L.— EDUCATION 223 



improper treatment during the pre-school stage. With a fully-organised 

 system of nursery schools the production of such maladjustments would 

 largely be avoided, and if there happened to be a clinic within reach to 

 which any serious difficulty might be referred, the needs of the district 

 as regards mental hygiene would be met. Attention given to prevention 

 would give far greater promise of ultimate success than the more elaborate 

 and costly curative provision. 



Apart from the new attitude to the pre-school child the most important 

 movement since 1905 is the coming of the Intelligence Test and its 

 incorporation as an essential element in the general scheme of education. 

 Probably more research has been carried out in recent years in connection 

 with tests for intelligence than in any other department of educational 

 activity. Even if only rough approximations could be secured in the 

 measurement of native ability, nevertheless, the advantage of such a 

 discovery would naturally make a very strong appeal to the minds of 

 progressive educationists. The researches of Binet and Simon clearly 

 pointed the way to the attainment of a means of estimating innate 

 intelligence. As a consequence, the Binet-Simon Scale has been the 

 starting point for an enormous amount of original research on a subject 

 which was destined to yield a rich harvest to the investigator if a really 

 satisfactory working method of testing native ability could be obtained. 



Various Revisions of the Scale have been adopted in difierent countries, 

 and improvements have been, and are still being, made. We are as yet 

 very far from having reached the ideal form of intelligence test, but 

 sufficient has already been done to show by actual experience, in a variety 

 of ways, the remarkable value of individual and group tests. 



In 1924, as a result of a very careful investigation by the Consultative 

 Committee of the English Board of Education, a Report was published 

 with the somewhat repellent title of ' Psychological Tests of Educable 

 Capacity.' From many points of view the Report is of considerable 

 importance and value. The Committeejconsisted of a body of well-known 

 educationists and administrators, but it contained no member who could 

 be regarded as a psychologist. The result was that the report was based 

 on the evidence of distinguished experts in psychology who came before 

 the Committee and who could speak with great authority on the subject of 

 intelligence. The conclusions thus formed, by men and women with no 

 special bias in favour of intelligence tests, were naturally unprejudiced, 

 and the report therefore can be relied upon as a cautious statement of 

 the position which is not calculated to over-estimate the value of this 

 new factor in the scheme of education. 



The following extracts from the report are of interest : ' What tests 

 of " intelligence " measure, therefore, is inborn, all-round, intellectual 

 ability, using the word " intellectual " in a loose sense to include practical 

 activities as well as theoretical, but to exclude processes of emotion and 

 qualities of character.' And after making certain criticisms : ' But, 

 with all these necessary reservations, the success and the wide-spread use 

 of intelligence tests remain among the most remarkable achievements of 

 modern experimental psychology.' The value of the Report is much 

 enhanced by an admirable historical sketch of the development of 

 psychological tests which was contributed by Professor Cyril Burt. 



