Non-readers who fall between 80 and 100 IQ are especially worthy of attention, since they have sufficient general intelligence to make considerable use of reading, and to suffer a special handicap from illiteracy.
It may be confidently stated, as a result of the research of the past five years, that all children of average or better than average general intelligence are capable of literacy; and that very early use of and interest in reading are strongly symptomatic of general superiority in selective thinking. From these facts we may hark back to the conclusion of the physiological psychologists, Ladd and Woodworth: “Indeed, the entire cerebrum would seem to be, of necessity, involved in man’s linguistic attainments and uses.” Mastery of language is, as Binet concluded, one of the most reliable indications of competence in general.
REFERENCES
Anderson, C. I., and Merton, E.—“Remedial Work in Silent Reading”; Elementary School Journal, 1920.
Anderson, C. I., and Merton, E.—“Remedial Work in Reading”; Elementary School Journal, 1920.
Berkau, O.—“Otto Pöhler, das frühlesende Braunschweiger Kind”; Zeitschrift für Kinderforschung, 1910.
Berkowitz, I. H.—The Eyesight of School Children; U. S. Bureau of Education Bulletin, 1919, No. 65.
Bronner, A. F.—The Psychology of Special Abilities and Disabilities; The Bobbs-Merrill Co., Boston, 1917.
Burt, C.—“Unstable Children”; Child Study, 1917.
Buswell, G. T.—“An Experimental Study of the Eye-Voice Span in Reading”; Supplementary Educational Monographs, University of Chicago, 1920.