[9] This child attended a private school where a number of the pupils tested above 140 IQ.
[10] This was written in 1931.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE THE ELEMENTARY SCHOOLING OF VERY BRIGHT CHILDREN
In this chapter are presented selected relevant paragraphs from two of the later papers by the author: "An Enrichment Curriculum for Rapid Learners" [1] and "What We Know about the Early Selection and Training of Leaders." [2]
This is neither the time nor the place for discussion of the techniques of mental measurement, but rather for the discussion of results. What, first, do we know about the selection of children who stand in the upper ranges of intelligence? Facts of much importance have been established since 1905.
In the first place, we have proved that children who rate in the top one per cent of the juvenile population in respect to "judgment," as Binet called it, also possess much more often than others those additional qualities which thinkers have most frequently named as desirable in leaders. There is a strong probability that a child who rates as only one in a hundred for intelligence will also be endowed in superior degree with "integrity, independence, originality, creative imagination, vitality, forcefulness, warmth, poise, and stability."
These characteristics are identical with those set forth by Harvard College as the additional traits desired in boys, already proved by tests to be highly intelligent, who are to receive National Scholarships. I believe no one would wish to delete from the list any trait thus stipulated. I would, however, add to it audacity, capacity for nonconformity, love of beauty, and cold courage, as traits to cherish in leaders, although these are often uncongenial to teachers in the elementary school, and possibly to other educators.
We find all these qualities in superior measure among highly intelligent children, according to the ratings of those who know them. If one would call for a mathematical statement of the likelihood of finding these traits in combination with high intelligence, we could give it. I may say that the correlation coefficients hover around .50. This means that in selecting any child testing far up in the top one per cent—say at 160 IQ or above (100 IQ being par)—there is far more than an even chance of having thus automatically selected a tall, healthy, fine-looking, honest, and courageous child, with a great love of adventure and of beauty in his makeup. With a correlation so far from unity as .50, however, we cannot be at all certain of such a happy combination. We shall find a minority of cases where fine judgment is combined with an unstable temper, a crippled body, an ugly face, a ruthless disregard for others, malign chicanery, cowardice. (I would say there cannot be a very high intelligence without the love of beauty.)
Educational psychology works constantly to find ways of knowing how to identify these additional elements. It will be a long time before we advance to a point where we can measure these as well as we can now measure intelligence. Some of these additional qualifications are undoubtedly as essential to leadership as intelligence is. A rascal, a coward, a liar, a tyrant, a panderer, a fanatic, an invalid, is not a desirable leader, no matter whether his IQ is 200. We must learn to select from among the highly intelligent those who have the greatest number of additional qualifications. We must learn what these additional qualifications are. One knows them when one sees them in action. For example, an eleven-year-old boy of IQ close to 180 decided to run for the office of class president in the senior high school to which he had been accelerated. His classmates were around sixteen years of age. During the electioneering a proponent of a rival candidate arose to speak against the eleven-year-old, and he said, among other things, "Fellows, we don't want a president in knee pants!"
In the midst of the applause following this remark, the eleven-year-old arose, and waving his hand casually in the direction of the full-length portrait of George Washington on the wall, he said, "Fellows, try to remember that when George got to be the Father of our country he was wearing knee pants." The eleven-year-old was elected by a large majority. He gave evidence not only of an IQ of 180, but also of the additional qualities of political leadership in highest degree: audacity, presence of mind, good humor, grace, and, above all, the genuine desire to be a popular leader. He knew how to bridge, by a debonair gesture, the great gap between him and those to be led.