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The transition process from school to work is often challenging for young people, especially those with disabilities. In order to gather a meaningful transition, a cross battery assessment and a functional vocational evaluation are needed. In this case review study, a young adult aged 20 years 8 months, JC, had his autistic condition reviewed. Assessment was done so as to know the current status of JC’s abilities and skills and his state of readiness for vocational employment. With the results, JC could then use them to look for vocational training centers so as to develop more skills in the area of his vocational interest.

Selection, Use, and Interpretation of German Intelligence Tests for Children and Adolescents Based on CHC-theory: Update, Extension, and Critical Discussion In order to facilitate planning and interpretation of cognitive assessments for children and adolescents a CHC broad and narrow ability classification of nine widespread German tests of intelligence is presented. The Cattel-Horn-Carroll-theory of intelligence is an influential model in the field of intelligence testing. Its structure and basic premises are presented. On this basis, intelligence testing can be planned and interpreted systematically in a common theoretical framework. Practical implications and suggestions for diagnosticians (e. g. cross-battery-assessment) are pointed out. Finally, possibilities and limitations of CHC-theory in the field of intelligence testing are discussed.

We used data simulations to test whether composites consisting of cohesive subtest scores are more accurate than composites consisting of divergent subtest scores. We demonstrate that when multivariate normality holds, divergent and cohesive scores are equally accurate. Furthermore, excluding divergent scores results in biased estimates of construct scores. We show that obtaining divergent scores should prompt additional testing under some conditions. Although there are many valid reasons to exclude scores from consideration (e.g., malingering, fatigue, and misunderstood directions), no score should be removed from a composite simply because it is different from other scores in the composite.

OBJECTIVE No previous empirical study has investigated whether the LD identification decisions of proposed methods to operationalize processing strengths and weaknesses (PSW) approaches for LD identification are associated with differential treatment response. We investigated whether the identification decisions of the concordance/discordance model (C/DM; Hale & Fiorello, 2004) and Cross Battery Assessment approach (XBA method; Flanagan, Ortiz, & Alfonso, 2007) were consistent and whether they predicted intervention response beyond that accounted for by pretest performance on measures of reading. METHOD Psychoeducational assessments were administered at pretest to 203 4th graders with low reading comprehension and individual results were utilized to identify students who met LD criteria according to the C/DM and XBA methods and students who did not. Resulting group status permitted an investigation of agreement for identification methods and whether group status at pretest (LD or not LD) was associated with differential treatment response to an intensive reading intervention. RESULTS The LD identification decisions of the XBA and C/DM demonstrated poor agreement with one another (κ = -.10). Comparisons of posttest performance for students who met LD criteria and those who did not meet were largely null, with small effect sizes across all measures. CONCLUSIONS LD status, as identified through the C/DM and XBA approaches, was not associated with differential treatment response and did not contribute educationally meaningful information about how students would respond to intensive reading intervention. These results do not support the value of cognitive assessment utilized in this way as part of the LD identification process.

When education works, it works to the benefit of all. It creates productive, innovative citizens eager to contribute to a well-functioning democracy. In contrast, educational failure has lifelong c...

In Conjectures and Refutations, the philosopher of science Karl Popper (1962) stated that “the criterion of the scientific status of a theory is its falsifiability, or refutability, or testability”...

The Cross-Battery Assessment (XBA) approach to identifying a specific learning disorder (SLD) is based on the postulate that deficits in cognitive abilities in the presence of otherwise average general intelligence are causally related to academic achievement weaknesses. To examine this postulate, we conducted a classification agreement analysis using the Woodcock-Johnson III Tests of Cognitive Abilities and Achievement. We examined the broad cognitive abilities of the Cattell-Horn-Carroll theory held to be meaningfully related to basic reading, reading comprehension, mathematics calculation, and mathematics reasoning across age groups. Results of analyses of 300 participants in three age groups (6–8, 9–13, and 14–19 years) indicated that the XBA method is very reliable and accurate in detecting true negatives. Mean specificity and negative predictive value were 92% and 89% across all broad cognitive abilities and academic domains. Mean sensitivity and positive predictive values, however, were generally q...