Shapes I can tell apart
Matches shapes, names them and sees size and direction — a drawn game with no reading, for the child before school.
What it measures
Describes what the child does with shapes today: whether they match a shape even when its colour differs, whether they know its name, and whether they see differences of size and direction. The last is the closest thing in the instrument to reading: a letter is a shape, and a child who sees which way a triangle points will see the difference between similar letters.
How to read the result
Matching and naming come apart exactly as they do with colours: a child who matches but does not name has not heard the names yet. "Sees size and direction" is the one most worth your attention — not because it predicts anything, but because the play that raises it (blocks and puzzles) is the same play that helps the child with everything else.
Before administering
Sit beside them, read the question aloud, and let them press with their finger. Do not correct and do not point. If this is the first time they have held a device, let them practise pressing before you begin — otherwise you have measured their finger, not their eye.
Its limits
⚠️ This is not a reading-readiness screen, it does not predict dyslexia, and it is not fit for delaying a child's start at school or placing them in a group. It is not standardised and has no norms, and four items in a dimension are enough for a description and not for a decision. And pressing a screen is itself a skill: a child who has never held a device may miss the target rather than the answer. The gap between a four-year-old and a five-year-old is vast — read it together with their age in months.
Its dimensions
- Matches the shapeWhen high: Sees the shape apart from its colour, and matches it even when the colour differs.
- Knows the shape nameWhen high: Links the name of the shape to its picture.
- Sees size and directionWhen high: Compares sizes and catches what is upside down and back to front.