Tests and Measurements of Products
There is a group of recent studies which affect the curriculum and all other phases of school organization so profoundly that a separate chapter must be devoted to an exposition of their character and aims. These are studies which aim to standardize school work through tests, measurements, and exact quantitative descriptions of the products of teaching.
For example, one of the efforts of the elementary school is to teach pupils to write. It is entirely possible after the school has done its work to find out by an examination of the results how well pupils can write. It is never expected that pupils in the second grade will write as well as pupils in the upper grades. In this sense, then, it may be said that the results expected in the second grade are of a lower standard than those expected higher in the school. Furthermore, there is a sharp contrast between rapid writing and slow writing. The pupil who writes one hundred and fifty letters in a minute with a quality or form of letters which is fair exhibits one kind of result, while the pupil who writes only seventy-five letters a minute but shows great regularity in his letters exhibits another kind of result. It is not easy in two cases such as have just been described to determine at once which result is better. It may be that speed should be encouraged in order to secure free, fluent movements even if quality has to be sacrificed for the time being.