The Teacher’s Guide to Intelligence and other Psychological Testing
- Author:
Allen Hunt and Percival Smith.
Published by Evans Bros. Price Is. 6d.
This book is intended as a guide to teachers and others, on the application of intelligence tests, and it claims to be a practical handbook. A teacher, or anyone else, taking it up full of hope and expectation would read from cover to cover and remain ignorant of what constitutes a thorough psychological examination. There is emphasis on the need for special training for all would-be testers, but no mention of courses where this training may be acquired, e.g., those organised by the National Institute of Industrial Psychology, and by certain local Education Authorities. There are general considerations about tests but no detailed references and no indication is given as to where test material and instructions may be obtained.
The authors note the limitations of group tests when the subjects are retarded children. They suggest that if children fail badly on one test they shall be re-tested ” to obtain a check, by giving another group test of intelligence, or, better still, an individual test “?but we are not told in what way the second group test should differ from the first, and whether, if the two sets of results tally, they are to be regarded as reliable.
This is certainly not the guide and practical handbook it claims to be. “Notes on the theory and practice of mental testing’’ would be a more acceptable title. There should, moreover, be some indication that the book contains preliminary considerations on the topic rather than details of practical help.
The ” preliminary considerations ” are extremely useful and include a timely statement of the difficulties involved in testing and the dangers of the mis-use of psychological tests.
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