The Wechsler Individual Achievement Test – Third Editionis a comprehensive, individually administered diagnostic tool designed to assess the academic strengths and development areas of children, adolescents, college students, and adults across a broad range of academic skills(oral language, reading, written language and mathematics) or specific areas of need.

The WIAT-III further provides two types of analyses that aid in the identification of specific learning difficulties, namely the traditional Ability Achievement Discrepancy (AAD) analysis as well as the Pattern of Strengths and Weaknesses (PSW) Discrepancy analysis.

ASSESSMENT SCALES

The WIAT-III consists of 16 subtests that can be grouped into 7 composite scales:

• Listening Comprehension: consists of two components;Receptive(listening)Vocabulary and Oral Discourse Comprehension (making inferences). Forms part of the Oral Language Composite.
• Oral Expression: consists of three components;Expressive Vocabulary, Oral Word Fluency and Sentence Repetition. Forms part of the Oral Language Composite.
• Early Reading Skills
• Word Reading forms part of the Total Reading and Basic Reading Composites.
• Pseudoword Decoding forms part of the Total Reading and Basic Reading Composites.
• Reading Comprehension forms part of the Total Reading and Reading Comprehension and Fluency Composites.
• Oral Reading Fluency forms part of the Total Reading and Reading Comprehension and Fluency Composites.
• Alphabet Writing Fluency forms part of the Written Expression Composite.
• Spelling forms part of the Written Expression Composite.
• Sentence Composition: consists of two components;Sentence Combining and Sentence Building. Forms part of the Written Expression Composite.
• Essay Composition forms part of the Written Expression Composite.
• Maths Problem Solving forms part of the Mathematics Composite.
• Numeracy forms part of the Mathematics Composite.
• Maths Fluency – Addition forms part of the Maths Fluency Composite.
• Maths Fluency – Subtraction forms part of the Maths Fluency Composite.
• Maths Fluency – Multiplication forms part of the Maths Fluency Composite.

AREAS OF APPLICATION

• Clinical settings – plan interventions andmeasure progress
• Educational settings – identify student strengths and weaknesses, inform decisions regarding eligibility for educational services, placements and specific learning disability diagnoses
• Research settings

SOUTH AFRICAN RESEARCH

Although South African research is not currently available, JVR Psychometrics welcomes the opportunity to partner with clients in conducting research studies.