R. S. Boy, age 6-5; mental age 9-6; I Q 148. When tested at age 5-2 he had a mental age of 7-6, I Q 142. Father a university professor. R. S. entered school at exactly 6 years of age, and at the present writing is 7½ years old and is entering the third grade. Leads his class in school and takes delight in the work. Is normal in play life and social traits and is dependable and thoughtful beyond his years. Should enter high school not later than 12; could probably be made ready a year earlier, but as he is somewhat nervous this might not be wise.
T. F. Boy, age 10-6; mental age 14; I Q 133. At 13-6 tested at “superior adult,” and had vocabulary of 13,000 (also “superior adult”). Son of a college professor. Did not go to school till age of 9 years and was not taught to read till 8½. At this writing he is 15½ years old and is a senior in high school. He will complete the high-school course in three and one-half years with A to B marks, mostly A. Gets his hardest mathematics lessons in five to ten minutes. Science is his play. When he discovered Hodge’s Nature Study and Life at age of 11 years he literally slept with the book till he almost knew it by heart. Since age 12 he has given much time to magazines on mechanics and electricity. At 13 he installed a wireless apparatus without other aid than his electrical magazines. He has, for a boy of his age, a rather remarkable understanding of the principles underlying electrical applications. He is known by his playmates as “the boy with a hobby.” Stamp collections, butterfly and moth collections (over 70 different varieties), seashore collections, and wireless apparatus all show that the appellation is fully merited. He chooses his hobbies and “rides” them entirely on his own initiative.
J. S. Boy, age 8-2; mental age 11-4; I Q 138. Father was a lawyer, parents now dead. Is in high fourth grade. Leads his class. Attractive, healthy, normal-appearing lad. Full of good humor. Is loving and obedient, strongly attached to his foster mother (an aunt). Composes verses and fables for pastime. Here are a couple of verses composed before his eighth birthday. They are reproduced without change of spelling or punctuation:—
Christmas
Hurrah for Christmas
And all it’s joy’s
That come that day
For girls and boy’s.Flowers
Flowers in the garden.
That is all you see
Who likes them best?
That’s the honey bee.J. S. ought to be in the fifth grade, instead of the fourth. He will easily be able to enter college by the age of 15 if he is allowed to make the progress which would be normal to a child of his intelligence. But it is too much to expect that the school will permit this.
| Christmas
Hurrah for Christmas And all it’s joy’s That come that day For girls and boy’s. |
Flowers
Flowers in the garden. That is all you see Who likes them best? That’s the honey bee. |
F. McA. Boy, age 10-3; mental age 14-6; I Q 142. Father a school principal. F. is leading his class of 24 pupils in the high seventh grade. Has received so many extra promotions only because his father insisted that the teachers allow him to try the next grade. The dire consequences which they predicted have never followed. F. is perfectly healthy and one of the most attractive lads the writer has ever seen. He has the normal play instincts, but when not at play he has the dignified bearing of a young prince, although without vanity. His vocabulary is 9000 (14 years), and his ability is remarkably even in all directions. F. should easily enter college by the age of 15.
Fig. 14. BALL AND FIELD F. McA., AGE 10-3, MENTAL AGE 14-6
E. M. Boy, age 6-11; mental age 10; I Q 145. Learned to read at age of 5 without instruction and shortly afterward had learned from geography maps the capitals of all the States of the Union. Started to school at 7½. Entered the first grade at 9 a.m. and had been promoted to the fourth grade by 3 p.m. of the same day! Has now attended school a half-year and is in the fifth grade, age 7 years, 8 months. Father is on the faculty of a university.
E. M. is as superior in personal and moral traits as in intelligence. Responsible, sturdy, playful, full of humor, loving, obedient. Health is excellent. Has had no home instruction in school work. His progress has been perfectly natural.
The above list of “very superior” children includes only a few of those we have tested who belong to this grade of intelligence. Every child in the list is so interesting that it is hard to omit any. We have found all such children (with one or two exceptions not included here) so superior to average children in all sorts of mental and moral traits that one is at a loss to understand how the popular superstitions about the “queerness” of bright children could have originated or survived. Nearly every child we have found with I Q above 140 is the kind one feels, before the test is over, one would like to adopt. If the crime of kidnaping could ever be forgiven it would be in the case of a child like one of these.
Fig. 15. DRAWING DESIGNS FROM MEMORY. E. M., AGE 6-11; MENTAL AGE 10, I Q 145 (This performance is satisfactory for year 10)