Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Identification, Testing & Assessment Cogat Question

Ianfan, very considerate. Unfortunately, you need only google CogAt and all that stuff pops right out at you. I was trying to dig up some info that portrays the CogAt negatively, but couldn't find any.

Thanks, I've seen some of it. I was looking for something that really rips it to shreds. I still think it's ridiculous how few questions can drop your score. Am I understanding this correctly? As the questions increase in difficulty, they are weighted differently? So a kid who misses one question early gets a lower score than one who misses one of the last ones?

I mean, what if the dork behind you wipes a booger on your shirt and you are so psyched out you mark the wrong anwer by accident?

You know what would be so totally awesome?!?!?!?

I would like Harcourt Assessment( who currently publishes the WISC, right?) to pay me to conduct a study on the CogAt, which is published by Houghlin Mifflin I think.


I'd take a group of kids and administer the CogAt. Then I'd call them back a year later and train them, I mean "prep" them with those shady prep tests you can buy on line.

Really, and not JUST to be antagonistic( which I greatly enjoy being at times) but I'd really like to see if those tests help kids score higher.

Hey Incogneato,

I think we could be friends :-) This issue has been driving my nuts for months!! I really do think there is a decent chance my dd won't get the score she needs, though her teachers say different and Dottie too. It all seems so unfair. There should really be a better way to get kids the kind of stimulation they need. Oh well in a perfect world maybe. I should go on one of the other boards and post but we are definitely doing CTY this year. I figure even if she doesn't make GT she definitely qualifies for those types of programs and I think she'll get a lot out of them. There are also many opportunities in our area so either way we'll be good.

OK deep breath. I'm over it.

Ah, 'Neato, I <3 you!

Ianfan, I think we are already friends!

Dottie is right. My daughter nailed that sucker. I still think it is a dumb dumb dumb test.

See my post above about asking her to SLOOOOOOOOW down while taking the test and take it seriously.

Here's another good test taking strategy for kids who *think too much*. Don't pick an answer until you read all the choices. If you think it could be either of two, start eliminating what the answer is NOT. Sometimes if they approach it backward it makes more sense.

Also tell her:

Don't be nervous, you are going to do great on it. Don't think of it as a test. Think of it as an "evaluation". The teachers want to see how much you know so they can make sure they start giving you work that is interesting and not too easy/boring. So make sure you try your best, but the teachers are going to see your score and know what we already know......you are a very bright little person!

She is going to do great. It just stinks that the schools sometimes rely so heavily on it and make it the "golden ticket" to these programs that some of these kids just NEED. It makes the parents crazy!

I see this happen all the time with STAR testing (for AR reading levels). Since each question is timed on the computer, a single classroom disruption, you miss the question to look/protect your space/clean up the mess and boom your reading level goes down two grades!

I feel the same way about my DD. She tests very well orally. Not so well on multiple choice tests. She will know the answer but fill in the wrong bubble due to her visual/motor issues. Or she will not be able to distinguish between two similar answers like 1578 and 1758. So she will mark the wrong one even though she calculated the right answer. If the question has any kind of figures or diagrams it's anybody's guess what answer she'll come up with

It seems like the school is not really in the business of identifying anybody's particular strengths.

Yeah, I feel the same way for my ds8; cogat could be a bomb.

Now if they had a test for wacky....whoooo-eee.

I could see him nailing the Naglieri; patterns are something he does really well at.

You may not need to worry: the CogAT has a big pattern section. It's the "nonverbal" part of the test.

DS7 is also a pattern guy, and he missed only one question on that part (Frankly, I was surprised that he missed any--I'm blaming that on the group testing...).

This is a timely discussion for me. I just received CogAT results with the ITBS scores for DS yesterday. He had taken the Iowa for the first time last year at his old school, but they must have elected to omit the CogAT assessment-or least omitted the results from the parents report so I hadn�t known of it before seeing the report yesterday.

The parent report this year is very condensed for both the ITBS and the CogAT. Last year the raw score information had been included for the ITBS only report so I could see how many were missed for each section.

On this report, I see that there are three sections for the CogAT; Verbal, Quantitative and Nonverbal. Does anyone here know how many questions are included per section and if they go above grade level at all?

Interestingly, his language achievement scores for the ITBS (Reading and Language totals) are almost identical to his CogAT Verbal (lowest), his Math Total IS identical to the CogAT Quantitative section and the overall composites are exactly the same.