Part 15 (2/2)

SCORING. The response is satisfactory if it indicates that the child has really made the discrimination, but we must be cautious about accepting any other response than the direct answer, ”A little girl,” or, ”A little boy.” ”Yes” and ”no” in response to the second question must be carefully checked up.

REMARKS. Binet and G.o.ddard say that 3-year-olds cannot pa.s.s this test and that 4-year-olds almost never fail. We can accept the last part of this statement, but not the first part. Nearly all of our 3-year-old subjects succeed with it.

The test probably has nothing to do with s.e.x consciousness, as such.

Success in it would seem to depend on the ability to discriminate between familiar cla.s.s names which are in a certain degree related.

III, 5. GIVING THE FAMILY NAME

PROCEDURE. The child is asked, ”_What is your name?_” If the answer, as often happens, includes only the first name (Walter, for example), say: ”_Yes, but what is your other name? Walter what?_” If the child is silent, or if he only repeats the first name, say: ”_Is your name Walter ... ?_” (giving a fict.i.tious name, as Jones, Smith, etc.). This question nearly always brings the correct answer if it is known.

SCORING. Simply + or -. No attention is paid to faults of p.r.o.nunciation.

REMARKS. There is unanimous agreement that this test belongs in the 3-year group. Although the child has not had as much opportunity to learn the family name as his first name, he is almost certain to have heard it more or less, and if his intelligence is normal the interest in self will ordinarily cause it to be remembered.

The critic of the intelligence scale need not be unduly exercised over the fact that there may be an occasional child of 3 years who has never heard his family name. We have all read of such children, but they are so extremely rare that the chances of a given 3-year-old being unjustly penalized for this reason are practically negligible. In the second place, contingencies of this nature are throughout the scale consistently allowed for in the percentage of pa.s.ses required for locating a test. Since (in the year groups below XIV) the individual tests are located at the age level where they are pa.s.sed by 60 to 70 per cent of unselected children of that age, it follows that the child of average ability _is expected_ to fail on about one third of the tests of his age group. The plan of the scale is such as to warrant this amount of leeway. But even granting the possibility that one subject out of a hundred or so may be unjustly penalized for lack of opportunity to acquire the knowledge which the test calls for, the injustice done does not greatly alter the result. A single test affects mental age only to the extent of two months, and the chances of two such injustices occurring with the same child are very slight. Herein lies the advantage of a multiplicity of tests. No test considered by itself is very dependable, but two dozen tests, properly arranged, are almost infinitely reliable.

III, 6. REPEATING SIX TO SEVEN SYLLABLES

PROCEDURE. Begin by saying: ”_Can you say 'mamma'? Now, say 'nice kitty.'_” Then ask the child to say, ”_I have a little dog._” Speak the sentence distinctly and with expression, but in a natural voice and not too slowly. If there is no response, the first sentence may be repeated two or three times. Then give the other two sentences: ”_The dog runs after the cat_,” and, ”_In summer the sun is hot._” A great deal of tact is sometimes necessary to enlist the child's cooperation in this test.

If he cannot be persuaded to try, the alternative test of three digits may be subst.i.tuted.

SCORING. The test is pa.s.sed if at least _one sentence is repeated without error after a single reading_. ”Without error” is to be taken literally; there must be no omission, insertion, or transposition of words. Ignore indistinctness of articulation and defects of p.r.o.nunciation as long as they do not mutilate the sentence beyond easy recognition.

REMARKS. The test does not presuppose that the child should have the ability to make and use sentences like these for purposes of communication, or even that he should know the meaning of all the words they contain. Its purpose is to bring out the ability of the child to repeat a six-syllable series of more or less familiar language sounds.

As every one knows, the normal child of 2 or 3 years is constantly imitating the speech of those around him and finds this a great source of delight. Long practice in the semi-mechanical repet.i.tion of language sounds is necessary for the learning of speech coordinations and is therefore an indispensable preliminary to the purposeful use of language. High-grade idiots and the lowest grade of imbeciles never acquire much facility in the repet.i.tion of language heard. The test gets at one of the simplest forms of mental integration.

Binet says that children of 3 years _never_ repeat sentences of ten syllables. This is not strictly true, for six out of nineteen 3-year-olds succeeded in doing so. All the data agree, however, that the _average_ child of 3 years repeats only six to seven syllables correctly.

III. ALTERNATIVE TEST: REPEATING THREE DIGITS

PROCEDURE. Use the following digits: 6-4-1, 3-5-2, 8-3-7. Begin with two digits, as follows: ”_Listen; say 4-2_.” ”_Now, say 6-4-1_.” ”_Now, say 3-5-2_,” etc. p.r.o.nounce the digits in a distinct voice and with perfectly uniform emphasis at a rate just a little faster than one per second. Two per second, as recommended by Binet, is too rapid.

Young subjects, because of their natural timidity in the presence of strangers, sometimes refuse to respond to this test. With subjects under 5 or 6 years of age it is sometimes necessary in such cases to re-read the first series of digits several times in order to secure a response.

The response thus secured, however, is not counted in scoring, the purpose of the re-reading being merely to break the child's silence. The second and third series may be read but once. With the digits tests above year IV the re-reading of a series is never permissible.

SCORING. Pa.s.sed if the child repeats correctly, _after a single reading, one series out of the three_ series given. Not only must the correct digits be given, but the order also must be correct.

REMARKS. Others, on the basis of rather scanty data, have usually located this test at the 4-year level. Our results show that with the procedure described above it is fully as easy as the test of repeating sentences of 6 to 7 syllables.[48]

[48] See p. 194 _ff._ for further discussion of the digits test.

CHAPTER X

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