Intelligence Tests in Classifying Children in the Elementary School

For the purpose of determining to what degree the school supervisor may through mental tests predict the educational career of public school children and thus throw light on their proper classification, the writer made a study of the results of the Haggerty Intelligence Examination in comparison with the school grades and estimates of teachers in the case of a group of pupils in the elementary grades at Lincoln, Nebraska. The tests were given to 1,078 grade children distributed as follows: primary grades (i, n, and in) 602 pupils, intermediate grade (vi) 476 pupils. The Haggerty Intelligence Examination, Delta I was used in the primary grades and Delta II in the intermediate grade. The tests were given by Miss Clara Slade, psychologist in the Lincoln schools, and the results were tabulated and interpreted by a class of 67 graduate students in educational measurements under the direction of the writer. The test paper of each pupil was corrected by three different students working independently. The examination was given in the middle of May, 1920. All teachers having to do with the instruction of the children gave their ratings of the intelligence of the pupils at the time the tests were made. The judgment of the teachers was based upon class grades made during the year and upon their general estimate of intelligence. In the case of each pupil the teacher's rating represents the average of the combined estimates of several instructors. As will be seen in Table I, the intelligence rank, as given by the teacher, was arranged on a five-point scale: very superior pupils being ranked A, superiors B, average pupils C, inferiors D, and very inferiors E. The rating by the intelligence tests was arranged on a similar scale and was based on the I. Q.'s obtained in the usual way (that is by dividing the mental age by the chronological age). Rank 1 in intelligence represents the students whose I. Q. was 120 or above, rank 2 those with an I. Q. from 110 to 119, rank 3 those with an I. Q. from 90 to 109, rank 4 those with an I. Q. from 80 to 89, and rank 5 those with an I. Q. below 80. In Table I all entries in the upper left-hand corners of the compartments are for the sixth-grade pupils; those in the lower 40