Teacher recommended WISC

[Anonymous]

My DC's teacher recommended taking the WISC. How do we go about finding a place to do this? Ask the school? Pediatrician? We live in NoVA. Thanks!

[Anonymous]

A lot of people have used George Mason University - http://cap.gmu.edu/. I like Family First Psychological Services - http://www.familyfirstva.com/

[Anonymous]

George Mason does a great job. I have talked to parents who liked the fact that George Mason is an academic institution, so is up on the latest research. Graduate level students who are supervised by full professors administer the tests and then discuss the results with the parents.

[Anonymous]

We had a poor experience with George Mason. The student was nice, but missed the ball with our kid. DC had scores that were over 50% different, and she didn't even mention any potential issues with the results. Also, DC's processing speed was very low, <20%, verse other sections were DC scored in the 90%. The tester never indicated that we might want to get our child tested for learning disabilities. We ended up having DC evaluated for ADHD due to behavior issues at school. We gave a copy of the WISC results to the psychologist, who noted that GMU did a really poor job in writing up the results. The psychologist noticed the inconsistencies right away and helped us understand the results. GMU essentially wrote up that everything was good.

[Anonymous]

I went to Mindwell Psychology in Chantilly.

[Anonymous]

I say BS to this whole thread. Every once and awile the WISC touts come out and invite advertisements for specific places to go for a WISC because the CogAt and GBRS get it so terribly wrong.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I say BS to this whole thread. Every once and awile the WISC touts come out and invite advertisements for specific places to go for a WISC because the CogAt and GBRS get it so terribly wrong.

But that's not what the OP asked. If you dislike the topic and have nothing meaningful to contribute to it, why even read the thread?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I say BS to this whole thread. Every once and awile the WISC touts come out and invite advertisements for specific places to go for a WISC because the CogAt and GBRS get it so terribly wrong.

But that's not what the OP asked. If you dislike the topic and have nothing meaningful to contribute to it, why even read the thread?

Perhaps I wasn't clear enough. I very much doubt any teacher recommended a WISC. I'm calling BS because of the long history here of WISC touts who inevitably invite the mention of certain named testers who profit from administering the test.

[Anonymous]

We had a very successful experience with George Mason. I liked the fact that since it is a public university, they weren't going to try to up-sell us on more testing. My sense was that the testing was very reliable because they are not a private office.
Only graduate students give the tests and we were told that if we had more questions we could speak with the full professor who oversees the program. The graduate student who worked with my child did a great job and explained the results to me very clearly and fully.

[Anonymous]

OP here. I truly am a parent and believe it or not a FCPS teacher recommended the WISC. She believes that the NNAT didn't reflect my DD at all and rather than take the NNAT again (which was in discussion) go right to WISC. This is our only child so I'm new to all this testing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We had a poor experience with George Mason. The student was nice, but missed the ball with our kid. DC had scores that were over 50% different, and she didn't even mention any potential issues with the results. Also, DC's processing speed was very low, <20%, verse other sections were DC scored in the 90%. The tester never indicated that we might want to get our child tested for learning disabilities. We ended up having DC evaluated for ADHD due to behavior issues at school. We gave a copy of the WISC results to the psychologist, who noted that GMU did a really poor job in writing up the results. The psychologist noticed the inconsistencies right away and helped us understand the results. GMU essentially wrote up that everything was good.

So, did your psychologist find that the low processing speed indicated ADHD? We had a similar issue (out-of-the park verbal and quantitative scores and low processing speed) but the tester said that it is rather common among the highly intelligent kids, and that by itself, it is not indicative of any disorder. She also said that kids do not know that the corresponding sections of the test are timed (while the rest are not), so often, they take their time answering because these questions are rather mundane and kind of boring (for them), as compared to the more challenging ones in the other sections. Did anyone else had a similar explanation by the WISC-administering psychologist?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We had a poor experience with George Mason. The student was nice, but missed the ball with our kid. DC had scores that were over 50% different, and she didn't even mention any potential issues with the results. Also, DC's processing speed was very low, <20%, verse other sections were DC scored in the 90%. The tester never indicated that we might want to get our child tested for learning disabilities. We ended up having DC evaluated for ADHD due to behavior issues at school. We gave a copy of the WISC results to the psychologist, who noted that GMU did a really poor job in writing up the results. The psychologist noticed the inconsistencies right away and helped us understand the results. GMU essentially wrote up that everything was good.

So, did your psychologist find that the low processing speed indicated ADHD? We had a similar issue (out-of-the park verbal and quantitative scores and low processing speed) but the tester said that it is rather common among the highly intelligent kids, and that by itself, it is not indicative of any disorder. She also said that kids do not know that the corresponding sections of the test are timed (while the rest are not), so often, they take their time answering because these questions are rather mundane and kind of boring (for them), as compared to the more challenging ones in the other sections. Did anyone else had a similar explanation by the WISC-administering psychologist?

We had a similar explanation. Our dc's VCI and PRI were greater than 99.9th percentile and processing speed and working memory were about 30 points lower, but still in the "superior" range. I was told it was a common profile in highly gifted kids.

[Anonymous]

Our George Mason tester gave the same explanation as above- not unusual at all with very bright kids. My child is out of elementary school now and has never had any ADD or ADHD issues.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP here. I truly am a parent and believe it or not a FCPS teacher recommended the WISC. She believes that the NNAT didn't reflect my DD at all and rather than take the NNAT again (which was in discussion) go right to WISC. This is our only child so I'm new to all this testing.

BS. A 1st grade teacher is not recommending your kid get an IQ test. YOU may have asked if you could do another test but that's about it. Tell s precisely how this conversation went.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP here. I truly am a parent and believe it or not a FCPS teacher recommended the WISC. She believes that the NNAT didn't reflect my DD at all and rather than take the NNAT again (which was in discussion) go right to WISC. This is our only child so I'm new to all this testing.

BS. A 1st grade teacher is not recommending your kid get an IQ test. YOU may have asked if you could do another test but that's about it. Tell s precisely how this conversation went.

I can think of one circumstance: if the child basically came out delayed. But then, the county would do the testing (think scores <80)

When my DD took the NNAT, they did it in the second grade. The teacher did not think the cogAT or NNAT represented her ability, as she got flustered during the test --- she wanted clarification on the instructions, which the teacher could not give. The teacher and the AART said that there was no need to give her a WISC, that they could put an AAP package together that would show my DD nicely. She was admitted. FWIW, her scores were around 120.