My DD17 is scheduled for her "educational diagnostic evaluation" later this month and after reviewing the paperwork and surveys that were sent to us, I have questions.
I will call the center as soon as they open Jan 3rd, but I am not entirely sure what questions to ask! We want to know: 1)her IQ, 2) her strengths and weaknesses and recommendations to help her compensate for any weaknesses, and 3) if she had Aspergers, NVLD or some other underlying issue that is making things harder for her than they need to be.
They sent us the Behavior Rating Inventory of Executive Function(BREIF), Learning Disabilities Evaluation Scale (LDES) and Student Styles Questionnaire (SSQ) to complete and bring with us to the appointment.
The brochure lists tests that they administer but I do not know which ones they plan to administer for my DD:
Ability tests: WAIS-IV, WJ III, Beery VMI, Bender-Gestalt II, GES-II
Academic Acheivement: WIAT-III, WJ III, CTOPP, Nelson-Denny Reading Test, GORT-4, Assesment of literacy and language, OWLS
I was told they would determine whether there was a need for additional Aspergers testing at the appointment.
I am a little concerned after reading the professional backgrounds of the staff at the testing center as nothing mentions working with gifted students, they all seem to be more special ed based (or is gifted considered special ed?). Should I push for one test over the others? She would really like to join Mensa if she qualifies, will any/all of these tests be valid for Mensa?
Background:
DD tested into the GT program at every school that offered one beginning at 4.5 years. I have never been given any info on what tests were administered or how she scored on them. I did get 2 Stanford 9 achievement test results from ages 9 and 10, but I don't know if that test has any relevance for IQ. She taught herself to read at 2 and every reading placement test she has ever taken has put her in the 99th percentile. Also, she tested out of reading and math in 6th grade. That's all I know as far as testing.
She is chronically disorganized and has been since she was 2 (before that, she had her own room and was very adamant about her toys being neatly lined up in their places). Her 3rd grade teacher lost it once and dumped DDs desk in front of the whole class. In 5th grade I received a call from the principal stating they had done a locker search and upon opening my DDs locker an avalanche had occurred requiring 2 large trash bags to clean up. She resists any of my attempts to help her get organized.
She skipped a year of math at one school but after we moved she was made to repeat it at the new school for school convenience reasons. From about 6th grade on, she failed to do homework or to turn in the assignments she had done (at all or on-time), but continued to ace all tests. She continued to take all honors and pre-AP classes and make A's on all tests in them but still no homework production... when asked, she would just shrug her shoulders or say she forgot or there was a substitute so she couldn't turn it in or some other vague explanation. Punishments, rewards and threats had no impact on this. She continued to pass classes based on tests and participation grades alone - 100s for tests and Zeros for homework. Her honors classes at the new school were heavily watered down due to lack of actual gifted kids in the classes, huge volumes of homework largely determined class grades since most of the students couldn't pass the tests and would fail otherwise.
She has no test anxiety and enjoys taking tests, she never even cracked open any of the SAT study materials I bought for her and she did pretty well on the test (2110)
We discovered recently that she is severely vision impaired and probably has been for quite some time, she just got new glasses and her first pair of contacts which set her off on "OMG, I can read that! I can see that over there!" etc. In my defense, I trusted the school vision screening tests which did not catch the problem until 9th grade by which time she was almost legally blind in one eye
Clearly, I am the world's least intuitive mom. Either my DD has some problem/s she just isn't verbalizing, or she is just gifted, bored and manipulative. The vision thing leads me to believe that there may be other problems that she just can't or wont verbalize, hence the testing.
Sorry for the long post, I am really just trying to get advice on which tests would be best for her situation. I don't know how the center would know without an interview ahead of time which does not seem to be planned. I will ask them on the 3rd but I want to be prepared to know what to ask for if given a choice. Thanks for any help!
Nik
