Name your tester and the scores they gave (give)

[Anonymous]

Testing for school admissions is a business. People who are pleased with their kid's test results recommend their tester. People who aren't pleased don't. The testing centers know and understand this.

[Anonymous]

I don't see how elite schools have anything to gain from falsely inflated scores, so why would they recommend 'easy' testers to their applicants? If everyone gets 99.9 the test has lost whatever (little) value it once had.

[Anonymous]

Sounds like a pure 500 dollar per child annual racket. Perhaps it is time for 13 and 35 dollar PSAT and SAT costs!

[Anonymous]

Testers do vary. Our DD had a 20 point IQ leap in a year, if you believe the testers. Parents should know-- and schools do know-- that these tests mean little for kids under 7 or 8. They can help reveal the super geniuses and the kids with very serious deficits. For kids not in either of those categories-- e.g., 90% of all kids-- they mean zilch.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Testers do vary. Our DD had a 20 point IQ leap in a year, if you believe the testers. Parents should know-- and schools do know-- that these tests mean little for kids under 7 or 8. They can help reveal the super geniuses and the kids with very serious deficits. For kids not in either of those categories-- e.g., 90% of all kids-- they mean zilch.

I agree with the point that testers vary a lot. Like you, our DC had a big leap from one year to the other. However, the second round would have put our DC in "genius" camp and while that would be quite thrilling for us, we think that our child is just a "regular smart" kid. So I don't think it can even reveal super geniuses.

[Anonymous]

So is it down to the tester's personality, that some testers are better at engaging young kids and getting them to do their best? Because the test itself leaves little room for subjectivity. On our kids' tests the tester always put a note about how "rapport was easily established and maintained" which I guess they wouldnt do unless it contained some insight if some sort.

For the kids who did better the second time around, I wonder if it was familiarity and confidence from having done the test before? Or maybe your kids really are geniuses, we shouldn't dismiss that possibility!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Testers do vary. Our DD had a 20 point IQ leap in a year, if you believe the testers. Parents should know-- and schools do know-- that these tests mean little for kids under 7 or 8. They can help reveal the super geniuses and the kids with very serious deficits. For kids not in either of those categories-- e.g., 90% of all kids-- they mean zilch.

There are supposed to be at least 2 years between tests, for this very reason. Exposure to the material boosts the scores. You won't see many posters note that their kid's scores went down when they retested after one year.

[Anonymous]

The schools usually provide a list of recommended testers.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:... But the WPPSI is notoriously unreliable as a predictor of IQ. NurtureShock, anyone?

After reading that section of NurtureShock, I actually got interested enough in the subject to read all the scientific journal articles the book cited. Those articles do say that IQ test scores of young children vary pretty significantly over time. However, they actually don't say the tests themselves are unreliable. What they really say is that children's development is moving in fits and starts at those young ages, and the performance of young children can be affected dramatically by a wide variety of factors. A lot of research in the area suggests that if a child is properly tested multiple times over a span of several weeks -- and those results prove consistent -- then they can be treated as pretty highly reliable.

I know that deeper nuanced view is not what Bronson and his co-author pushed in NurtureShock. They focused instead on the unreliability angle. I suspect that was because it fit with their theme of trying to upend conventional thinking. The message that "Tests are sort of reliable, if done carefully!" isn't a recipe for selling books to parents at Barnes & Noble.

So I'm not really disagreeing with your primary point, PP, but rather just discouraging people from taking it too far.

Early WPPSI scores aren't stable and have limited predictive value. You can't test the kid multiple time over a span of several weeks, even if that improves the predictive value of the scores. WPPSI doesn't work that way. Later WISC scores have much more predictive value. It's not as simple as saying that tests are "reliable" or "unreliable." The bottom line is that parents should take early scores with a grain of salt and take later scores more seriously.. but not too seriously.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Just the name and the WPPSI scores.

Uh, no.

[Anonymous]

99th percentile

[Anonymous]

What dcummie ignorami keep harping prepping or exposure to test format does not increase score? Works for every test or challenge (mental or physical) conceived by womankind. The high SES know this but continue to lie (etch a sketch strategy). They simply want to keep this inside information to themselves. The election year is ample evidence of this blazon selfishness. They will lie about the truth to the masses and low SES to maintain the status quo.

[Anonymous]

Hmmm, our tester was not on some of the school lists but was on others and was recommended to us for shy kids. If indeed our tester is one of those whose scoring is doubted how will my DD's scores be viewed and evaluated?