(Age 8 years 8 months) "Books about people who really lived."
A has always preferred books of fact to books of fancy—"true books," as he called them; but now he enjoys fairy tales more than he did when he was younger. This may be because the fact behind the fancy now makes a stronger appeal. The following list represents six months' reading, from the age of 7 years 0 months to 7 years 6 months, some of the books being read to A, to reduce eyestrain. [4]
On Plymouth Rock S. A. Drake
Four Great Americans J. Baldwin
Stories of New York A. T. Lovering
The Children's City E. Singleton
The Burgess Bird Book Thornton Burgess
The Burgess Animal Book
The Empire State J. W. Redway
Around the World with the Children F. G. Carpenter
East o' the Sun and West o' the Moon G. W. Dasent
Miles Standish H. W. Longfellow
The Wreck of the Hesperus H. W. Longfellow
Fables Bulfinch
Aesop's Fables
Tales and Teachings from the
Pentateuch M. M. Joseph
The Little Gray Grandmother Carolyn S. Bailey
Stories of the Bible Louise M. Pleasanton
The Pied Piper of Hamelin R. Browning
Tanglewood Tales N. Hawthorne
First Jungle Book R. Kipling
Second Jungle Book R. Kipling
Poems J. W. Riley
Poems Eugene Field
Poems R. L. Stevenson
The Wonder Book of Knowledge
The Blue Bird M. Maeterlinck
Historic Boyhoods R. S. Holland
The Friendly Stars M. E. Martin
This list gives an idea of the reading preferences of A, at the age of 7 years. Within the year following, the preference for biography and autobiography developed.
Interest in astronomy. Because other very young children of more than 180 IQ known to the present writer had been especially interested in astronomy—particularly Child E—it was desired to observe what would be the reaction of A if knowledge of astronomy were made accessible to him. Books which had interested Child E at the age of 6 to 7 years were therefore made accessible to A. He at once became interested in the heavenly bodies and their movements.
Tendency to classify and diagram. A's love of classifying— first noted at the age of about 12 months—is a conspicuous characteristic. He classifies events, objects, names, numbers, and other data of experience. He can think in terms of diagrams and sometimes draws a diagram to clarify or condense his meaning.
Lightning calculation. A's keenest intellectual interest is probably in numbers, and he has responded very readily to his father's instruction in short-cut methods of calculation. By March, 1922, he could very quickly square any number up to 100; multiply any two numbers of a sum not to exceed 200; square any number up to 1000 ending in 5 such as 865, 935, etc.); square any number up to 10,000, ending in 55 or in 555; solve problems in proportion, such as 9 : 21 :: 21 : x, 8 ÷ 42 :: x ÷ 21, 8 : 9 :: 10 : x, subtract the square of one number ending in 5 from the square of another number ending in 5, where the difference between the two numbers is 10, or 20, or 30 (e.g., 2255² or 2245² or 3345² or 3325²). Also at that age he could calculate series of operations, thus: "Take 2, square it, square that, divide by 4, cube it, add 17, take the square root, add 7, square it, square it, give the result," his calculations taking about five seconds each.
EDITOR'S SUPPLEMENT
The author's original write-up of Child A ends with the above, written early in 1923. From records in the author's files the following further data concerning later development may be added:
December 26, 1923 AGE: 9 years 6 months SCHOOL GRADE: Sixth TEST RECORD: Given Stanford-Binet by L. S. H. with Mental Age of 16-11. This would give IQ 178, but the comment is made, "Can no longer be measured by Stanford-Binet." On this day also given Army Alpha, with a score of 128 points, this being the score assigned to chronological age 17 years 8 months.