IQ Tests Selection Issues - Assignment Example

1. There are numerous types of IQ tests with a wide variety of validity and reliability as well as what they test. Most tests take an hour to two hours to complete. Some of these include WISC-IV (Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children), WPPSI for very young children, KABC-II, WJ-III, WAIS-III, which is the most common, Stanford-Binet-IV, RIAS, UNIT, and WASI. Most IQ tests give a verbal intelligence score and a nonverbal and performance intelligence score. UNIT is nonverbal and widely used for people that are not native speakers or are deaf. WASI is a brief IQ test and RIAS is also brief but is used as a full blown IQ test while the WASI at least is a screener and takes 20 minutes to finish. All IQ tests only measure ability, any IQ test that measures writing, reading, math or something else is an achievement test and not an IQ test. Many of these test the broad abilities of fluid and crystallized intelligences, reading and writing ability, quantitative reasoning, short-term memory, long-term memory storage and retrieval, visual and auditory processing, decision and reaction speed. The WISC-IV and WPPSI are both Weschler IQ tests. The WISC-IV is appropriate for kids ages 6-16 years old to take while the WPPSI-II is appropriate for ages 3-7 years old. Kids are asked to solve problems and complete puzzles. The KABC-II is the Kaufman Assessment Battery for Children measures cognitive abilities and is used for kids 3-18. It uses knowledge and crystallized ability scales which broaden the amount of information. There are two approaches to this IQ test including a neuropsychological model and a method of categorizing cognitive abilities. 2. Piagets four stages of cognitive development include 1. Sensorimotor (age 0-2) which is the stage that children have a cognitive thought process that is limited to their motor reflexes. They start to build these reflexes up through interaction and experiences and their reflexes become more sophisticated. At 7 months old, a child learns more about object permanency which is knowing that an object is still there though it is not in their view. They have simple activities and are just learning how to communicate with others all the while developing new intellectual capabilities. They also learn a lot through imitation. 2. Preoperational (age 2-6) and this is when a child begins to use mental imagery and language. They are also egocentric and can only view things that are happening around them only in their point of view. Children in this stage are not capable of thinking logically but can only process things from only what they know. 3. Concrete Operational (ages 6 or 7-11 or 12) is the third stage Piaget outlined and it is the point where a child is capable of considering another persons point of view and are able to process their point of view along with someone elses simultaneously. They are only able to look at the concrete knowledge and are unable to look at the abstract side of things, able to process facts. They also are starting to understand conservation processes and they are becoming more logical at problem solving. 4. Formal Operational (ages 11 or 12 and up) and in this stage children are able to think logically, abstractly and theoretically. Piaget considers this the ultimate stage of development and they are able to learn reading, trying new ideas, help friends and are self-motivated. Piagets six substages of the sensorimotor stage of cognitive development include 1. Reflexes (ages 0-1 month); during this substage, the child understands the environment only through inborn reflexes such as sucking and looking. 2. Primary Circular Reactions (1-4 months); children begin to coordinate sensations and new schemas, finding that for example, they may suck their thumb on accident but then later intentionally repeat the act because they like it. 3. Secondary Circular Reactions (4-8 months old); a child becomes more focused on the world around them and begin to intentionally repeat actions to trigger response in the environment. For example, a child will purposely pick up a toy to put it in their mouth. 4. Coordination of Reactions (8-12 months); this is when a child begins to show clearly intentional actions and combine schemas to achieve a desired effect. They will begin to explore the environment around them and will imitate what others around them are doing. They also begin to correlate action and reaction, realizing, for example, that if they pick up a rattle and shake it, that it will make noise. 5. Tertiary Circular Reaction (12-18 months); Children will begin to perform trial and error experimentations during this point, trying out different sounds or actions to get attention from someone. 6. Early Representational Thought (18-24 months); kids start to develop symbols to represent events or objects in the world and start to see the world through mental operations rather than just completely actions. Assimiliation: it is a process referring to the adaption process in which people take in new information and experiences to incorporate them into existing ideas. We add new information to our existing knowledge and can reinterpret this information to fit with previously known information. Accommodation: in order to learn more ideas and process information, a person has to alter ones existing schemas and information in order to adapt. For example, a child may realize that dogs have four legs, however they may think that all animals have four legs and are dogs. However, when they learn that cats also have four legs and are not dogs, they are accommodating and learning new information to develop a new schema. Scheme: a scheme describes any thought process that could include an organized pattern of thought or behavior, a structured cluster of pre-conceived ideas, mental structure that represents some aspect of the world, knowledge of one-self, capability to focus on a theme and organize knowledge; structures that organize knowledge and assumption and used to process and interpret information. It is the use of organizing knowledge and creating thoughts to understand the world. Equilibrium: it is the operation of the two processes of assimilating new information and accommodating to this information. Examples of how this theory can be applied to child-rearing and education were gien throughout the various explanations of the stages above. Using these stages, people who work with children, both parents and teachers are able to set a model up according to the stage that a child is at in their life to better understand how they are functioning and if they are measuring up to other children their age. Teachers and parents know what to expect from children of certain ages because of their knowledge at the point a child is at in processing things cognitively. It also explains some of the things they begin to say and helps a parent or teacher expose them to things that can continue to broaden their ways of thought and continue to learn how to see the world in different ways, edging from one stage of cognitive thought processes to another. It will help teachers be able to devise appropriate curriculum for their grade levels if they know what stage their children (or class) are at in thought processing. Read More