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The VPA™: Assessment & Clinical Reasoning — participation guide

4 contact hours · 0.4 AOTA CEUs · Module 5 — follow along, take notes, and complete the reflection prompts.

Module 5

Administering the Full VPA™

Follow along

What this module covers

  • Progression, basal, ceiling
  • The five validity threats
  • The 15 skills sit on the five levels
  • Keeping a full battery clean

Key ideas

Capture these as you listen

  • Full VPA™ progression is strictly sequential from Level 1. Adaptive entry inflates profiles and hides the floor.
  • Basal = criterion performance at the first level administered. A Level 1 failure stops that skill; a Level 1 Domain 1 failure triggers referral immediately.
  • Ceiling = the first level failed; achieved level = highest level passed. Never score an unreached ceiling as a Level 5 pass.
  • Five validity threats: incomplete basal/ceiling, environmental deviation, fatigue, attention/behavioral state, unfamiliar stimulus content.
  • Domain 5 is administered last and is the most endurance-loaded, suspect fatigue there first, and re-administer fresh rather than interpreting through it.

Notes

My notes for this module

Reference figures

Keep these for practice

Screenshot — Full VPA™ runner in progress

Full VPA™ · in progress · Skill 6 of 9
Oculomotor efficiency → Pursuits02:14 elapsed
Level 1Pass
Level 2Pass
Level 3Pass (effortful)
Level 4Not attempted
Level 5Not attempted

Running record

Basal established: L2

Ceiling rule: 2 consecutive fails

Observed: head substitution, 3 losses of place

Student report: “letters go blurry”

Achieved level: 3

The runner keeps three things on screen at once: which probe you are in, the level ladder you are scoring against, and the running record. Basal and ceiling are computed as you go so you stop at the right place.

Photo — materials laid out for a full session

1Near cards (40 cm set)
2Distance chart
3Pursuit / saccade targets
4Copy worksheet + pencil
5Timer or phone stopwatch
6Tape measure
7Scoring sheet or tablet
8Occluder / patch
Lay materials out before the student arrives, in administration order. Hunting for a target mid-probe changes pacing, and pacing changes the score.

Apply it

Case prompt

A student was referred because she cannot locate the problem she is working on in a dense math worksheet. She passes Levels 1–3 in figure-ground, fails Level 4 narrowly after a hallway interruption, and you stop. What is the achieved level, what do you flag, and what one additional trial would you consider?

Practice

Mini exercise

Write the basal rule and the ceiling rule in one sentence each, then write the sentence you would put in a report when the ceiling was never reached.

Take it to work

Action step this week

Review your last three evaluation reports for any statement that would have required an unreached ceiling to support it. Rewrite one of them to state what was actually administered.