Haggerty: The Ability to Read 



17 



Not only in those cases already mentioned where the median 

 score of one grade exceeds the median of a higher grade, but also 

 in other cases where there is an approximate equality does the 

 irregularity of grading appear. Thus the fifth grade of city 18 

 has exactly the median fourth grade rating in visual vocabulary. 

 The sixth grade of city 4 is not so good as the median fifth grade, 

 while the sixth grades of city 18 and city 1 are better than the 

 median seventh grade. The seventh grades of city 6 and city 

 10 are not so good as median sixth grades, while the seventh of 

 city 2 is better than the median eighth. Thus in city 9 the sev- 

 enth grade is essentially of the same ability in visual vocabulary 

 as the sixth; in city 11 and city 12, the sixth is the same as the 

 fifth; in city 4, grades 4, 5, and 6 are approximately the same; 

 in city 10, the sixth is even better than the seventh; and in city 

 2, the seventh is better than the eighth. 



Similar facts appear in Table 4, graphically in Figure IV, 

 showing results for the understanding of sentences. Here the 

 eighth grade (city 2) appears slightly superior to the seventh, 

 and the seventh slightly superior to the sixth, but the superi- 

 ority of score is so slight as to be negligible. On the basis 

 of the results of the two tests, it is clear that there is no essential 

 grade difference in reading ability between the two groups of 

 children constituting the seventh and eight grades of city 2. It 

 would be interesting to know what does constitute the child's 

 right to be promoted from the seventh to the eighth grade of that 

 city. Similarly what do cities 9 and 10 mean by passing pupils 

 from grade 6 to grade 7, or city 14 by passing sixth grade children 

 on to the seventh grade, or city 12 by promoting seventh graders 

 to the eighth grade? 



Several possible reasons are advanced for the failure of pupils 

 to continue their improvement in reading ability in the upper 

 grades. First and probably the most mischievous as well as the 

 most erroneous is that the pupils already read well enough. This 

 view, tho not often openly championed, is tacitly assumed with 

 a unanimity and complacency that is at least dispiriting. Teachers 

 and supervisors are rightly concerned to teach the pupils in the 

 early grades to read, but after a fair proficiency in vocabulary 

 and sentence interpretation is acquired, the attention of teachers 

 and pupils is turned to other things, to arithmetic, to literature, 

 to history, and the wide range of other studies clamoring for a 

 hearing. The teaching of silent reading as an art of understand- 

 ing and interpreting printed pages is made subsidiary and inciden- 



2—5533 



