Cases where Failures show the Urgency of the Grading Problem
The foregoing paragraphs have, it is to be hoped, made clear the fact that the grouping of pupils and the organization of the curriculum are closely interrelated problems. The same lesson can be taught by a study of the actual operations of certain school systems which are organized under the graded system.
Fig. 11 shows certain records of failures in the elementary schools of Cleveland for one half of the year 1914. A failure on the part of a child in any school can have no other meaning than this: the child was, at the time of his failure, in the wrong group for his intellectual advantage. There is no effort in such a remark to place the blame for the child’s failure. Perhaps the child who fails is indolent. Perhaps the work is too difficult for him. Whatever the reason, failure means that the pupil and the system of grading are out of joint with each other. Hence, when we find pupils failing, we know that the grading system is not working perfectly.
In the figure the diagram at the left shows the percentage of nonpromotions in each grade. About 17 per cent failed in the first grade, about 12 per cent in the second, and so on. It may be well to comment briefly on the high percentage in the first grade. This is due to the fact that some pupils enter school when they are immature. Many pupils lose a great many days of schooling in the first years through contagious diseases, which, as shown by school statistics, are contracted more commonly during the first years than later. The family does not take care of attendance as carefully in the first year as later. The first year supplies the test which in many cases brings evidence of mental deficiency. These and other reasons explain the high percentage of nonpromotions in the first year. The reduced percentage in the second year is explained by the fact that a part of the task of adjusting pupils to the graded system and to the curriculum has been accomplished in the first grade.
Fig. 11. Record of nonpromotions and failures in Cleveland, 1914
The record given in the diagram for the third, fourth, and fifth grades is an impressive exhibition of increasing incoördination between the pupils and the work of the school. So striking is the difficulty in these later grades that we are led to ask for an explanation. This is supplied in part by the diagram in the middle of the figure and by the one at the right. These present the records of failures in two of the most important school subjects.
A record of constantly diminishing failures in reading is exhibited in the middle diagram. This shows that the teachers judge that the pupils improve steadily in reading. There is a satisfactory response to the methods of teaching reading and to the demands of the upper grades. Those pupils who have difficulty in reading in the lower grades are held back or are helped to master the art. The evident fact is that improvement in reading is, according to the record, continuous and satisfactory.
The diagram at the right shows the record in arithmetic. Here is the cause of many of the nonpromotions shown in the diagram at the left. Failures mount up in the middle grades at a rate which shows with manifest clearness that something is radically wrong.
One may venture several remarks in the presence of such records. It does not seem likely that the pupils are stupid, since it is shown that they can read. It is to be noted that they do not have any option about taking arithmetic, nor do they determine what arithmetic they shall study. They are evidently not getting a section of arithmetic in each of the grades which suitably parallels the reading which is administered to them.