Comprehensive academic achievement tests are routinely used by school psychologists in psycho-educational assessment batteries to identify learning disabled students. A variety of assessment measures are used across age groups to determine if a discrepancy exists between academic achievement and intellectual functioning; however, among the most…

IQ tests are used to judge the mental capacities of black Americans, a fact which places a tremendous ethical responsibility on those involved in IQ test research and administration: most IQ test developers and administrators have abrogated this responsibility. (Author/JM)

The concept that a child's potential reading level can be measured via listening comprehension has at least one major shortcoming: it is of doubtful worth for children in grades one through three. First, reading comprehension and listening comprehension are not approximately equal early in a child's schooling. In fact, it seems that they generally…

This critical evaluation of the Slosson Intelligence Test (SIT) determined that the test items are 30 years old, scores are derived from a nonrepresentative norm group, and scores are not interchangeable with other intelligence measures. The paper concludes that the SIT is unsuited for educational decision-making purposes, including screening,…

Technical problems in the assessment of learning disabilities (LD) are only a small part of the problems leading to the misidentification of children in this category of handicap. Given all the other motives and purposes served by labeling a child LD in school, apparently sound measurement advice may actually do more harm than good. (LC)

Explores the role of diagnostic practices in school psychology. Basic principles related to diagnostic typology and concepts of reliability and validity are reviewed in the context of recent diagnostic decision-making research. The intrusion and eventual reduction of particular errors of consistency and inconsistency in psychodiagnosis are…

Contrary to popular opinion, it is very difficult to find any objective evidence of culture bias that could account for social class and racial differences in performance on current standard tests of intelligence, even those like the Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test (PPVT), which give the appearance of being highly culture-loaded. They may be…

The materials cited here represent information on such diverse but interrelated areas as: methods of assessing achievement, intelligence, personality factors, and attitudes; effects of testing on self concept and employment opportunities; prediction of academic success; reliability and validity of specific tests; criticism of the methods and use…

This brief review explains some alternate scoring procedures to the classical method of summing correct responses. The novel procedures attempt in some way to retrieve and use even the information in the wrong responses. (Author)

Following a critique of so-called educational testing, this article examines three "educationally noteworthy school testing programs"--those of Portland, Oregon; Orange County, Florida; and Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania; and one noteworthy school with no standardized testing: the Prospect School in Bennington, Vermont. Derives some broad…

This set of four research reports is a product of the Mathemagenic Activities Program (MAP) for early childhood education of the University of Georgia Follow Through Program. Based on Piagetian theory, the MAP provides sequentially structured sets of curriculum materials and processes that are designed to continually challenge children in…

Controversies centering around the accuracy of the estimates made of bilingual children's intellectual functioning and the effectiveness of prescriptive programs recommended for their subsequent development have resulted in the investigation and assessment of different instruments used for student placement in special education classes. The three…

It is asserted in this paper that some standardized tests do not do a good job of what they claim to do, and for some testing purposes nonstandardized tests are more appropriate or efficient. Under present circumstances, group I.Q. tests should be abolished. They provide no useful information that cannot be gained from achievement tests. And what…

This pair of studies investigated the psychometric adequacy of the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children - Revised (WISC-R) with a population of 8,396 potentially gifted elementary children of diverse ethnic and cultural backgrounds as well as diverse emotional and social environments. Study I showed subjects' profiles differed strikingly from…