Are you interested in referring your student for possible gifted identification? Please click here to access a variety of referral forms.
How do we identify giftedness?
Curious how we go about identifying students as gifted? This video gives an overview of the process and describes what you need to know. It may even produce a few questions for you to take back to your school GT Coordinator!
The process for identification in the State of Colorado begins with a referral. That referral can come from teachers who notice high levels of thinking in a student, parents who see their child performing above standards regularly, or as a result of test scores on an academic achievement test such as NWEA or aptitude test like CogAT (Cognitive Abilities Test). Further information can be found in the Identification Guidebook from CDE.
It is important to note that no one score, and no one referral by itself, qualifies a student as "gifted" in a specific area. Instead, a body of evidence is collected once a referral starts the process. Once the referral has been made, the school district has 30 school days to gather and review evidence to determine qualification status.
In a general sense, there are four different types of evidence that are used to build a Body of Evidence for a student. These include the following:
Aptitude measures how a student thinks, not what he/she knows. This is measured by the CogAT in Northeast BOCES. This test is given to every second grader in every school of this BOCES in the spring of second grade (usually around March-April). In all of the BOCES schools, students are given this test again somewhere in middle school. This varies by school as to whether it is given in 6th, 7th, or 8th grade. If you have recently received scores from your school and want to understand the ability profile given to you, click here. Parents and guardians can input the ability profile on the report and receive a printable report back on the strengths and challenges your student may encounter in school.
For more general information about the CogAT, see their website. Or watch the short, 2-minute video.
There are three batteries of the CogAT: Verbal, Quantitative, and Nonverbal. A qualifying score for the body of evidence is a 95th percentile or above on any one of the three batteries. However, any score above the 85th percentile is considered strong supporting evidence when examining the full body of evidence for a student.
Achievement is the most familiar measure to teachers and parents alike. Any standardized test score that measures a student against standardized norms can be used for achievement. This can include CMAS, PARCC, and/or NWEA scores.
A qualifying score in achievement is a 95th percentile or above on a test. For a test given once per year, teachers are encouraged to use that one score as qualifying. However, on tests such as NWEA that are given multiple times in a year, teachers are encouraged to look at a trend over time. For example, a student may score in the 89th percentile, then the 97th percentile, then the 93rd percentile. In this case, the school GT Coordinator and/or identification team would watch the student for another few tests to see if the student is still hovering around the 95th percentile. A student who scores in the 93rd, then the 95th, then the 97th over a year would have qualifying evidence.
Additional assessments can be administered, particularly when a student is "close" by not quite at the level the school would wish to see for qualification. A full listing of these assessments can be found here.
Remember that not every area in a body of evidence must be "qualifying," meaning it is at the 95th percentile or above. Colorado law requires one anchor point at or above the 95th percentile, which can be from aptitude tests or achievement testing. Other scores must be supportive and show potential and/or very high ability.
Behavior can be measured against a standardized norm. There are several scales that can be used by teachers to evaluate gifted behavior. Most scales ask teachers to rate students on a scale of 1-5 on how often they see a specific behavior. After scales are filled out, a school GT coordinator scores the scale. A qualifying score on any of the scales is a 95th percentile or higher on any one of the subsets or subject areas (not the entire scale as a whole). Scores less than 95th percentile may still be considered strong supporting evidence. This will vary by teacher as personalities and perception are individual and what is considered a high score for one teacher may not be a high score for another.
In third grade, all teachers complete a Slocumb-Payne scale on all students in their classroom. This scale allows a teacher to report on behavior by choosing between statements that sound more positive or more challenging in student nature and then rating the frequency. By universally administering this behavior scale and gathering data on all students, Northeast BOCES GT Coordinators are able to pick up on another important piece of information on all students, which may help in buliding a Body of Evidence for students being considered for gifted identification.
The most common behavior scale in use in Northeast BOCES schools is the Scales for Identifying Gifted Students (SIGS). This particular scale has two options: one for teachers and one for parents. While similar to the GES, the SIGS breaks out behavior statements by subject area, so some schools may prefer to use this scale as teachers do not have to complete the entire scale for scoring to work out. Additionally, parents have a way to give input onthe behavior seen at home with a potentially gifted student. More information about the SIGS can be found on this website.
Samples of both scales (including the SIGS school scale and the SIGS parent/home scale) are provided.
The performance area allows students to be measured using rubrics, juried performances (judged items), and/or audio and video tapes. Performance can include a variety of items, such as science fair placements, dance auditions, honor bands, or state fair placements. Placements must be between the 1st and 3rd place at a regional, state, or national level. Local competitions that are only school-wide are not eligible as qualifying evidence, but in some cases can be great supporting evidence.
If a student is being evaluated for a talent area such as visual arts, performing arts, creative/productive thinking, leadership, or dance, a specific process and set of evidence is used that looks different than what has already been described. Because these areas vary greatly in requirements, Northeast BOCES uses a set of frameworks for each talent area with multiple links and descriptions of what is needed in a talent area for identification. These frameworks can be accessed on our website at this link.
The Identification process overall can sometimes be easier seen as a flowchart. If you'd like to see a visual representation of the identification process, please click on the document to the right or left.
School-level GT Coordinators who have been trained in gifted identification lead a review team at each school to evaluate the evidence in each of the four categories. To be qualified as "gifted," a student must have three pieces of evidence that support a specific area; only one must have the 95th percentile or higher by state law. However, the question that GT Coordinators ask at this point is, "Does this student need more than what is happening in the typical classroom? What evidence do I have showing this?"
Collecting a body of evidence is an ongoing process so while a student may not have enough evidence in the initial evaluation, another examination of the evidence several months or another school year later may show enough information.
In Northeast BOCES, this evaluation process can begin anytime after a student starts school. However, it often does not start until after the first CogAT test has been taken. This is because there is not enough evidence accumulated before that time to offer effective alternative programming. However, if a student shows strong data earlier, exceptions can be made at a school level. Students can be identified as gifted and talented in the following areas: