classes?

Please help! I see that he is not interested in school as he was before and I do not know if this could be the issue...

Appreciate any comment!

If you have the scaled scores (the #s that are btwn 1-19), you should also take a look at figuring a General Ability Index (GAI) rather than Full Scale IQ (FSIQ) b/c the variation btwn the indeces would indicate that the FSIQ isn't the best measure of his intellect. The report for figuring the GAI can be found here: http://www.ksde.org/Portals/0/Special%20Education%20Services/gifted/WISCIVTechReport4.pdf

He looks like someone who would be a strong student, and one who might do well with some advanced classes. The verbal comprehension index (VCI) usually correlates pretty well with scholastic achievement and that's his high one. The other thing to look for, if you have those scaled scores again, is whether there was a lot of scatter within the indeces themselves. For instance, his 92nd percentile VCI looks like a bright-mildly gifted child in the verbal realm. However, if the scores within the VCI were all over the place (some very low and some very high) rather than all clustering within a few points of one another, he might be more able than that.

FWIW, my one child with ADHD, inattentive type, had a similar profile but much more uneven (higher highs and lower lows). Low processing speed and working memory in comparison to the other two indeces can sometimes be common among kids with ADD and other learning disabilities. On the other hand, an IQ test alone should never be used to diagnose a LD. I have another child with much lower processing speed who does not have a LD as well.

Dear Cricket2
thanks a lot for your comments!
I think this is the information you mentioned:

Verbal Comprehension Subtests:
Similarities: 15 (scaled score) - 95 (percentile rank)
Vocabulary: 13 - 84
Comprehension: 13 - 84

Percentual Reasoning Subtests:
Block Design: 11 - 63
Picture Concepts: 12 - 75
Matrix Reasoning: 15 - 95

Working Memory Subtests:
Digit Span: 10 - 50
Letter-Number Sequencing: 12 - 75

Processing Speed Subtests:
Coding: 12 - 75
Symbol Search: 10 - 50

Really appreciate your help and comments!!

Sorry not to have replied sooner. I've been off the board and busy! Just for background, I'm not a psychologist. I am a parent of two HG kids, one of whom is twice-exceptional, have some education in psychological testing, and have had some people share their kids' scores with me b/c I am a GCC for my local Mensa group and they were seeking input from us as to local schools, qualification for Mensa, etc. (I've also seen my own kids' scores of course -- lol!)

At brief glance, I'd say that there is nothing wildly concerning in the scatter of his test. A normally developing child is expected to have scores that pretty much cluster between 8-12 (the 25th-75th percentiles). These are all considered within the realm of "average" on the WISC.

The Gifted Development Center has an article in which they look at all of the subtests and say which ones are the most heavily "g" loaded (i.e. -- which are the best indicators of high intelligence). You can find it here: http://www.gifteddevelopment.com/About_GDC/whoaregiftd.htm

Your ds does have some scores that are outside of that "typical" range and, not surprisingly if his processing speed really is a personal weaker area, he did more poorly on the one timed piece of the PRI, block design, than he did on the other pieces of that index.

You may have already pulled it with the link above, but I am getting a GAI of 122 (93rd percentile), which really should be used given the lower processing speed and working memory indeces. Do you know if your son's school offers any GT programming in which he can participate or would he need a 95th percentile score to qualify?

My general gut feeling is that he is a very bright-mildly gifted child who would probably do well in enrichment/accelerated/GT classes but who probably wouldn't need major acceleration like a grade skip. Unless there is something else going on that you haven't mentioned, I also don't see anything in there to indicate a worry about twice exceptionality (gifted + Learning Disability).