Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Identification, Testing & Assessment Weird Scores

Hi,
I'm a new member and I'm scratching my head about my daughter's scores. In Spring 08 (Kindergarten)she had what appeared to be high scores across the board:

GRADE Stanine 9
DRA (on level is 3) 24
MST (on level 17/35) 34/35
SRI 216
MAP Reading 187 99%
MAP Math 183 98%

I asked about the Gifted program for this year (1st grade) and her teacher said her Fall 08 scores aren't high enough:

SRI 314
MAP Reading 195 81%
MAP Math 187 77%

I don't understand this discrepancy between spring and fall since I saw good progress in her reading and math over the summer. I'm hoping someone on this board may have some insight or at least help me form some good questions for the teacher so I can understand what's going on.

Thanks for the info and I'm still trying to sort it out. The teacher told me her reading MAP RIT needed to be 209 to be considered for the gifted program as a first grader. On this link the highest initial RIT block for 2nd graders is 200-209. She told me her math MAP RIT needed to be 211 and on this link the highest initial RIT block for 2nd graders is 190-199:

http://www.foridahoteachers.org/isat%20resources%20files/RIT%20Growth%20Norms.pdf

I downloaded the 2008 Normative Data. It only has means and medians but not standard deviations. That's why I was looking at the other information that had RIT blocks for grade.

Based on the 2008 Normative Data her RIT score puts her around 3rd grade middle of the year median and mean for reading. It puts her around 2nd grade middle of the year median and mean for math. This makes sense with the work we've seen her doing.

I'm going to ask to talk to the school MAP testing expert on Monday because I think the percentiles were for a different grade.

That's a good point Dottie that I hadn't considered. I think the 2002 NWEA RIT Block Growth Norms are still in use. I can only find updated Normative Data (2008). The Block Growth norms only start for 2nd grade and that ties into this part:

RIT point growth norms are available for grades 2 � 10 in Reading, Language Usage, Mathematics, General Science Topics and Science Concepts and Processes.
For kindergarten and 1st grade, RIT block growth norms, based on 10-point RIT blocks, provide a reference for measuring typical growth in the primary grades.

I'm wishing I'd paid closer attention in stats class. I found this link that had information about RIT standard deviation. It says:

"At each grade the standard deviation (for reading) is between 14 and 15. That means that if a student takes the test repeatedly on the same day, his/her scores will fall within 7-7.5 points on either side of the reported RIT score. That represents the RIT range....

The (Math) standard deviations (sd) varied from a high of 16.69 RIT points in 8 th grade to a low of 10.93 RIT points in second grade in the fall."

So using the 2008 1st grade Reading Mean of 160 and SD of 15, my daughter's score is over 2 SD above the mean for reading. Using 2008 1st grade Math Mean of 164 and SD of 10.93, her score is over 2 SD above the mean for math.

Does that make sense or am I messing up applying stats?
http://www.illinoisnwea.org/NWEA-06/MAP_101-handout.pdf

It's not you, it's them! That is absolutely not what a standard deviation means. In fact, if you think about it, it couldn't possibly be this. Suppose someone takes the test at 9am and gets a score of N. According to the above, if they take the test again at 10am, 11am, ... 11pm, all the subsequent scores will be between N - 7.5 and N + 7.5. That is, magically, the very first test managed to produce a score that was in the middle, not an outlier, among the set of all possible scores that that student could produce. How's that supposed to happen?

The standard deviation is about how much variation there is among the test scores of a group of subjects, in this case the ones the test was normed on. It has nothing to do with how much an individual's score may vary. (You *could* talk about that using SD, but I looked at the link - it isn't.)

That's what I cynically thought too, but of course it's a classic case of "reversion to the mean" which is not sinister but just what obviously happens with imperfect testing. If someone, by fluke, does better than they "should" do on the test, then chances are that won't happen again next time, so their next score will probably be closer to their "true" score and they will show less growth than most. Similarly, if someone does badly by "fluke", they'll probably show more growth than most. In order for that trend to show up, you don't have to posit that that's the ONLY reason for someone to test unusually high/low - just that sometimes that's the reason.

That said, it is all too plausible that there's a real effect (not just an artifact of test imperfections) there too.

The document does definitely say it's talking about SDs. The simplest interpretation would be that someone who didn't understand the document assumed other people wouldn't understand it and "helpfully" added the wrong explanation of what SD means.

My sympathies! I'm still hoping to avoid having to test at all, but we'll see.

Dottie, it is disturbing. If you look at the RIT Block Growth Norms, a 2nd grader starting with an initial RIT score between 150-159 has a mean growth of 21.4. A 2nd grader with an initial RIT score between 200-209 has a mean growth of 7.9.

ColinsMum thanks, now I feel better about the SD definition I'd learned in my stats class.

It's disturbing because we know gifted kids have the potential for great growth with the proper conditions. This data may indicate they're not experiencing that growth.