THE ACCOMPLISHMENT RATIO
A Treatment of the Inherited Determinants
of Disparity in School Product
_By_
RAYMOND FRANZEN
A.B. (Harvard), M.A. (Columbia)
Ph.D. (Columbia)
Teachers College, Columbia University
Contributions to Education, No. 125
Published by
Teachers College, Columbia University
New York City
1922
_Copyright, 1922, by RAYMOND FRANZEN_
PREFACE
The results of the experiment reported here have become so much a
portion of my process of reasoning that duplication of material
presented elsewhere is unavoidable. I wish in particular to recognize my
indebtedness to the TEACHERS COLLEGE RECORD for permission to reprint
here revised portions of an article which appeared in the November,
1920, number of that journal. I will warn here any reader to whom the
intricacies of a full statistical account are irksome that the logic and
conclusions presented in this study are incorporated in a more palatable
and abbreviated form in Chapter IV of _Intelligence Tests and School
Reorganization_ (World Book Company).
The work presented here has been made possible by the cooperation
and interest of the two principals of the Garden City public school
during the period of my work there, Miss Gladys Locke and Mrs. Edna
Maule. I also owe any success that this experiment may have had to the
teachers who did the real work of “pushing” abilities to their limit.
My indebtedness to Gladys Locke Franzen for help in expression and
correction is surpassed only by what I credit to her encouragement and
cooperation at its inception.
During the period in which this experiment was planned and executed it
grew into a real problem through the advice of two of my teachers to whom
I owe all such inspiration and knowledge as I possess—Edward L. Thorndike
and Truman L. Kelley.
RAYMOND H. FRANZEN
_Des Moines, Iowa, 1922._
CONTENTS
I. AN OUTLINE OF THE EXPERIMENT 1
The Use of Quotients and Ratios
The Derivation of Age Norms
A Method of Survey of Reading, Language and Arithmetic
II. STATISTICAL TREATMENT OF THE EXPERIMENT 17
The Quotients
The Ratios
Summary
III. THE PSYCHOLOGICAL CONCLUSIONS OF THE EXPERIMENT 43
The Neglect of Genius
Is Genius Specialized?
Current Psychological Opinion
Conclusions
PART I[1]
AN OUTLINE OF THE EXPERIMENT
THE USE OF QUOTIENTS AND RATIOS
Standardized measurement of educational product has won its way to a
recognized place in the school life of this country. Many of our larger
cities have research bureaus of tests and measurements, and advanced
private schools have departments of measurement. The logic of the use of
statistically derived evaluations versus the use of opinion, swayed as it
is by the haphazard captions of emotion and condition, has become widely
recognized. The case of scientific measurement in education has been
argued and won. The objections to older forms of measurement have become
the criteria of the value of the new.
Still administrators, although they have been convinced theoretically of
its importance, find it hard to see just what measurement does for their
schools. They often object that measurements are made, the tests are
carried away by the examiner, and some time later they are presented with
a neat series of distributions and are told where their school stands
in relation to certain other schools or to schools in general. This is
undoubtedly a very important piece of information; since a determination
of the extent to which a goal has been attained forms the basis of the
commendation or condemnation of the methods, curricula, and text-books
employed in the process. But administrators want to know which of the
various elements of school procedure are to be praised and which are to
be blamed.
We cannot condemn or support a whole school system on the basis of
composite results (unless all possible educational objectives have been
measured, and show one common drift; or unless it is necessary that the
system fall or stand as a whole) since then we should be throwing good
and bad into a common discard. We must measure each thing separately. We
must build our ideal system of education synthetically, taking the best
methods from each of the prevalent groups of theories. There has been
too much absolutism in education, too little of a realism that sees the
good and bad in all and diminishes the bad and augments the good. If
we adopt this point of view we become really empirical in our method,
living through each educational experiment to incorporate it into a
growing treasury of tested theory, not deducing success or failure from
metaphysical or doctrinaire prejudice. In this administrators have been
more scientific than those who measure. They have always objected that
they wanted differential diagnoses. Here the answer to their needs must
come through experimentation and it is only through nation-wide study and
careful comparison and integration of results that methods of teaching
can be scientifically established.
Three uses of measurement commonly stressed are: (1) Diagnosis of degree
of attainment of goal; (2) selection of method of attainment of goal;
(3) definitive outline of goals. We have seen that the first two are
of little immediate value to the administrator. The first only gives
him an accurate notion of where he stands in any one subject without
pretending to tell him why; the second is a promissory note. Some day
we shall be able to tell him the best methods for the attainment of his
goal. The third has slightly more immediate value. Measurement splits up
the goals of education, gives them concrete formulation, allows teachers
to see an advance in the class in one function as separate from the
rest; allows them, for instance, to distinguish more clearly than they
otherwise would between oral reading and silent reading, or between
addition and division. But this, too, is rather too general to appeal to
administrative economy. One would find it very difficult to sell one’s
services as a measurer to a school board or a superintendent on the basis
of these three values. They answer that universities and scientific
research give them as much as they want of these values. What an expert
on measurement could add in interpretation of results would seem of small
additional value to them.
Still there is a very marked function that such an expert can perform;
but he must serve a fourth and fifth use of measurement while he serves
a particular school. When he serves the first three he is serving the
science of education and, unfortunately, no one school will pay him to do
that. The uses of measurement that directly benefit any one school are:
(4) Classification by information and intelligence and (5) diagnosis
of individual disability. For the proper prosecution of these aims
individual measurements and age norms are essential. Only with such
equipment can we make the prognoses of future school behavior which the
administrator so urgently needs.
Grade norms cannot be used to make individual diagnoses. Though we can
see by them which children are below and which above the level that in
their grade they should attain, we cannot see just what administrators
most need to know; namely, whether the retardation and acceleration are
justified or not—how many children are working at maximum. More than
that, computations based on grade norms are very inaccurate in individual
cases because the variability within any grade is so great. As it becomes
necessary to use new norms for such purposes it is important to have them
in terms that are directly comparable to intelligence mensuration.[2]
First in importance is an interpretation of the meaning of an
Intelligence Quotient. Too often it is stated as a number and left as a
number with the belief that somehow or other that is a tag which carries
its own divine implication. Its importance lies in its diagnosis of power
of adaptation, and it has a high correlation with the maximum possible
rate of school progress. Just as a pure information test diagnoses the
neural bonds that have been formed in any one field, so an intelligence
test diagnoses the ability to form bonds, to meet a new situation and
form satisfactory habits—power to learn. It may be thought of as a
diagnosis of the neural chemistry of the individual. As such it is not
concerned with the connections or quantity, but rather with the quality
of the neural tissue.
As an intelligence quotient is actual mental age divided by chronological
age—which is the normal mental level of the child’s age-group—so it is
the rate at which the child has progressed to mental maturity. It is his
potential rate of progress. It is a division of what is by what normally
would be. Then, when we use IQ we express the various degrees of power
of adaptation due to various degrees of fitness of neural equipment to
form bonds, by means of a diagnosis of the rate of formation of bonds
which everyone forms sooner or later in an environment such as ours. It
is conceivable that we might test this same power without testing the
presence of such bonds at all. Such a test would detect directly the
quality of the neural equipment irrespective of quantity or conformation.
A ten-year-old child whose mental age is ten has progressed at the rate
which is normal, and his IQ is 1.00. A very exceptional ten-year-old
child whose mental age is fifteen has progressed just one and one half
times as fast as the former, and his IQ is 1.50. Another exceptional
ten-year-old child whose mental age is five has progressed at just
one-half the rate of the first, and his IQ is .50. What we mean, then, by
an Intelligence Quotient is the rate at which a child grows to the mental
maturity of human beings in the world as it is.
For purposes of presentation of a problem one can here assume (an
hypothesis the value of which will here be determined) that each child
can attain this rate of progress in each of the elementary school
subjects. The degree to which this is true is the degree to which the
IQ is a valid index of power to deal with school subjects. This assumes
that inherited special disabilities in the school subjects are uncommon,
that school progress is determined by the interplay of intelligence and
environment, and that so-called interest characteristics which aid in
development are the result of an earlier interplay of intelligence and
environment. The degree to which educational product of children can be
made to approach this intelligence will allow us to judge how far these
factors are inherited, since differences that are removable must be
learned, not innate.
We can the more readily see the significance of viewing a child’s
equipment in terms of educational and mental age, when we conceive of
a Subject Quotient. This is a quotient resulting from the division of
the age level reached in the test in question by the chronological age
of the pupil. It is a measure of the rate of progress of the child in
the school subject under consideration. Thus a ten-year-old child with
ten-year-old ability in Thorndike Reading Scale Alpha 2 would have as
his reading age divided by chronological age, 1.00. This may be called
his Subject Quotient in Reading or his Reading Quotient. The division of
what is by what would be if the child were normal gives the percentage
of normality, the actual rate of progress. Since the IQ is the potential
rate of progress and the SQ the actual rate of progress, the ratio of
SQ to IQ gives the percentage of what that child could do, that he has
actually done. Thus a child with an IQ of 1.32 whose reading quotient
(his RQ) is 1.10, though he is doing work which is above normal, is not
doing work which is above normal for him. His RQ⁄IQ is 1.10⁄1.32, whereas
if he were progressing at his optimum rate it would equal 1.32⁄1.32. This
RQ⁄IQ is the same quantity as RA⁄MA. We may call this a Subject Ratio and
the average of Subject Ratios an Accomplishment Ratio. We could, if the
absolute association between reading age and mental age were perfect,
measure the approximation to ideal educational performance of any one
child in any one elementary school subject through the approximation
of this Subject Ratio to 1.00. As we will see later, Subject Quotients
approach the Intelligence Quotients when special treatment is given; that
is, the correlation of SQ and IQ becomes nearer 1.00 and the difference
between the average IQ and the average SQ approaches zero. It is safe
then to expect these Subject Ratios to be at least 1.00 before we
pronounce satisfaction with the school product.
There is certainly a significant relation between IQ and SQ, and the
more perfect the educational procedure has been, the more it has called
forth all that the child is capable of, the higher it will be. To
determine whether the quotient in any school subject can be greater than
the Intelligence Quotient in any significant amount, it will only be
necessary after we have perfect age norms by months to get that quotient
amongst enough pupils whom we know to be working at maximum. What is
significant here is that the more nearly any such quotient reaches or
exceeds the Intelligence Quotient the more nearly has the child been
brought up to what he is able to do under the best conditions. The
Accomplishment Ratio is the degree to which his actual progress has
attained to his potential progress by the best possible measures of both.
This would be a mark of the child’s effort, a mark of the concentration
and interest that the child has in the school work, and as far as no
inherited traits or capacities other than intelligence affect school
work it is a measure of the efficiency of a child’s education thus
far. If there are such other innate bases, it is also a measure of
those inherited traits and capacities or their predisposition, such
as concentration, effort, written expression, etc. At any rate it is
a measure of the child’s accomplishment, and so of the effort and
concentration as they really are at present working under those school
conditions. It is an index of achievement irrespective of intelligence.
A very convenient graph representing the same facts and easily
interpreted by the teacher may be constructed thus:
[Illustration:
Age Scale +------------------------------------------------ Mental Age
| _Reading Age_
+----------------------------------------- Chronological Age
| _Spelling Age_
| _Arithmetic Age_
+----------------------------------------------------------
]
Here it can be easily shown that Spelling Age, Reading Age, Arithmetic
Age, etc., are in some definite relation to both Chronological Age and
Mental Age. Using the Mental Age line as a goal, these records may be
kept constantly up to date. Another use of the Accomplishment Ratio is
as the medium in which the children may keep records of their own work.
As it is a mark in terms of intelligence, dull and brilliant children
may compete on a parity to bring their Accomplishment Ratios as high as
possible.
Mainly we have advanced formal education. We have in many ways promoted
the abilities to read, write, spell and figure. But our philosophy of
education has advanced far beyond that. We have other aims in education,
and consequently other methods and modes, which also must be measured and
judged. We wish to promote such qualities as stability, self-reliance,
concentration, and ambition. It does not necessarily follow that we must
measure these things directly, although every one vitally interested
in measurement cherishes the hope that we may some day measure their
behavioristic correlates,—“For the quality of anything exists in some
quantity, and that quantity can be measured.”
“Some of us might be entirely willing to rest the case after asking
whether in practical school life anyone ever saw a teacher thoroughly
confident of teaching ideals but neglectful of reading and arithmetic.
The fact is that the conscientious teacher always gives attention to both
and the successful teacher is able, without omitting one, to cultivate
the other. The theoretical possibility of thinking of the two results
separately has little significance in dealing with real teachers and
real schools. Good reading is a school virtue; and when one has measured
good reading he has measured more than the trivial or formal side of
education.”[3]
This I believe to be true, but I also believe that through measurement
we can actually promote those other more ethical ideals in education.
Through classification by information and by intelligence we gain
a marked increase of attention, concentration, ambition, and other
objectives, measured in part by Accomplishment Ratios. More discussion
due to a greater homogeneity promotes powers of inference and insight;
being only with equals promotes self-confidence and honor, and in many
cases prevents a regrettable conceit among supernormals; having work to
do which is hard enough prevents habits of indolence and carelessness so
commonly found among intelligent children.[4]
It is a well-known fact that much work must be done in classification to
get homogeneity or real conditions of teaching. As it is, most teachers
are talking to the middle of their classes. When they do they mystify the
lower quarter and bore the upper quarter; they talk to the upper quarter
and mystify the lower three quarters; or they talk to the lower quarter
and bore the upper three quarters. When a child is bored or mystified his
Subject Quotients become less while his Intelligence Quotient remains
constant. Then his Accomplishment Ratios become less as long as he
remains in a position where he is being mistreated educationally. This,
then, is the proper measure to see whether a child is classified properly
or not. At the Garden City public school I changed as far as I was
able the conditions of education of each child in that subject wherein
his Accomplishment Ratio was markedly below 1.00. The concentration
and effort of the child were obviously low and my attempt was to
change conditions and to promote habits of consistent work. When the
Accomplishment Ratio increased I knew that the child was profiting, that
he was working. Our objective was to increase Ratios of all children, not
to attain any set standard.
This Accomplishment Ratio would, to my mind, be an ideal school mark.
Besides the inaccuracy of marks to-day, which are accurate marks only of
the teacher’s opinion, biased as it is by the personal equation of her
character with that of the pupil, there is another fault of prevalent
school marking. It is based on average work. The mark is the link between
education in the school and education in the home. It gives the parents
an index of the child’s work and allows them to encourage or discourage
the child’s attitudes. Such indices have no real significance when they
are based upon average development, as the parent is generally mistaken
about the ability of the child.
Marks given by a teacher are satisfactory only for a normal child with
normal age for the grade. Brilliant children are over-praised for work
which, though over the ability for the group, is under their own ability.
Marks given to stupid children are misinterpreted by parents so as
greatly to prejudice the effort of the child. Though his work may be such
as to merit encouragement his mark may be very low. Teachers’ marks are,
aside from their inaccuracy, just, only in a group that is perfectly
classified; just, only when the children are all of the same ability and
all possess the same initial information. So far as they are unjust they
are subversive of our aims, as they then transmit a faulty message to
the home and disrupt the continuity of school and home education.[5]
Such marks as are here advocated would correct this feature of our
present system, as well as the inaccuracy of our present marks. It is a
mark which evaluates the accomplishment of the child in terms of his own
ability. A brilliant child would no longer be praised for work which in
terms of his own effort is 70 per cent perfect, in terms of the maximum
of the group 90 per cent. The teacher gives him a mark of 90 while we
mark him 70. A stupid child who does work which is marked 70 in terms of
the maximum of the class but 90 in terms of his own, a limited ability,
is no longer discouraged. His effort is evaluated, and the praise which
he receives from home is merited and consequently economical, since the
resultant satisfaction cements the bonds of concentration and attention.
Such a mark is an actual index of the effort that child is making and
consequently forms the proper link between the school and the home.
Parents would need no great instruction in the interpretation of these
marks, since they have always acted as though the other marks were these,
and since these also are in percentage form. The only kind of mark they
can understand is an Accomplishment Ratio. I found that the parents of
the children at Garden City were more attentive to such marks than to
others, and acted upon them more readily. Of course the parents of the
very intelligent children, who are used to marks above 90, are surprised
at first when you tell them that your mark of the child is 80; but upon
explanation, which should in all cases precede the first report to the
parents, they immediately see the value of such grading. It is fortunate
in this connection that the greatest amount of explanation is necessary
about intelligent children, as one usually deals then with intelligent
parents.
THE DERIVATION OF AGE NORMS
In this study age norms were derived empirically, both regression lines
being taken into consideration. From the point of view of statistics
it becomes imperative, in order to use the technique here advised, to
have the average age of a score—since we are going to predict age from
score—to translate crude scores into indices of maturity in each subject
under consideration. We are in error in the use of grade norms, if we
find the average score of a grade and then, when we obtain that score
in practice, say that the work is of that grade. To be able to say this
we must know the average grade of a score. This takes in an entirely
different cross-section of data. If we get the average score of all
children in grade 6, then we can predict what a 6th grade child is likely
to get, but we can say nothing about a child who is not in grade 6. In
order to decide that a 4th grade child has 6th grade ability, we must
know that he has such ability that all children who share this score make
an average grade of 6.[6] It would be wise then to get the regression
of score on age as well as the regression of age on score, since they
are not identical, the correlation between score and age being less than
unity.
We will note in passing that the data to establish these norms, except
those of reading, are not as complete as may be desired, inasmuch as
it was difficult to get test scores where the age in months also was
available. However, the general data behind the grade norms could be
used to keep the results from any crude error; and the averages were
obtained for every month from 8 years to 14 years, with a corresponding
refinement in intervals of score, which made still more improbable an
error in the general tendency of the regression lines. Then all the
distributions, when grouped by years, were corrected for truncation; that
is, the tendency for the brighter children of the older group to be in
high school (the data were from elementary schools only) and the duller
children of the younger group to be in the lower grades where they could
not be reached was recognized and corrected by finding the average,
standard deviation, and number of cases which would have existed if these
forces of truncation were not operating. This was done by the use of the
other one half of the figures comprising Table XI of Pearson’s _Tables
for Statisticians and Biometricians_. Dr. Truman L. Kelley pointed the
way to its derivation.
These norms differ somewhat from those derived from the grade norms by
translation of grade into average age for the grade. This is because the
norm for a grade is the average score for a grade. Hence the norm of age
10 obtained in this way is the average score obtained by a grade whose
average age is 10. Then the data used to obtain this average are made up
of diverse ages, all of one grade, instead of all of one age and diverse
grades. Even then, we would have only an average score of an age which
approximates what we want, but is not as reliable to use as average age
for a score.
A METHOD OF SURVEY OF READING, LANGUAGE, AND ARITHMETIC
The following procedure was employed in the experiment. The experiment
was carried out in the public school at Garden City. Two hundred children
were given the tests. The instructions, shown below, were followed in
November, 1919, and in November, 1918; in June, 1919, and in June, 1920,
with the exception that no arithmetic test was used in November, 1918,
and June, 1919. The Binet tests were given by the author; all of the
others were given either by the author or the principal who was careful
not to deviate from the directions in any way. In June of both years
the author gave instructions for a test in one room, and then left the
teacher in charge and went on to the next. This could be done in June of
each year as the teachers were then fully acquainted with the experiment
and their coöperation was assured.
DIRECTIONS
I. Administer and score the following tests according to
standard instructions. Give all tests to grades 3 and above.
Woody-McCall Mixed Fundamentals in Arithmetic
Thorndike Reading Scale Alpha 2
Thorndike Visual Vocabulary Scale, A2
Kelley-Trabue Completion Exercises in Language
Stanford-Binet Tests (given by the author)
II. Translate the scores into year-month indices of maturity by
means of the following table. (Use Mental Age for the Binet.)
Assume rectilinear development, that is, that the amount of
score which equals the development of one month is the same as
the amount of score which equals the development of any other
month. Then interpolation and extension are allowable. Use the
table in this way: Find in the table the score made by a child
(for instance in the Woody-McCall); find the age to which it
corresponds, then call this age the Arithmetic Age of the
child. For instance, if the score in Woody-McCall is 20, his
Arithmetic Age is about halfway between 10 and 11 or 10 years 6
months.
=====+============+=======+=============+=============
Age |Woody-McCall|Alpha 2|Visual Vocab.|Kelley-Trabue
-----+------------+-------+-------------+-------------
8—0 | 12.00 | 4.50 | 3.60 | 4.30
9—0 | 15.16⅔ | 4.98 | 4.32 | 5.00
10—0 | 18.33⅓ | 5.46 | 5.04 | 5.65
11—0 | 21.50 | 5.94 | 5.76 | 6.35
12—0 | 24.66⅔ | 6.42 | 6.48 | 7.05
13—0 | 27.83⅓ | 6.90 | 7.20 | 7.70
-----+------------+-------+-------------+-------------
III. Arrange these Arithmetic Ages of all the children of your
school in order from high to low with the names opposite the
scores in the extreme left-hand column of the paper. At the
right have parallel columns of the grades. Check the grade of
each child in these columns. You will then have a sheet like
this:
================+======+===================
| | Grade
| +---+---+---+---+---
Name |Arith.| 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8
| Age +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-
| |B|A|B|A|B|A|B|A|B|A
----------------+------+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-
Gertrude Smith | 180 | | | | | | | | |#|
| +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-
Saul Sampson | 176 | | | | |#| | | | |
| +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-
Ed Jones | 176 | | | | | | | | |#|
| +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-
George Calut | 172 | | | | | | | | | |#
| +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-
Ida Henry | 172 | | | | | | | | | |#
| +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-
Raymond Teller | 172 | | | | | | | | | |#
| +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-
Ed Hoard | 172 | | | | | | |#| | |
_Etc._
Do the same with each of the tests. It is clear that,
independent of the unreliability of the test, if your school
were perfectly classified all the 8th grade children would come
first on each relation sheet and then the 7th grade children,
etc. You have now a picture of the overlapping of your grades.
Regrade in reading and arithmetic. Draw horizontal lines across
these relation sheets at the points of delineation. Divide your
total number of children by the number of teachers available
and then make a class division by the number of pupils, that
is, call the upper one-sixth of the total number of pupils
grade 8 in this subject, the next one-sixth, grade 7, etc.
Teach all grades of arithmetic at the same time and all grades
of reading at the same time. You can now send each pupil to the
grade in which he belongs in each subject.
IV. Call each derived age a Subject Age (SA). Divide each
subject age by the chronological age of the child. This will
yield what may be called a Subject Quotient (SQ), previously
called an Educational Quotient (EQ).[7] Dividing the Reading
Age by the Chronological Age, you arrive at a Reading Quotient.
This RQ is the rate at which the child has progressed in
reading. We have the same kind of quotient for intelligence
(Stanford-Binet IQ). This IQ is the potential rate of progress
of the child.
V. The ratio of any Subject Age to Mental Age[8] may be called
a Subject Ratio (SR), previously called an Accomplishment
Quotient (AccQ).[7] This Subject Ratio gives the proportion
that the child has done in that subject of what he actually
could have done, and is a mark of the efficiency of the
education of the child in that subject to date. The goal is
to bring up these Subject Ratios as high as possible. When
they are above .90, the child may be considered as receiving
satisfactory treatment, providing norms for subject ages
are reasonably accurate. (This figure, .90, applies to a
Subject Ratio obtained by using a Stanford-Binet Mental Age.)
An Arithmetic Ratio based on one arithmetic test and one
intelligence test only is not as good as one based on three
arithmetic tests and three intelligence tests. If Subject
Ratios go far over 1.00 the chances are that the Mental Age
diagnosis is too low. The average of the Subject Ratios of a
child may be called his Accomplishment Ratio.
In the application of the above instructions, whenever
opportunity offers for classification of both subject matter
and intelligence (which means many teachers or a large school),
use a Relation Sheet (for instance for Arithmetic) and then
have additional columns at the extreme right for intelligence
headed _A_, _B_, _C_, and _D_. If a child’s IQ is in the upper
quarter of the IQ’s of your school, check in the column A
opposite his name; if it is in the upper half but not in the
upper quarter check in _B_, and so on with _C_ and _D_. Then
you will be able to split each group; for instance, the one
which is defined as 8th grade in arithmetic ability, into four
sections, each of which progresses at a rate differing from the
others. The _A_ section will progress most rapidly, _B_ next,
_C_ more slowly, and _D_ most slowly.
As Garden City was a small school, adjustment of procedure to individual
differences in intelligence, besides the grouping for subject matter,
was done mostly by pushing children. Children were advanced whole years
(the grade they “belonged to” was the one in which geography and history
were taught; this was their home grade) besides the readjustment made
by the special regrading in reading and arithmetic. A special treatment
class was formed where pronounced negative deviates were given special
attention. Regrading was also instituted for spelling. Children were
promoted whenever it was considered advisable; teachers were switched
from subject to subject whenever that was considered advisable by the
principal and the author. The Thorndike _Arithmetics_ and other new texts
were introduced to some extent. _Any change possible was made in order
to bring EQ⁄IQ as high as possible._ That was the goal. The purpose
was not to prove that any certain educational procedure would tend to
promote abilities more rapidly than others, but that abilities could be
promoted to the level of intelligence—that intelligence is substantially
the exclusive inherited determinant of variety of product among school
children. (It is to be understood that intelligence may be, and probably
is, the summation of thousands of inherited factors,—neutral elements,
here merged in the broader behavioristic concept of intelligence.)
SCIENTIFIC QUESTIONS INVOLVED IN CLASSIFICATION
If we were able to negate other influences upon disparity of product,
we could conclude that these were not inherited. Hence it would be our
burden as educators so to manipulate education as to prevent their
operation. We will attempt to analyze the determinants of individual
differences in product in these children, to see which influences besides
intelligence are part of the inborn equipment which is not the province
of education, but of eugenics, to correct. No absolute validity is held
for any of the conclusions stated here. The subject is, at best, vague
and complicated; but our conclusions can be used as the basis for a
good guess in school procedure. We can judge general tendencies from the
educational experiences of the two hundred children whose abilities for
two years are here charted.
The importance to educators of the subject in hand is excuse enough
for its treatment. All educational procedure points a prophetic finger
toward the classification of pupils and a reduction of the individual
differences of product to the inherited bases of these differences.
Classification, however, needs some more accurate psychological
foundation than the mere awareness of individual variance. We must know:
1. What tests to use.
2. How to use them.
3. Whether abilities in reading, spelling, and arithmetic or their
predispositions exist as special abilities, or whether children differ in
these simply because of their innate differences of intelligence.
4. Whether individual differences in ambition, interest, and industry, in
so far as they influence accomplishment, are due to special tendencies,
or whether they are learned manifestations of a more general heritage.
5. How these proclivities, specific or general, are related to
intelligence.
Points 1 and 2 are problems of procedure which must be evolved from our
existent knowledge of measurements and statistics. Points 3, 4, and
5 are problems which must be solved from the evidence resulting from
an experiment in classification using these methods. Points 4 and 5
introduce the vexed question of whether there is a “general factor” or
some general inherited cause of disparity in school product other than
intelligence. Should reading ability prove to be the result of certain
inherited abilities, or predisposition to abilities, we could not use
a measure of mental ability alone as the guide to what a child could
attain in reading. If intelligence, however, were the only inherited
prognostic factor of school achievement, we could mark the education
which had functioned in the child’s life by the percentage which the
actual accomplishment of the child was of the maximum accomplishment
of which he was capable at that stage of his mental development. So,
too, if interest in particular subjects and ambition are not mainly the
result of rewards and punishments of early life, but are themselves
significantly rooted in the nature of the child, we could not condemn
or commend curricula and methods upon a basis of the ratio of resultant
accomplishment to mental ability, but must include a measure of this
potentiality. The practical queries whether or not a child can do reading
as well as he does arithmetic, whether his ambition and his honesty have
their origin in the same strength or weakness, can be answered only when
these problems are fully solved. The immediate consequences of knowing
that a child can usually be taught to read if he does other tasks well
is of obvious import. It would be of great service, too, to know whether
lack of application can be corrected so as to bring concentration to the
level of the other traits. If a child is normal in other ways and not in
his tendency to respond to the approval of others by satisfaction, can
this “drive” be increased or reduced to the average, or are individual
differences in specific original tendencies basic to development of
character, and if they are, how much influence do these differences
exert upon school accomplishment? In order to classify children and
comprehendingly watch and control their progress we must know the
relation of achievement to the inherited bases upon which it depends. We
must be able to state a child’s progress in any one school subject in
terms of the potential capacity of the child to progress. We must know
the inherited determinants of disparity in school product.