Present Day Tendencies in Education

for a reading in the fifth grade; another has another standard, and so on for the other grades. No two teachers have the same standards for either of these grades. We can tell nothing from such measurements, either as to the child's reading ability or as to his progress in reading. We should have a standard by which we can say that the second-grade child should make a mark of 35, for instance, the third-grade child a mark of 50, the fourth-grade child a mark of 75, and so on. If we had such a standard, we could tell what progress the child makes from year to year, and we could tell, too, when he has reached the desired degree of proficiency in reading. We could then let him drop reading as a school subject and devote his time to other subjects in which he was below the standard, or we could let him advance to a higher grade. As conditions are now, we make all the children in the room read, write, spell, and figure together regardless of the degree of proficiency they have attained. When a child has acquired the degree of proficiency required of a fifth-grade pupil in reading, writing, or arithmetic, there is no good reason why he should be required to study that subject with other fifth-graders.

STANDARD TESTS

Tests that approach a high degree of reliability have already been prepared for reading, spelling, grammar, composition, and a number of other school subjects. For example, Dr. Starch of the University of Wisconsin has prepared a spelling test by taking the second word on every even-numbered page of Webster's New International Dictionary, discarding 586 technical, scientific, and obsolete words and arranging the remaining 600 into six groups of 100 words each and of the same degree of difficulty in spelling. Thus the pupil who can spell all

of these words can spell 100 per cent of the commoner words in the English language. By giving the tests to thousands of school children over the country, it has been found that first-grade pupils spell correctly 10 words, second-grade pupils 30 words, third-graders 40 words, fourth-graders 51, fifth-graders 61, sixth-graders 71, seventh-graders 78, and eighth-graders 85. Thus we have a standard of attainment in spelling. If our children can come up to these standards, we may know that they spell well enough; if they do not come up to these standards, we know that they are not spelling as well as they should, and if they go far beyond the standard, we may know that we are devoting more time to spelling than is necessary. We can see, too, how the individual pupil is progressing from grade to grade. This test gives a means of comparing his spelling ability now with that of a year ago and of knowing the progress he is making in spelling. In the common system, when we mark the pupil 90 this year and 90 again next year, we have no means of knowing either his ability in spelling or his progress from year to year.

RELATIVE EMPHASIS TO BE PLACED ON SUBJECTS

The scientific standard tests will also render valuable service to the schools in that they help us determine how much emphasis should be placed on the several subjects. Many schools are putting more emphasis on English grammar, for instance, than is necessary. The teacher, the principal, or the superintendent of such schools believes in the educational efficacy of English grammar and frequently emphasizes it to the neglect of other subjects. The best school system, other things being equal, is that which keeps a proper balance between the several subjects and emphasizes each subject no more than is necessary for practical purposes. Some schools

put undue emphasis on geography, some on handwriting, some on arithmetic, and others on music and drawing. That is, they put more time than can be afforded for these subjects when we consider the needs of the other subjects.

The scientific measurements will also enable us to adjust the costs of the several subjects. When Latin costs five times as much per student hour as English or history, we may know there is something wrong. Either the cost of Latin should be reduced or the subject should be dropped from the curriculum. It is nonsense for us to retain a subject as a part of our curriculum regardless of the cost and regardless of its educational value.

THE RELATIVE WORTH OF SUBJECTS

There is another phase of educational measurement that has received but little attention up to this time, and that is that of evaluating the several subjects. We say algebra has great educational value in that it cultivates certain powers needed in after-life, but in this judgment we are controlled almost wholly by tradition. We say algebra develops the power of concentration, of accuracy, of thoroughness, etc.; but do we know scientifically that this is true?

Some of our greatest educational thinkers tell us that 'there is no such thing as a general ability along these lines. Those of you who have carefully read Dr. Moore's What Is Education? were impressed with. the weight of his arguments and there is in your minds, to put it mildly, a doubt as to the existence of a general ability along any line. To say the least, we do not absolutely know that we are offering the child in our schools the subjects that have for him the greatest educational value, nor do we know that we are offering the subjects we do offer in such a way as to make them

count for most in the child's education. Of course, great advances must be made in educational psychology before the pathway along this line is as clear as it should be; however, we have more light than we are using. We follow blindly the path of tradition, using the same school organization, the same methods, and the same curriculum our fathers used, and we seem to have the utmost faith in their transforming power. Most of us need not be quite so sure of the efficacy of the old-time educational régime. A small degree of skepticism, to say the least, would be a good thing for us. It is such skepticism that is awakening a spirit of progress in the educational system of our country. It is causing our educational leaders to attempt to evaluate our educational program and to adopt a system of organization, methods of instruction, and courses of study that will bring about the highest degree of social efficiency among our people. Of course the methods of evaluation offered up to this time are not scientifically perfect, but they have attained a high degree of perfection in several instances, and with the hearty coöperation of the school people of the country in trying out such methods we may expect even greater things in the future. Surely no progressive student of educational problems can close his eyes to what is being done.

TOPICS FOR REPORT AND INVESTIGATION

1. Quantitative measurement of school work.

2. The defects of the old-time system of grading with 100 as the basis.

3. Some of the scientific standard tests in the common branches. 4. Individual differences among children and their bearing on school work.

5. The application of the standard tests in evaluating the work of the schools.

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