The WPPSI was used in a Manhattan, N.Y., public school because administrators, teachers, and parents had asked for help in understanding children who had difficulty in learning to read well, despite special efforts to help them. A preventive intervention program was begun based on a clinical study of every first grader. Forty children were predicted to make normal progress; 30, a "high risk" group, gave evidence on neurological and perceptual examinations that they might have learning problems; and 12 children were omitted. High risk cases were those with a discrepancy between expectancy and achievement. Comparisons were made of the total groups of high risk and normal progress children, of samples matched for IQ and sex, and of subgroups based upon diagnosis within the Intervention (high risk) group. Despite the small diagnostic subgroups, some tentative conclusions can be drawn: (1) the WPPSI produced rich clinical material best understood in conjunction with the diagnostic subgroups; (2) the quantitative and qualitative WPPSI material helps in the selection and diagnostic processes and in planning intervention; and (3) it is inadvisable to assume that learning disability is a homogeneous condition manifesting itself in a characteristic cognitive pattern in first grade. WPPSI profiles for some typical cases and for the diagnostic subgroups are included. (CK)