Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Identification, Testing & Assessment Possible 2E Achievement Testing?

Dear Group,

We've known my son is slightly more than 3 standard deviations above normal on the WPPSI, but didn't know what this meant for schooling until recently--it is raising a lot of questions about the supports he needs and we have been offered consideration for acceleration.

We've also been feeling isolated--wanting to connect with others facing similar circumstances. I discovered the Davidson Young Scholars Program 2 weeks ago and am starting to hope that we might qualify and even be able to meet other DYSs in our same school district.

I think our application would be strengthened by an achievement test, mostly because my child's IQ test happened 7 wks before he turned 4. It is not recommended for him to take another one until at least next fall (wait of 2 years between).

Could anybody please explain to me the differences between the KTEA-II or KTEA-3, WIAT � III, and WJ-IV Ach?

Are any of these particularly recommended or not recommended for a 5 year-old who is still in pre-K (missed cut-off for kindergarten), or kids with probable ADHD?

I'm not completely sure we want to go the route of achievement testing, but if so, I'd like some advice from people who have greater experience than us.

(Cross-posted in 2E thread.)

Thanking you in advance!

What are you trying to get out of testing? <-- this is the question to drive your choices.

I would think reviewing your school district's policies would be first priority. Check for acceleration request deadlines - often in February for the next school year! Check if they will do *anything* for children under grade 2 - many districts won't. If your school/district is not accommodating or understanding, there may not be much point in further testing.

I got blown off by the elementary school when my son was 4K-1st. They wouldn't come close to meeting his needs and refused accelerations because his "normal, typical" behavior. They interpreted his ADHD symptoms as being childish, low maturity and therefore no need for academic intervention. IQ and WIAT III testing didn't help me. I pulled him out of school, he accelerated 3 grades immediately and after a school-year with ADHD medication he was up to 5 grade levels ahead of his age peers. There was no way that the district could physically accomodate that without putting him in the middle/high school building. Even if testing would have convinced them to meet his academic needs, it wasn't physically possible.

Welcome!

The wait interval is for subsequent administrations of the same specific IQ test. It does not preclude IQ testing using other test instruments. If you have a new test administrator, s/he should be made aware of any previous testing and test dates.

It looks like the cross-post may have been removed by moderators? You'll notice the board rules advise against cross-posting one's questions/dilemmas.

sanne asks a very good question and provides excellent advice - begin by knowing what your purpose for testing is.

For example, you mention possible qualification for DYS... you may want to discuss that as a potential goal of testing with your test administrator.

Because you mention a hope of meeting other DYS in your local public school district... Be aware that DYS has a Confidentiality Policy. Some families may wish to keep their child's DYS membership private. Therefore it is possible that you may not meet other DYS in your area... and if you do, you must respect their right to privacy by not making their membership in DYS known to others without their consent.

Holy smokes!!! Your child is so incredibly advanced! I usually describe my son as "different" rather than bright. He's not the kind of kid who answers all of the questions correctly. He's the type to ask questions about the given questions and come up with his own . I worry about his future in our public school, and am also hesitant to try acceleration.

I already turned down the offer from the school to assess our child for acceleration. Like your child, ours has been described as immature (throughout preschool, which he had a very hard time with), and we have wondered whether he could survive the longer kindergarten day (2 hours longer than pre-k; our picky son has never eaten a meal at school before and gets very tired). The first grade school day is 3 hours longer than his pre-k schedule.

He was in a play-based preschool for 3 years and never understood that school was a place where you were supposed to learn things like reading or math so in some ways he is not feeling frustrated by the curriculum yet. At first, I was concerned because of his radical under-performance. The teacher recommended an online reading and math program that is aligned with the common core standards to give us a better idea of where my child stood. I think she wanted us to learn how exaggerated my own perceptions were. Instead, my son breezed through the content and completed 75% of the second grade reading curriculum and 80% of the second grade math content in less than 2 months with occasional use.

Outside of school, my son has been incredibly driven to learn--learning letters, colors, numbers, shapes, memorizing long stories, reciting the alphabet forwards and backwards, spelling his name, exhibiting a freakishly large vocabulary and advanced expressive language as a toddler and teaching himself to read despite our concerted efforts to steer him into other interests. I raised concerns that he will be reading and doing math at a third grade level at minimum when he starts kindergarten. This is when we were offered acceleration by our school principal...

I was very compelled by the prospect of the networking and extracurricular enrichment opportunities offered by the Davidson Young Scholars Program. I am also very interested in the advice a family consultant could provide us. Most of what I've read about acceleration seems to suggest that it is bad for kids, especially for those who are having a lot of problems connecting with peers socially. The matter is even more confusing given my child's probable ADHD diagnosis.

Our main reason for achievement testing--now it may sound silly, but it would be to support our application for the Davidson Young Scholars Program given that his IQ test took place 7 weeks before he turned 4. The achievement testing costs about $600. I'm not sure if my child would test really low since he is self-taught and has many holes in his learning (like grammar, which he has asked questions about because of his online reading program, but has otherwise not been "taught"). He was oppositional and argumentative during his WPPSI, and so I worry that we might pay for testing and put my son through an ordeal only to have him under-perform or fight the test.

I am primarily unsure about which test would be best given his age and possible ADHD. Are some of these tests normed more for the younger end of kids? Will any of these tests be harder for kids with ADHD?

The achievement tests I am asking about are the ones recognized by the DYS program. We are not interested in acceleration at this time. My gut tells me to let my son play for another year and then maybe learn about the school routine in kindergarten. I am planning to put him into a dual English/Spanish immersion program so that he can experience learning the alphabet and reading with peers, although I have no strong conviction that the dual immersion program will be able to address his asynchronies, especially if he starts reading at a very advanced level in Spanish too.

Thank you for your insights. I'm so impressed with how some of these kids are navigating school. It is actually blowing my mind. Our preschool teacher for 2 years was a very strong proponent of staying with your school/age cohort. I trusted her. Preschool was a nightmare in many ways with a few bright spots. I wonder if I could have changed things by going with my gut and putting him with older kids before his spirit got crushed by his school-aged peers who rejected and teased him (when they finally got old enough to start talking--it seemed to take two years before his peers were talking enough for him to start talking to them, and then things got very sad in whole new ways).

If you have qualifying scores, there is no need to "bolster" your DYS application by getting a different test. Just apply before the "in the last two years" part of the requirement runs out.

I believe the OP's concern stems from the information on the DYS qualifications page which states "Accepted tests must:
Be administered when the applicant was at least 4 years old;" as it appears her child was younger than this... approximately 3 years, 10 months of age when he took the IQ test.

Assessing for acceleration is not necessarily accelerating. The assessments which they would provide may help you learn a lot about your child, as well as learning about the educational system. Reading about the Iowa Acceleration Scale (IAS) may shed some light on assessment for acceleration.

What is described as "immaturity" is not necessarily something a child may grow out of with time... if it is related to an underlying condition such as a learning disability, ADD/ADHD, ASD, etc. For those things, a child benefits the most the sooner there is a diagnosis and efforts can be made toward remediation and accommodation.

Actually the opposite is true. These resources may be of interest...
- Acceleration Institute
- roundup of discussion threads on acceleration

This may depend upon the reason(s) for the lack of connection with peers.
- Some children excel when placed among older peers who may have similar interests and knowledge base.
- Some children need direct teaching of social skills.

You may want to explore this, and have a formal diagnosis if it applies.

This is a perfectly wonderful reason to test... not silly at all. However it would not necessarily have to be an achievement test. For example: since he took the WPPSI previously, he could take a WISC now.

I think the problem is that he was not yet four years old at the time of the test. I gather he will be six towards the end of this year? Once he turns six, he can take the WISC-V, instead of the WPPSI-IV, which is what the publisher advises for high-cognitive children (they have overlapping age ranges, both including 6-0 to 7-5).

As far as achievement tests go, I would probably lean toward the KTEA-3, out of the options listed, if you want a sense of his real range, though I'm sure you could get scores sufficient for access to resources out of any of the KTEA-3, WIAT-III, or WJIV. The WIAT is a bit limited for kindergartners (no reading comprehension, for example), and I don't find the WJ as young-child-friendly (it's relatively long, for one). You should be able to derive core reading, math, and written language scores in six subtests on the KTEA, which I think strikes a nice balance between informative and brief (important for small, wiggly people). Also important because very high achieving students (particularly very young ones) often take much longer to complete testing, as they have to go through many more items to reach their challenge level.

Whoops, I think I posted at the same time as the OP's later post and so didn't see this.


As a rule of thumb, I think that achievement testing tends to be less expensive than IQ testing. (I could be wrong about this - it may be that IQ testing more often takes place in the context of a full neuropsych exam, which of course costs more than just a test. On the other hand, if ADHD is a real concern, a full neuropsych exam may be warranted anyway.) MVMom, you might want to approach this by first finding an appropriate tester, and then asking which test instruments s/he uses. Not everyone has a license to give every test, and it's a perfectly reasonable way of narrowing things down a bit. What were the circumstances of your child's first WPPSI? Why did you test him/her, and who did the test? You could just return to that person, if it's someone who had a good rapport with your child.

ETA: If you don't know this already, aeh is our "resident expert" on testing, and she is a good one to listen to in terms of what instrument to use and why.

LOL, no worries! It was also in the OP. Meanwhile, I distractedly did not do the math and realize that kiddo was not yet 6, could not take the WISC just yet. I was quite focused on getting the potential 2e identified. Good thing there are many of us to answer posts! Somehow together we get it all covered.

Agreed!