Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Identification, Testing & Assessment WJ-III results; where do I start?

Our 5 year old son's situation is complicated due to a medical problem that requires a lot of accomodations from his school. During this year's review, his child psychologist recommended they do the WJ-III Achievement to make sure his academics needs are being met. This has been a huge concern because he comes home at least a couple of times a week crying because he is bored.

Based on the results, the district is going to involve the school's gifted teacher in differentiated learning for him. We cannot discuss acceleration until he turns 6; they said that is state law. These test results are meaningless to me. Our only experience with testing was 1 1/2 years ago when he had a very small amount of testing done.

I would appreciate any advise and any guidance on where to start. It is very overwhelming to advocate for his academic needs when we are already so overwhelmed with his medical needs. Thank you!

WJ III Achievement:
Standard Scores Total- 148
Broad Reading- 151
Broad Math- 134
Broad Written Language- 135
Then, there are many other scores for each individual test.

I believe that his Broad Reading and Total scores qualify for DYS. If you can get together info for a portfolio or manage to get IQ testing done, I would consider applying to see if they could help you out with advocacy.

I'm really, really skeptical about state law being such that you they cannot consider any acceleration for him before age six. I'd ask the GT coordinator about that specifically and ask for a copy of the state law. Subject acceleration seems like a reasonable accommodation to seek at least.

These scores are very strong. Here is his percentile rank (how he did against same age peers)

Broad Reading >99
Broad Math 99
Broad Written Language 99

Basically, given 100 same aged peers he would do better than 99 of them in math and written language. He does better than more than 99 of them in reading. It would also be interesting to see how he fares on the WJ cognitive - more of an IQ measure. I suspect you will see high scores there, too.

I agree with Cricket - I'd ask for the state law or district policy that says no acceleration before age 6.

I know that Florida has it in state statute that you can't enter K until age 5, and that you can't enter 1st until age 6, but subject acceleration without a grade skip is legal. They might be confused about the implications of the law.

Thank you for your replies. I checked the law, and they are correct. I guess I'll start preparing for his birthday and see what we need to do to apply to the young scholars program.

Ah, it didn't occur to me to go back and look at prior posts!

What exactly does the state law say regarding acceleration? Does it rule out subject acceleration as well? That would be really unfortunate if so. I really believe that it is not uncommon for kindergarteners who are reading as well as your ds to be allowed to at least go to 1st grade for language arts.

Very good information and questions! Thank you so much! The reason I hadn't commented on his previous scores were because of when they were done. He was very ill at the time and the testing was stopped due to him getting on the floor and trying to go to sleep. He is in remission right now, so it was a much better time to do testing. I hope that when he turns 6 in April he will still be feeling well enough to go through the IQ testing. If not, we will put it off. Although it is a catch 22 because the more challenged he is, the more his mind is off his pain.

His school will not consider subject acceleration until he turns 6. They have started "allowing" him to go to the 2nd grade classroom to pick his books for reading, but he is getting no guidance with this. Also, they have been sending home the 2nd grade homework notebook with him. He loves this, but most of it is still so easy for him. He laughs about it and asks why he has to do such simple work. It is hard to encourage him to be positive about it when I know the school has no plan for him. It is also frustrating because here I am working with him at home, yet he sits at school doing the K level work.

I will post the rest of the scores that I have, but I only have scores that she typed on the Eligibility for Special Education form. The special ed teacher said she will send the full report home tomorrow. If anyone can make sense of all of this, I would appreciate it.

Thank you for all the help!

Broad Reading 151
Broad Math 134
Broad Written Language 135
Basic Reading Skills 155
Math Calculation Skills 129
Written Expression 140
Academic Skills 143
Academic Fluency 123
Academic Apps 150
Oral Language 128
Oral Expression 126
Listening Comprehension 127
Letter Word Identification 150
Reading Fluency 138
Story Recall 127
Understanding Directions 126
Calculation 128
Math Fluency 108
Spelling 124
Writing Fluency 101
Passage Comprehension 147
Applied Problems 128
Writing Samples 151
Story Recall Delayed 136
Word Attack 148
Picture Vocabulary 121
Oral Comprehension 123

Cricket, the state law does rule out acceleration of any kind before the age of 6.

Dottie, the school system uses the Iowa scale for acceleration. They told us yesterday that based on his scores that we could consider it. However, they strongly encouraged us not to because of the social aspect. I think this is going to be an uphill battle.

Wow, Dottie. You are quick! We have not found kids at similar levels here locally. I'm sure there are some but none that we know of at this time. I would love for him to have friends who are at a similar level as him, but I don't know how else to find them.

Also, while we are in one of the top school systems in the state, they don't seem to have much experience with young gifted kids. They do have gifted services, pull out starting in 3rd grade. They say that they've never done anything for any child younger, but we plan to hold them to the law. And so far, they have been willing to work through the process. We would pursue another school environment for him, but we are stuck by his medical needs. He requires a full time nurse to be in the building at all times, and the state requires that nurse to be an RN. We just won't find this type of accomodation in a private school.

I appreciate your time very much!

Given the constraints you are working under, would the school be willing to do an IQ test, such as a WISC IV, now while he is feeling well. At the very least it will eat up some of that Kindy class time. I would strongly encourage you to push the school to decide about the skip now, so that everything is in place by April, so that he can move up as soon as is legally possible. If a school was trying to hurry things along, they would have to work hard to be ready by April.

Some may say, why bother to move in April, when the end of the year is so close to over? I would say the 8 weeks of a child's life is a long time. Also, if he starts 1st grade in April, then you will have the whole summer to plan the additional accomidation - more full skips or subject accelerations. Every step brings you closer to getting him what he needs.

It's ok that the school 'recommends against' for social reasons, as long as they are willing to do it if you insist. It's tricky to 'insist' when no parent feels 'sure' on the inside, but the actual research says that the social issues isn't the norm.

I'm sorry to hear that your son has such severe medical problems. I'm sending strenght and prayers to you.
Grinity