VMI- Beery Butinika Test.

[bochead]

Test for visual motor integration

• wot is this for the thick lay Mum in English please?
• is it used to indicate dyspraxia?

Scores;-
8th centile
79 standard score

• again any idea wot these scores indicate for this dumb Mum?

I can't help I'm afraid but sitting in anticipation for who can - DD had similar score for hers but a tad higher, still below average.

I think to be useful the VMI should be administered in 3 parts. The child copies some shapes first (integration task). They then have to look at the same shapes and have to identify each shape from a small group of similar shapes (visual task). Then they have to trace over copies of the original shapes (motor task).

The idea is to score their drawing skill first. The second two tasks allow you to score their visual skills and motor skills (that underpin the original copying task) separately.

The three scores can be compared so that if the child gets a low score for copying (integration task), you can work out whether there is a problem with just the motor aspect, just the visual perceptual aspect or only when they have to combine the two.

Does that help or hinder?

VMI essentially assesses how well the child's eyes and hands work together...an essential skill for handwriting, typing, craft work etc etc.
As scattergun says there are 3 parts.

It would usually be part of the assessment for dyspraxia but certainly not a stand alone assessment to diagnose it.

Scores are in comparison to other children of the same age and 8th centile would indicate that out of 100 children tested, 92 would score better. Don't despair at that as often the component scores would give strengths and weaknesses.

VMI would usually be done in conjunction with another test of Visual Perception and a Motor Skills assessment. But not necessarily all on one day.

What are your concerns for your child?

This gives a brief description www.answers.com/topic/beery-buktenica-test-1 but basically what Scatter and Wanna have said.

For us, DD had her test by a private OT and we gave the results to the Paed who is refering her for further OT reviews.
Not sure if that helps boc - but I'd ask for further evaluation or for the OT who performed the test to explain it properly and if they have any further recommendations? I'm seeing mine this week so if you don't have any joy I'll let you know what they say.

My lads handwriting,cutlery use etc leave a LOT to be desired despite him trying REALLY hard and my spendng a LOT of time on his fine motor skills.
The 8th centile score was a disapointment, (noone likes hard confirmation of their kids difficulties ykwim).

His overall standard score is 79 (average 80) which suggests to me from your component parts of the test that he must have scored really hghly on other parts of the test to bring that up - or that she's made a typing error. I know he has the eyes of a hawk so am presuming that raised his overall score. It would have helped if she'd given the centile scores for all 3 sections of the test though as the discrepancy doesn't quite make sense.

He's now been discharged with a report full of waffle (story of the poor kids life) but from what you guys have said that 8th centile score does seem to merit further investigation privately when I can raise the funds.

Thank you so much!

Bochead, it sounds like she only gave one part of the test. The 8th centile and the standard score of 79 are different ways of saying the same thing. A standard score of 80 is below average.

right at the risk of sounding thick - isn't the average the 50th centile?

If 80 is the standard score shouldn't you expect the centile score be over 40% as a rough marker? Maths has never been my strong point but this doesn't "compute" for me at all with his score of 79. Unless that 1 point is critical and the standard score scale only runs from 78- 82 or summat.

Gah I'm not even making sense, but neither does this report, which contains quite a few generalist non-medical factual errors, (eg family structure etc).

WHY do we never get to see the full test scores? It would be easier to check they were for the right kid for a start. Gah! I'm so confused : (

The average for centiles is 50 (average range usually 16-84). The average for standard scores is 100 (average range usually 85-115).

Standard scores and centiles are different scales and their spread of scores is not directly comparable.

A standard score of 70 would give a centile of 2.
A standard score of 85 would give a centile of 16.
A standard score of 100 = 50th centile
A standard score of 115 = 86th centile
A standard score of 130 = 98th centile

I am a truly interesting person.

Sorry. standard score 115 = 84th centile.

Ta - you've confirmed what I was thinking but couldn't articulate - a standard score of 79 is well below the average, so her report doesn't make sense as she's saying he needs no further OT input to help at school. The 8th centile score confirms that.

She also hasn't given the results of all 3 parts of the test, which also isn't that helpful for sharing with other professionals as I assume that's the first question they'll ask (I would).

He's been discharged so another dead end.

It is difficult when not all professionals use the same methods, or understand the results so that there is a standard approach.
My DS scored 0.4 centile in the same test - yet a paediatrician last week suggested that he had no problems at all, but that he was obviously dyspraxic (have a look back in his notes - and I think you'll find he was dx 6 years ago - that's not why i'm here!)
He also receives very little support - most of it because of my continual nagging - and is continually discharged off lists - and i'm continually getting him put back on them.
I took his results as an indication that i am not mad, over anxious, deluded, but in fact quite sane and realistic and justified in keep nagging for support.
I've had more support from the SENco in practical terms. Had a chat after this paediatrician meeting and talked about techniques we could use to help with his visual tracking. He is going to do some research, but came up with a few ideas and has already started implementing them.
Fight the good fight bochead

The INPP Retained Reflex therapist administered the Beery VMI test on our son. As expected son scored very poorly.

We are dong the Retained Reflex program and this is expected to improve his abilities. Once this is done, we will re-evaluate and then check for vision and hearing.

If your child has VMI issues, you might need more than a OT to help.

It sounds like your OT has used this assessment as a screener, has incorrectly thought 79 is within or very near to average and has failed to administer the other 2 parts. This is a guess, but not everyone has the opportunity for training or properly reads how to administer the assessments they use/have available. Its a shame no further OT was recommended and I hope you have been able to get ongoing services.

You are absolutely right, by the way. Awesome visual processing skills (making sense of what you see) will def mask challenges with motor planning (planning how you are going to move). That's why the papers are split into three. The first one tests hand eye co-ordination (hands and eyes together). If the therapist has any concerns or gut feelings or sees low results they use the supplementary tests too. If not, they discharge, if those skills are the only goal/concern, as the challenge may be medical or something else outside our scope. The second paper relies on visual skills only and the third paper gives you all the visual cues you need to focus on movement. That way, you can see where the challenge lies and target it. Hope that makes sense?