Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Identification, Testing & Assessment Private Testing

Hello! I'm a first time poster on this forum, but I have appreciated reading on this site for help in the past.

We (my wife and I) have a second grader (girl) who is in a highly gifted class and absolutely loves it. It has provided her a great educational fit where she feels challenged and comfortable. What a relief!

Our kindergartener (girl) has shown a higher level of achievement and congnitive ability than our second grader (at least from our untrained perspective). We are considering private testing for her in preparation for application to the highly gifted program, which we feel will be an excellent fit for her...even more than for our second grader. However, we are concerned about the group testing for her that the school district carries out, as her skills don't lend themselves well to a group administered test.

We are working on finding someone to do the testing but would appreciate some help in how to locate and select the right person to do it. We live in Boise, Idaho and would probably be willing to travel to Salt Lake, Portland, Reno, or somewhere else within a reasonable geography if need be. Any suggestions on specific people? Also, any suggestions on a good process to find the right person would be very much appreciated. Thank you for your help!

--ALSUMMIT

Welcom Alsummit -
I'm glad to hear that Boise has a good program for highly gifted kids. I agree that group screeners can be very poor at showing the skills of Highly gifted (and beyond) kids.

Here's a page to try
http://www.hoagiesgifted.org/psychologists.htm

As for Reno, I know they have excellent folks doing Psychoeducational Evaluations - but don't have a specific name -
Contact these folks for specifics:

Davidson Academy of Nevada - Reno, Nevadawww.davidsonacademy.unr.edu/Cached - Similar
The Davidson Academy of Nevada, free public school for profoundly gifted middle and high school students, web page. Located at the University of Nevada, ...
1164 North Virginia Street Reno, NV 89503
(775) 682-5800

Melanie Crawford - you can see her name to the right on the Davidson Twitter - does testing in Reno. She also has a website that you can take a look at to find out more information. She was my DS's tester and we are very happy with her. Susan Ayarbe also works in the same group and does child and adolescent testing too.

We used Steve Curtis on Bainbridge Island, WA. We found him through SENG.
www.lifespanps.com

Bainbridge Island is a short ferry ride from Seattle. My son enjoyed the testing and they got him to cooperate.

Thank you so much for your feedback Grinity, Deonne, and KJP!

Thanks Deonne...I've heard crawford give a talk on 2e kids and I was very impressed....she was kind and responsive to the parents in the audience as well as knowlegeble.