Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Identification, Testing & Assessment Puzzling results and disparity: KTEA-III and DAS-2

​Hi all, I need help understanding the test results from the school district evaluation report for my 5 year old preschooler (going to K this fall). ​

KTEA-III scores are ​all 99.9%​ile​+ scores in ​each of the 3 subsets​: Math Concepts & Applications (MCA) SS=148, Written Expression (WE) 160, and Reading (LWR) 150. However, the Differential Ability Scales-2 shows overall results in the 87​%​ile. ​ ​

Does anyone have experience with this? It would be easier to understand higher cognitive scores and lower achievement scores, but th​e reverse​ is puzzling. What should we do to get to the bottom of this scoring disparity? Does this mean we need to probe deeper to identify possible LD-related concerns, like processing speed, sensory issues, attention deficits, etc.? I think the adaptive part of DSA brought his scores down, but I have not had access to the full report yet. TIA

Welcome!

If you don't mind re-posting the cognitive results...something seems to have interfered with the legibility of those numbers. We can't (at least, I cant't!) read them.

I think I can decipher them, aeh. Tell me if I'm wrong, Chrisa.

Ooh, you are good, Elizabeth! Better pattern recognition/cyphering skills than I have, clearly. =)

I would suggest, Chrisa, that there may be some diversity among the cluster scores for the DAS-2. Were you provided with those numbers?

Another factor is that the norms for young children have a high degree of variability. Small differences in skill can constitute very large differences in standard scores. As expectations for the average child are rather low, a little bit of academic skill appears as a much larger normative difference. For example, most preschoolers are not even at the beginning stages of reading (age four is about when NT children start to be able to demonstrate pre-reading skills like segment syllables), so a preschooler that can read at all immediately jumps way up in the norms. Most preschoolers can count by rote, but cannot add and subtract, so a child who can do both (even if it's just single-digit, facts to ten) is also high in the norms.

A third factor is the unpredictable testability of preschoolers. It may be that the achievement tests were administered during a particularly accessible interval, while the cognitive instrument just didn't grab the interest of the child, or was during a specifically not-very-attentive 30-60 minutes.

IOW, the difference may or may not be meaningful, it may or may not reflect developmental qualities of the age that affect how comprehensively children display their skills on demand, and it may or may not suggest potential learning differences that require additional attention. There are still a lot of missing pieces needed to push all those uncertainties one way or the other.

On a side note, the DAS doesn't have an adaptive skill cluster. We can probably have a more informative discussion about this when you have access to the cluster and subtest scores from the DAS-II.

Elizabeth, I'm impressed with your decoding skills, thank you!

aeh, thank you for your reply, which makes a lot of sense. It looks like this DAS test did include an Adaptive subset, in which he scored low - 18th percentile. For all the other subsets and clusters of the test, his results are closer to the overall score.

I met with the evaluator today and was able to get more information. You guessed correctly: they told me he was at times inattentive and disinterested during the DAS. The professional opinion is that these tests become more accurate around 6-7 years of age.

Based on the KTEA alone he would qualify for DYS. His math, reading and writing abilities are at 3rd-4th grade level. Part of me wants to forget all this and give him more time to be a kid preschool; but then I see so much yearning to learn in him - whenever he has a spare minute, he grabs a book. And he's pretty much done with preK-2 books; now he gravitates to encyclopedias, biology, astronomy and foreign language learning books.

So the DAS-II really doesn't have an adaptive cluster or subtest that feeds into the overall composite, but it is often administered with the ABAS-3 (Adaptive Behavior Assessment System); you may actually be looking at results from a different test, just reported in combination with the DAS-II. Or it could be that the examiner is describing nonverbal reasoning as the ability to think adaptively and flexibly.

Another thought I had was that sometimes very high cognitive children who are age five are better able to show the full range of their skills when administered the school-age form of the DAS-II, rather than the standard early years form. (Five-year-olds can take either version, but the default is the preschool version.) We don't know which version was administered in this case.

Your educational placement decisions will be based on many aspects of his development and your family values. Also--and feel free not to respond to this question if you prefer--the depth of the school district evaluation suggests to me that he was receiving preschool support services for something (since this goes well beyond a typical kindergarten screening). If there are any delays in any area, including social or behavioral domains, those factors will need to be considered as well. Academics are not the only learning demands in school.

aeh, you're right on both counts: the Adaptive Behavior Domain was from the Developmental Assessment of Young Children � 2 (DAYC-2). And the test used was DAS- 2 Early Years.

Thank you so much for helping me understand all this!