really bad cogAT test score-- eek!!!

[borninthesouth]

I started homeschooling 4 years ago, so all my children had been to public school but the youngest.  She decided that she wanted to go to school (she pushed and threw fits with me until I sent her) and stayed for 1 semester then she wanted to come back home.  She decided that it wasn't all that it is cracked up to be.  She is a very, very, very, busy, bright kid.  She reads at a high level (she is in 2nd grade, but reads about 6th and up material).  I check her comprehension as we read and she seems to understand well.  We are doing Math Mammonth and she does well with her work there also-- I would say her biggest drawback as a student is that she goes too fast with her work and makes careless errors. But, I have a kid with dyslexia and she is obviously a much faster (different-I am ok with the strengths and weaknesses there) learner than her.  I received her cogAT test scores today and she scored a 43!  I was stunned.  I had 2 other kids take this test and do much better-- even the one with learning problems.  I hate to worry about a test (I hate standardized testing-- BLAH!), but having a 9th grader and I have learned this awful reality-- kids have to test somewhat well if they are homeschooled because they have to do well on the SAT.  Colleges have to have something other than my transcript for my kid's grades to go on for admittance into their school.  So, I want to work on this bit by bit now while she is young and more willing to bend and maybe see where my homeschool needs to be strengthened for my other kids.  So, I need suggestions-- especially for working on the computer (we rarely do that), reading comprehension and seeing the big picture in math. Please understand I do not wish to teach to any test.  I don't want to start a big back in forth on how horrible testing is-- I agree it is!!! But, I am just trying to work with how to cope with testing when it is needed... Does that make sense!!  I am in such a hurry that this may not make any sense... LOL.

 

I should also mention that she did really bad on the MAP testing also that is done at the beginning of the year to see progress, placement, etc... But, it was the very first day she attended school and on a computer which she has never used for testing before.        

Edited January 18, 2017 by rabonic2

[Arcadia]

Isn't CogAT often used as a first round group screening test for GATE (gifted and talented) program? I have a kid who test well and a kid who doesn't do as well on timed test. I don't see any mention of correlation of standardized test scores to CogAT scores though. My kids SAT scores tallies with their old state testing scores profile and percentiles except higher due to having more test experience. My kids did the Olsat and did not do the CogAT.

 

At 2nd grade, my oldest did the state testing hyper fast because he wanted to be out of the testing room. He did very well but could have done better. He was a young 7. By the time he was taking the ACT and SAT, he was a lot more careful about test taking.

 

Crtitical Thinking Co. may have what you are looking for http://www.criticalthinking.com/articles/test-preparation-practice-for-cogat-assessment

"The Cognitive Abilities Test™ or CogAT® is commonly utilized as part of the entrance process for students who have been identified as potentially gifted and talented. The CogAT® (Cognitive Abilities Test™) is published by Riverside Publishing, a Houghton Mifflin Company"

Edited January 18, 2017 by Arcadia

[wapiti]

No worries.  CogAT is not helpful for anything unless you are applying to a gifted program right now.  It means literally nothing IME and isn't likely to reflect anything about how a student performs standardized testing in general.  The only correlation I can think of is for a kid who has difficulty finishing in time, though that may also improve over the years.

 

I'd plan standardized test prep later, in high school, as for any college-bound student regardless of CogAT result.  I'd forget the CogAT ever happened.

Edited January 18, 2017 by wapiti

[MistyMountain]

Kids can have bad days where they do not test well. One test does not mean a lot. If the test does not match what you see I would chalk it up them just not doing as well as they could on it either by being careless, rushing or not paying close enough attention to the directions etc.

[debi21]

When you take the cogat, they give you a score and a nationally normed percentile, also they subdivide into verbal nonverbal (spatial reasoning) and quantitative. The actual score means nothing, is 43 the score or percentile? Also you should have given you percentiles for each subcategory so you can see strengths and weaknesses. Are you familiar with the question types and had your daughter seen them before or was this the first standardized test? For example if a child has never seen analogies before, they might not really understand how they work immediately.

[fralala]

What everybody else said about the CogAT. My kids would have to take it to be admitted to the gifted program here, but it's totally different from the nationally normed tests that are required as evidence of progress. And there are other ways to be identified as gifted-- maybe you are surprised because you KNOW this child is very bright, but this silly test doesn't mean you were wrong and she's not extremely bright/gifted. If you REALLY wanted to take it seriously, you could see this as a sign that you need to work on spatial reasoning skills. That's worth doing for sure, but not to prove a kid's smarts on the CogAT, which in any case truly doesn't really tell us anything about how your daughter is doing in math or reading comprehension.

 

If you want her to do well on the CogAT, you can work on those skills; if you want her to practice taking her time and filling in bubbles and figuring out how to best take multiple-choice tests, you can work on those skills; but again, I'm just not sure from what you wrote that you need to be concerned about how she's doing in her actual school work!

 

 

[Paige]

My Ds was referred to the gifted program in 2nd grade and bombed the CoGat. He did ok in some areas but in others he scored so low you'd think he would be unable to function. He did not perform as well as expected in any area. His teacher was stunned but there was no getting around the test. She said he was one of the best thinkers she'd ever had in class.

 

Years later, we can see several potential causes for the bad score:

He is hearing impaired and we didn't know at the time.

He is not a people pleaser and is a poor test taker. He will give answers he finds amusing or interesting vs a kid who gives what he knows the admin wants.

He has a nonverbal learning disorder which shows up as really bad testing skills.

 

He's still very bright. We now wears hearing aids, we've worked on learning to just give the teacher the responses he or she wants, and we have worked on his nonverbal skills. I don't know if he'd do better on the cogat now, but I don't care. He's in HS now and the CoGat doesn't matter and didn't hurt him.

 

You may want to look into why she scored badly, but I don't think it means she's any less bright or capable than you had thought before the test.

 

If the CoGat is not correlated well to other tests, why do schools still use it?

[debi21]

On that question, I did read that the CoGat is correlated to overall performance on the ITBS/Iowa tests, I think on the CoGat site itself. However, my friend's son just got admitted to a gifted program based on Iowa results, while his CoGat were not good enough and substantially lower. Iowa is an achievement test and CoGat is a reasoning test, I believe?