EDUCATION 



1935 



EDUCATION 



children of different degrees of educational 

 progress. 



Many of the earlier and more crude stand- 

 ards of measuring the educational progress of 

 children still prevail. One of the best examples 

 is the use of text-books which are theoretically 

 graded so as to mark the progress of the 

 children. The use of the text-books in reading 

 is a case in point. Here the editors designate 

 the gradation by a series of titles such as First 

 Readers, Second Readers, Third Readers, and 

 so on. Unfortunately editors of reading text- 

 books have rarely known enough about the 

 progress of the children to be able to issue 

 the final verdict in connection with reading 

 ability. 



Variations in Standards of Promotion. The 

 theory of promotion from one grade to the 

 next has been that the work of one grade would 

 prepare a child to do the work of the next. 

 One of the difficult problems in connection with 

 this system has been the inability of the 

 teacher to know what to expect of a child in 

 a particular grade. The teacher in a particular 

 grade has often been ignorant as to how much 

 or what to expect of the children in her own 

 grade. She has also frequently been ignorant 

 of what the teacher would expect of her chil- 

 dren in the grade following. Some teachers 

 in their desire to be thorough and to escape 

 criticism from the teachers, in the grade beyond 

 set an unreasonably high standard, refusing to 

 promote any but those able to meet this un- 

 reasonable standard. Others set up too low a 

 standard of promotion, so that when the chil- 

 dren are promoted they are unable to do the 

 work required of them. These variations in 

 standards for promotion have become so ob- 

 vious as to be the cause of no little concern 

 in the minds of teachers and school adminis- 

 trators. 



The attempts to measure the progress of 

 children throughout the grades made by Thorn- 

 dike, Ayres, Blan, Strayer and others not only 

 have served to call the attention of the gen- 

 eral public to the necessity for a more adequate 

 system of measurement of what to expect of 

 the children from grade to grade and from 

 subject to subject, but they have helped to 

 meet the situation suggested above. 



Dr. Blan found that wide variation existed 

 in different sections in regard to the number 

 of children who failed of promotion in certain 

 grades. For example, 30.8 per cent of the 

 eighth-grade pupils of one city had failed of 

 promotion in the first grade; whereas, in an- 



other only 1.2 per cent of the children in the 

 eighth grade had failed in the first grade. This 

 indicated that in the first city a different stand- 

 ard of attainment was held for the children in 

 the first grade, or the children of the first grade 

 were of an inferior type. It is not likely that 

 the latter is as satisfactory an explanation as 

 the former. In all probability it is due to the 

 fact that there are different degrees of ability 

 in the measurement of the work in the first 

 grade in the two cities, as well as differences 

 in standards of attainment to be expected of 

 first-grade children in the two cities. Dr. Blan 

 found in general that "the pupils find the lower 

 much easier than the upper grades." This dif- 

 ficulty of properly grading the work of the 

 different grades is partially due to the fact that 

 the schools have not adequately done the work 

 to be accomplished in the different grades. 



Why Educational Measurement Is Necessary. 

 The demand for adequate educational measure- 

 ment has come about through the desire to 

 throw light on these and similar questions. The 

 superintendent has found it necessary to ask 

 the fourth-grade teacher, for example, what she 

 expected of her children in spelling, penman- 

 ship, arithmetic and reading. He has asked her 

 whether or not the standard of attainment in 

 her grade has been as high as in a similar grade 

 in New York, in Boston, Detroit, or in neigh- 

 boring cities. The answers to these questions 

 are highly desirable in view of the fact that the 

 work of the schools is being constantly eval- 

 uated by the public. Children leave one school 

 to go to another, or go out into the world. 

 There should be a clear understanding of the 

 expectation of performance on the part of a 

 child in the various fundamental subjects. By 

 means of educational measurement it should bo 

 possible for us to determine whether or not a 

 child in a particular grade is able to read, to 

 write or to cipher as well as we have a right to 

 expect him to do. 



Measurement of Handwriting. One of the 

 earliest attempts at the measurement of hand- 

 writing was made by Professor Thorndike, of 

 Columbia University. Ee secured thousands 

 of samples of handwriting, which he afterwards 

 had rated on general merit by a large number 

 of competent judges. Each judge was asked to 

 distribute the samples into a series of groups, 

 based on the least noticeable differences, the 

 best papers in one pile, the next best in an- 

 other pile, and so on. Building on the compos- 

 ite judgment of a large number of these judges, 

 Professor Thorndike constructed his handwrit- 



