Being tested this school year? For most programs choose the bundle for the grade your child is currently in. In some circumstances, particularly late in the school year it may be beneficial to go up a level if this won't overwhelm your child.
Please contact Helen if you've got any questions about making your selection.
|
|
Gifted and Talented Education and Testing (GATE)
Talented and Gifted (TAG)
Despite what you may have been told you can prepare your child for Gifted and Talented Education (GATE) or Talented and Gifted (TAG) testing by working with your child on developing the skills they'll be tested on.
The bundles below also work well over Summer. You'll get a variety of activities to enhance and enrich your child's education and ensure that they don't lose any academic skills over Summer. The reason that these skills are tested for in gifted tests are because smart children have them. Your child can too! Whether or not they're going to be tested you'll improve their essential thinking skills leading to improved learning and understanding.
We do not advocate purchasing practice tests and getting your child to cram on the types on questions on those tests. Athletes cross-train. If you're preparing to run a marathon you don't just run marathons to get ready. The same is true of developing cognitive skills. Different skills develop in tandem. If you focus on just what will be tested in the format that it is tested you will miss learning opportunities and risk not fully developing the skill needed. Think about spelling tests. If you know the list of words that will be tested you focus on that. The test is defined and you know exactly what will be on it. In contrast if you're preparing for a Spelling Bee you do a lot more learning etymology and pronunciation and ... This is a test of your skill as a speller. That's different from a test of whether or not you know a list of words.
There's nothing wrong with practice tests as a supplement but, in out opinion, test type questions shouldn't be the focus of your learning.
There's another reason why did don't carry a huge range of practice tests. Many tests used for GATE screening are what is called "protected." The test itself is developed over a long period of time and tested on a large group of children. For each grade level the same test is used for many years. The test is only sold to people who are licensed to give the test to children. The only people who see the actual tests are those involved in development, those giving the test, and the children taking it. That means that there isn't a history of past tests that practice questions can be developed from.
In some school districts the GATE/TAG test is a specific test (most commonly the Naglieri Non-Verbal Ability Test (NNAT), Otis-Lenon School Abilities Test (OLSAT) or Cognitive Abilities Test (CogAT)).In others Gifted and Talented Program entry involves passing a series of steps which may include parent recommendation, teacher assessment (perhaps informal or perhaps using a checklist of attributes), achievement testing to ensure a high level of math and reading competence, creativity testing and cognitive ability testing.
Some school districts test children as a group.The OLSAT and CogAT are group timed tests of verbal, non-verbal and quantitative reasoning.The Ravens Progressive Matrix and Naglieri Non-Verbal Ability Test (NNAT) are group tests of non-verbal reasoning ability.Some school districts test children one on one with a school psychologist using a full scale IQ test like the WISV-IV or Stanford-Binet.
A good place to start is the Test Prep bundle below for your child's current grade. The contents of these bundles were chosen to cover the skill areas most commonly tested:
Verbal Reasoning
Non-Verbal Reasoning
Quantitative Reasoning
Logic
Creativity
Test Taking Skills
For further assistance please contact us and we'll do our best to help.
|
|
|
