Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Identification, Testing & Assessment To appeal or Not to appeal?

We received a letter with results of GT testing today. Our school district does not disclose any of the testing tools utilized for placement. All it gives you is the score and a GT standard of 130 on the mystery "measure" and then scores for parent/teacher inventories. He is in kindergarten. We had him privately tested at 5 yrs (1 yr ago) as we had a few problems with his preschool. After starting at his new school, we noticed an immediate change in his verbal skills and reading proficiency. At start of kinder, his DRA was an 18. He has started accelerated reader testing a yr early than age peers and consistently gets 100% on books up to 3rd grade level. These are his test scores from 1 yr ago before switching him preschools.

These were his scores:
WPPSI-III Standard Score/Percentile
Verbal (VIQ) 118 Standard Score/88 Percentile
Information 14/91
Vocabulary 13/84
Word Reasoning 13/84
Comprehension 9/37

Performance (PIQ)123/94
Block Design 15/95
Matrix Reasoning 17/99
Picture Concepts 9/37

Processing Speed (PSQ) 119/90
Symbol Search 13/84
Coding 14/91

Full Scale IQ (FSIQ) 125/95th percentile

WJ-III NU
St Score Percentile
Academic Skills 134/99
Academic Fluency 115/83
Letter Word Id 139/99.5
Reading Fluency 121/92
Math Fluency 112/79
Spelling 124/94
Writing Fluency 109/72
Math Calc Skills 119/90

He is our only child so I know very little about these scores and GT placement. Is it reasonable that I am surprised he did not place? I would love advice on whether we should try to appeal this. If so, what is the process like? I have read a few threads about portfolios. What are those exactly? Any and all help would be greatly appreciated.

Given he would not have been admitted with the private testing you already had done yourselves, I guess it is not too surprising? Is there a particular reason you thought your private testing was an under estimate of his IQ and that the school test would return a higher result?

It sounds like your school has a high cutoff for gifted placement. In our district this would have been more than enough for him to be identified as gifted (I think our cutoff is as low as 89% with three other indicators.)

Whether he made it into the program or not, he's still scoring within the top 5% which is a great range. He's obviously flourishing. If your district is anything like mine, the school will do another testing in 3rd and another in 7th. Your ds was tested quite young. If you see a disparity between these scores and what you're seeing in him down the road, you can always retest him.

That said, if you suspect their testing is inadequate, and a group ability test such as the Co-Gat often is as it underestimates many gifted kids, you may want to dig deeper.

We tested because we had major issues with his preschool and it was a difficult time for him switching from the only school he had ever known to a different place. I suppose I am most torn over the fact that what his score on whatever measure they use, which they do not disclose to parents, is so different from what his individually tested results are. It is as much as a 20 pt gap which is so far from SEM. I just don't know how valid these results are considering this gap. All testing done at school is a big mystery. They don't disclose which days they are testing, the time/location or who is administering the test. I imagine it's in a group setting and I suppose he does not do as well with that.

If the criteria is 130 it is not surprising really. And the scores from the two tests agree. Like the pp I think you will have to wait for the next test. Maybe do a little gentle work on his weakest areas. Was any explanation offered for the two much lower scores on the original test (reading comprehension and picture concepts)?

if it has been a year find a tester that will do the WPPSI-IV (now to age 7.5 with extended norms, a very different test that the WPPSI-III) or WISC-IV. I recommend the new WPPSI, as it deals with issues like young kids not having fine motor issues such that the child is not tested on how well they can write, but how well they can answer the questions. For most 6 year old boys, even and perhaps especially gifted ones, fine motor shouldn't be a relevant portion of the testing. If he gets similar scores, it looks like he may below the cut-off for most gifted programs. My kids public school has >135 for gifted. I would retest with the proper instrument, and make sure your child is relaxed and has a nice day the day of testing.

I don't remember a specific explanation other than the psychologist saying they were relative weaknesses considering they do in fact fall on the average range as opposed to all others that are high average-superior range. I do see how back when we tested comprehension was a weakness; however, he takes reading comprehension tests through accelerated reader in grade 2-3 books and gets all 100%s. Also, he has started using glasses since then for astigmatism.

Does anyone know what group administered tests are frequently used for GT qualification? Are they a test of cognitive abilities or educational achievement tests (like WJ)? The results we got specifically broke it down into "verbal language/social studies" and "quantitative math/science score" and "non-verbal ability score" out of a 130 scale. I am mostly concerned with issues of validity of whatever private testing I present now or at a later time (using the same test twice).