Wide Range Achievement Test Pros And Cons

General Information The Wide Range Achievement Test: Fourth Edition (WRAT 4) is a test that measures basic academic skills, written by Gary S. Wilkinson and Gary J. Robertson. Psychological Assessment Resources, Inc. published this test in 2006. Administration time for this test takes about 15-25 minutes for younger children ages 5-7. Administration time for those eight years and older takes about 30-45 minutes.
Description of Purpose and Nature of Test The WRAT 4 is an achievement test designed to measure individual performance using four subtests (Wilkinson & Robertson, 2006). This test has two forms, a green form and a blue form that can be used interchangeably. The subtests: word reading, sentence comprehension, spelling, and math computation
K. (n.d.) in The 16th mental measurements yearbook, claims that the WRAT 4 should be recommended for research purposes and not for clinical use. While she argues that there is satisfactory reliability, she also argue that the test is lacking in validity evidence. Her review also discusses some potential limitations to the two forms, green and blue. The authors claim that the forms are parallel with providing alternate forms evidence, however, Hoff found that the two forms seem to be measuring slightly different mathematical skills. Another key argument in Hoff’s review is that the wide age span for this test restricts the content validity by limiting the number of skills being
Scoring of the test is also quite simple in that determining right from wrong answers is clear. Like most achievement tests, the WRAT 4 increases in difficulty throughout the subtests in order to determine academic ability. With the four subtests, word reading, sentence comprehension, spelling, and math computation, basic academic skills appear to be measured by looking at the items, however, after having difficulty combing through the validity in the tests’ manual, and reading others’ test review comments about validity, I believe that validity needs to be studied further to fully determine whether this test is measuring what it claims to. I also agree that this test should refrain from being used to make any life changing decisions for an individual, and should continue to be used in psychological research and aids to other assessment tools with stronger