Mentimeter No. 6
COMPLETION OF FORM SERIES
Character of the Test.
The Completion test is always very satisfactory because it shows in itself just what should be done and does not require a great deal of special explanation. The Form Series Completion test is particularly valuable in that it does not depend upon the English language either in its content or in the explanations to be made of it.
As with the majority of the other tests for non-English-speaking persons this test is here described as a test of one individual at a time, although it will be found very simple and easy to test a large group at the same time if the examples which appear on the title page of the test booklet can be painted on the wall or reproduced on a blackboard in such a way that the examiner can demonstrate to everyone at once just what is to be done. It is very desirable to examine large groups at the same time if the provision for such demonstration can be made.
Previous Form Series Completion tests have required the candidate to fill in the last characters of each line, everything being printed in order up to within a few sections of the end. The present form, in which the elisions are distributed through the series rather than being grouped at the end, has the advantage that it may be made more difficult by far than the previous forms. Although this test probably measures a rather specialized type of intellectual ability, it is nevertheless sufficiently well graduated in difficulty so that the result obtained by it will show a close relationship to the result obtained in other more general tests.
The problem of the candidate who is given this test is chiefly that of solving, from the rather meagre data presented, just what the serial order of the different forms may be. This undoubtedly calls for a complex variety of special mental qualities, including imagination and abstract reasoning ability. Nevertheless, it is hardly possible for the authors to make any sort of estimate of just where this test will be most valuable or just what it measures. It will certainly be interesting and entertaining whether it works out to have any particular usefulness or not.
Directions for Giving the Test.
The candidate should be seated at the left of the examiner in order that he may conveniently work upon the test booklet which should be placed on a table between them. After filling out for the candidate the information blanks giving name, age, and the like, the examiner should show for fifteen or twenty seconds (not more than 20 seconds) the inside of the booklet. He should then turn back to the title page and demonstrate the nature of the test by means of the examples printed there.
Probably the best and most effective method of demonstration is that of “jumping” the pencil rhythmically from one block to the next corresponding one to show the rhythmic sequence of the same symbols. When a block is reached in which the symbol has been omitted (but in which the samples have been crudely marked with a fine pen), the examiner should make an appropriate heavy mark such as is used in the printed sections of each series. After any symbol has been written on the explanation samples it would be very much worth while to skip rhythmically along the line making certain that the sequence is correctly followed. When it seems fairly certain that the candidate has grasped the rhythmic nature of the forms, the examiner should open the booklet, give him a pencil, and say “Put them in.” “Fix it up.” “Go ahead.”