The widely respected WRAT4 accurately measures the basic academic skills of word reading, sentence comprehension, spelling, and math computation. This quick, simple, psychometrically sound assessment of a student’s important fundamental academic skills serves as an excellent initial evaluation, re-evaluation, or progress measure for any student—especially those referred for learning, behavioral, or vocational difficulties.

Features and benefits

• Evaluates reading comprehension. The WRAT4 improves on its predecessor by adding a Sentence Comprehension subtest.
• Extension of norms. Grade-based norms increase the usefulness of the test in Grades K-12, and age-based norms extend to age 94 years, allowing for standardized assessment of older adults’ literacy skills.
• Parallel forms make retesting easy. The Blue and Green forms can be used interchangeably with comparable results, permitting retesting within short periods of time without practice effects. Alternate forms can also be combined into a single examination for a more qualitative assessment of academic skills.
• Time-efficient. Assessments can be obtained in as little as 15 minutes for younger children and as little as 30 minutes for older children and adults.
• Flexible. Use with individuals, or use with small groups (selected math and spelling areas) to identify those who need a more comprehensive evaluation.
• Reliable and valid. Standardized on a representative national sample of over 3,000 individuals ranging in age from 5 to 94 years, the WRAT4 has been shown to be highly reliable and valid.

Test structure

The WRAT4 provides derived scores and interpretive information for four subtests:

• Word Reading measures letter and word decoding through letter identification and word recognition.
• Sentence Comprehension measures an individual’s ability to gain meaning from words and to comprehend ideas and information in sentences using a modified cloze technique.
• Spelling measures an individual’s ability to encode sounds into written form from dictated letters and words.
• Math Computation measures an individual’s ability to count, identify numbers, solve simple oral math problems, and calculate written math problems.
• A Reading Composite score is created by combining the Word Reading and Sentence Comprehension standard scores.

Technical information

• Standardized on a representative national sample of over 3,000 individuals ranging in age from 5 to 94 years. Derived scores were developed for both age- and grade-referenced groups. Standard scores, percentile ranks, stanines, normal curve equivalents, grade equivalents, and Rasch ability scaled scores are provided.
• Alternate-form immediate retest reliability coefficients ranged from .78 to .89 for an age-based sample and from .86 to .90 for a grade-based sample. The alternate-form delayed (approximately 30 days) retest study indicated that practice effects are quite small. Mean score differences of 0.4-2.2 were found for an age-based sample; differences of 0.1-0.5 were found for a grade-based sample.
• Validity evidence is derived from the content and structure of the test battery, studies with special groups of individuals, and correlations with other widely used achievement and cognitive ability measures, including the KTEA-II Comprehensive and Brief, WISC^®-IV, WASI™, RIAS™, WAIS^®-III, WIAT^®-II, SB5, WJ^®-III, WRAT-Expanded, KBIT, and WRIT.