Testing Mom Holds Emergency Gifted and Talented Session for Parents in New York City

posted by Karen Quinn, The Testing Mom - April 21st, 2012

NYC Parents On-Edge as Gifted and Talented Kindergarten Decisions Are Made

On Wednesday, April 18 TestingMom.com held an Emergency G&T Session for NYC Parents as the short deadline for their gifted and talented school selection needed to be made by 11:59pm on Friday, April 20. The sold-out event was held at the Poet’s House in downtown Manhattan as parents sat on the edges of their seats to hear the expert panel all things G&T. The panel reviewed the school selection process and the recent changes to the New York City gifted and talented test which now includes the Naglieri Non-verbal Abilities Test (NNAT®) instead of the much easier BSRA exam given to the talented tots in New York City over the past 5 years.

Speakers on the Panel Included:

• Karen Quinn, best-selling author of The Ivy Chronicles and Testing for Kindergarten, testing authority and the Testing Mom.
• Michael McCurdy, co-founder of TestingMom.com and NYC gifted and talented parent expert who has a daughter attending the much sought after District 2 gifted and talented program at PS 33 Chelsea Prep.
• A parent from NEST+M gifted and talented city-wide school who has 2 children enrolled in the New York City gifted and talented program at NEST.
• A NYC gifted and talented teacher

The nervous parents in attendance asked numerous questions regarding the school selection process, how the lottery works for city-wide schools, G&T school touring, curriculum and much more. There was also over an hour of live Q&A from the audience.

Many of the questions early-on were from parents focused on the recent changes announced by the NYC Department of Ed. for the gifted and talented testing for next year. The Bracken School Readiness Assessment (BSRA) that is currently used will be replaced with the much more difficult Naglieri Non-verbal Ability Test (NNAT®2). The NNAT-2 test is designed to provide a nonverbal measure of general ability, and assesses students on a number of nonverbal skills such as pattern completion, reasoning by analogy, serial reasoning and spatial visualization.

Parents attending were given handouts with practice questions for the NNAT-2 (Naglieri). After parents reviewed the practice questions they immediately realized the test is much more difficult than the BSRA and requires more in-depth problem solving ability rather than the basic knowledge of shapes, colors and sizes.

It still has yet to be decided by the New York City Depart of Ed how much weight will be given to the Naglieri (NNAT-2 test) in relation to the OLSAT test which currently accounts for 75% of the child’s score for the gifted and talented entrance criteria for New York City.

Karen Quinn, the Testing Mom, recommended parents start practicing early for the OLSAT and NNAT-2. Karen said “It’s never too early to start practicing these concepts from the OLSAT and Nagleiri with your little ones. It will not only help them in testing but also with their school work. For NNAT practice, your child can play with puzzles and pattern games to help build up their visual spatial skills.”

Testing Mom provides parents practice questions to help their child prepare for gifted and talented testing and private school admissions testing. TestingMom.com’s extensive inventory of original test preparation materials for concepts based upon commonly-used intelligence tests, including the Stanford-Binet Intelligence Scales, the WPPSI-ERB test (Wechsler Preschool and Primary Scale of Intelligence), ISEE, the Bracken School Readiness Assessment, the CogAT (Cognitive Abilities Test),  NNAT-2 test (Naglieri Non-Verbal Ability Test), ITBS, WISC-4, Raven’s Progressive Matrices, RIAS and KBIT-2.

About Testing Mom: TestingMom.com is an online-based membership service for parents seeking prep materials and expert guidance on Gifted and Talented and private school admissions. The company was founded in 2010  by Karen Quinn, author of the New York Times Bestselling The Ivy Chronicles and Testing for Kindergarten and inventor of IQ Fun Park: Test Prep Disguised as a Game, and Michael McCurdy, one of the most popular “daddy bloggers” in New York City with his New York City Gifted and Talented Blog.