Billy
Bernice Leland Detroit Teachers’ College, Detroit, Michigan A fat little figure tottered down the hall in the wake of the first grade teacher. He stepped briskly and unafraid but appeared to receive just the proper support from a sympathetic hand at each step to keep him from falling flat on his face. “Please do something about Billy. I can not teach him to read.” This from the teacher, and the lovable little boy with her was Billy.
Billy was three semesters overdue in the second grade. In other words he was now spending his fifth in the first. He was nine years old, attractive to look upon, and apparently intelligent with a pleasing sense of humor. He weighed 69^2 pounds and was but 47 inches tall which fact produced a roly-poly effect, adding somewhat to the immaturity which seemed stamped all over him. Today, eight years later at the age of seventeen years three months, Billy is a larger edition of what he seemed to be that first day. Teachers are still asking that someone “do something for Billy.” His mother is still suggesting that he be “started all over again” in reading and we, with special interest in the problem, are still wondering what the answer is.
The case somewhat in detail, is as follows:
Billy was first placed with a small group of children who were being given special study. This was early in November, 1917. He rapidly became a general favorite in the room, his receptive attitude, ready willingness to learn, and unfailing good nature helping to make him so. The free organization of the group gave Billy the benefit of such help as other children were capable of giving, which proved to be desirable stimulation if no more tangible result can be recorded. Also, every lesson was under very direct supervision of the teacher.
It was found at once that he had a negligible reading vocabulary, the number of words which he was able to recognize being by no means up to a standard for any grade and furthermore he was uncertain of them from day to day. All reading was attended by great effort. He stumbled along pushing his head forward, shifting from one foot to the other, stopping often to smile, open his mouth, close it, wet his lips, give a little grunt, cock his head on one side, arrange or rearrange the speech organs and?still smiling ?give it up. Of course, such a performance upset phrasing completely, comprehension as well, and was more or less repeated when any silent reading exercises were presentd to him?all explained, of course, by the fact that he could not recognize words. On November 5, an Aldine Primer was presented to him. He learned the rhymes by rote readily enough, comprehending the situation perfectly, entering into dramatizations, making suggestions for play in this connection which showed observation and understanding. Each given word, having been first presented in the rote-rhyme way, was presented again and again in situations new and old. Billy saw and heard all new words many times. He met them on the blackboard in script and in print, singly in phrases, and in sentences. He found them on the printed pages of his book. He wrote them. He searched and found them in the newspaper. They stared at him from slips typed for silent reading exercises, or from labeled actors, pictures and toys. They were presented in every conceivable situation and Billy happy in the novel experience of acquisition in reading smiled and smiled in engaging enthusiasm, completing the Primer on January 15 a little over two months from the time he began it. The record at this time reads, “Reading much improved. Comprehension good.
Memory for words seems poor, preventing fluent reading.” Billy was advanced to the First Reader. Hoping now to give him some new means of helping himself, he was introduced to certain phonetic possibilities. He absorbed the plan readily enough, was able to blend the parts easily, and to be sure when the occasion for such a performance arose. But, in the end, the plan proved ineffective and useless because he consistently forgot from one day to the next what to call the key. For instance, it was no trick at all for him to see that t-all was tall, provided he did not forget that all was all, which he usually did. So this means of help was abandoned as unreliable. The sum of it all was that Billy was taught to recognize such words as he finally came to know through as great a variety of presentation as the skill and ingenuity of the instructor could devise, the plan of any given lesson being dependent upon the results of the one preceding and upon the situation at the moment.
Billy was born December 15, 1908. He is the oldest of ten children, nine of whom are living. The three youngest are triplets and the girl who died in early infancy was a twin. The next
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younger than Billy is a girl who has been rather carefully studied.1 Six of these children have attended the same public school and five of these were non-readers to as great an extent as Billy. One of the six entered parochial school too soon to have any record with us on reading.
The Binet reveals I.Q.’s as follows: Billy 79, when tested in January, 1918, D?98.7, D?96.1 J=, H?83, P?71. The parents own their own home in a good residential district. The father holds a responsible position with one of the largest R.R. concerns in the country and the mother manages their home efficiently with the help of the children all of whom have been trained to take some responsibility. We are not able to find any
morbid history.
Billy’s instrumental birth (without injury), the proverbial fall from a second story window at the tender age of two years, measles, whooping cough?none of these serve our purpose in defining the cause of Billy’s difficulties in learning to read. The mother is of Swiss descent. Billy was overweight from birth, 121/2 pounds at birth. Is it possible that this suggestion of glandular disturbance is of importance? In February, 1918, a specialist was unwilling to make any statement, requesting a return in six months and advising “no treatment for the present.” Meantime Billy was transferred to the parochial school where he “didn’t get along very well” but remained until the spring of 1926. He then re-entered public school in the A 7th grade and our attention was again called to him in December, 1926. His difficulties now are essentially the same as they were in the beginning. On Gray’s Oral Reading test, his score is 13.75. He omits, mispronounces, and substitutes words. He ignores the punctuation and frequently points to words. His rate is of course very low and he moves his head from side to side as his eyes shift. A common error is substituting a word similar in appearance as place for palace, when for then, youngest for younger. In many such cases, the sense of the passage is not too seriously disturbed and Billy is satisfied unless his attention is called to the word. Then he pronounces it correctly. His comprehension is everywhere superior to the mechanical performance, which so far as memory and records serve us, seems to be about what it was when he left us. Apparently he does not get an adequate word-image of any type?visual, kinesthetic or auditory, when he reads and 1 Dana?The Psychological Clinic, Jan.-Feb. 1922.
I think the explanation may be a congenital defect of attention. Details of words escape him. Furthermore he has a visual span of only three letters.
Billy is classified as “dull,” but he does not conform to any picture of the typically all-around dull child. He is alert, comprehending, responsible, and capable of persistent effort. He gathers up general information from his environment and makes good use of it. His difficulty in school comes mainly from his disability in connection with words. A word is a pattern of fine detail, comparatively, and he cannot seem to get these details. What connection if any there may be between his dullness and some possible glandular insufficiency is of course undetermined and must remain so as he is completely removed from observation now. In February, he left school to “get a job.” This has not yet materialized but his parents hope to find a place for him eventually where he can attend a trade school in connection. The college education so earnestly desired by these parents for each of the children is impossible for him and they realize it now. We suspect that the same conclusion must be reached later on for the others.
Billy is certainly one of the host who succeed better with their hands and heels than with their heads. Being socially agreeable and competent to meet situations which do not involve much intellectual activity, it is probable that he will find a niche where he can be useful in doing the plain work of the world. Some feelings of inferiority were detected but they have not overwhelmed him and he has not turned to undesirable ways of using his leisure time. Not a little interest in his case is derived from the fact that he is one of a family of children not feebleminded, who learn to read as well as they do only by most untiring effort and then, not fluently and well.
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