SCHOOL ACHIEVEMENT
E went to kindergarten from the age of 3 years to the age of 5 years. From 5 to 6 he was out of school on account of school organization (he could not be accepted in the first grade). From 6 to 7 years he attended an open-air, ungraded school and did the work of the second to the fourth grades. From 7 to 8 years he was in the fourth grade in regular school classes, and at the time of first observation by the writer, when he was 8 years old, he was in the sixth grade.
He was thus three full years accelerated in school grading, according to age-grade norms, but was still three years retarded in school according to his Mental Age. (Terman makes special note of the fact that superior children are almost invariably retarded in school grading according to Mental Age.) His mother stated that under private tutors E had at this time covered the work of the seventh and nearly all the work of the eighth grade. His school standing, on his last report preceding this initial account, was as follows (the highest attainable rating is 1, the lowest, 4):
Courtesy 1 Composition 2 Penmanship 3
Promptness 1 Grammar or Industrial Arts 1 [7]
System 1 Language 2 Fine Arts 4 [8]
Spelling 2 Mathematics 3 [6] Music 2
Reading or Geography 1 Physical Educa-
Literature 1 History 1 tion 4
Science 1
In addition to his regular school work E, by the time he was 8 years old, had covered the following special work in language and mathematics, either with a tutor or with his mother:
Mathematics: Algebra as far as equations; geometry.
Latin: Partial knowledge of the four declensions (he has been
taught by the direct, informal method, and reads easy Latin).
Greek: Worked out the alphabet for himself from an astronomical
chart, between the ages of 5 and 6 years.
French: Equal to about two years in the ordinary school.
German: Ordinary conversation.