A Study of the Reading Attainment of Children in Ungraded Classes
- Author:
Edna Willis McElwee
Department of Ungraded Classes, New York City Some of the children who find their way into ungraded schools have been retarded in their school progress because of reading disability. It is known that success in all other school subjects is dependent upon the ability to read for content. For this reason the value of remedial reading instruction can not be over-estimated. This study presents an analysis of the reading attainment of 800 entrants to ungraded classes. The cases were selected to give a random sampling of the children admitted to ungraded classes during one school year. All nationalities were represented, but the majority were Italian.
The 450 boys and 350 girls in the study were in the first four grades of school. Their chronological age range was from eight to fourteen years. Their I. Q. range on the Stanford-Binet examination was from 50 to 75. The range of their mental ages was from five to nine years with a median mental age of seven years. In Table 1 the distribution of reading attainment according to mental age is shown. The range of reading attainment was from zero to 4A with a median reading grade of IB. Approximately 25 per cent of the entire group (203 children) had a total reading disability. Of that number 53 had a mental age of seven, eight or nine years.
Further analysis shows that approximately 17 per cent of the entire group (137 children) were reading above expectation, considering their mental age. As the reading norms used were for the end of the term, a child with a mental age of seven years to seven years, eleven months should have completed either IB or 2A reading, depending on whether his mental age was above or below seven years, six months. On this basis the 57 children with a mental age of seven years and a reading grade of 2B or above were reading above expectation. In the same way 26 children with a mental age of five years, 35 with a mental age of six years and 19 with a mental age of eight years were reading
Table I Tabulation of the Mental Ages and Reading Grades of 800 Entrants (450 Boys and 350 Girls) Who Were Admitted to the Ungraded Classes During the School Year 1930-1931 Reading Grade 0 Boys Girls Total 36 37 73 Mental Age 39 38 77 16 19 35 9 17 Total 203 1A Boys Girls Total 15 9 24 20 26 46 34 15 49 20 6 26 147 IB Boys Girls Total 9 7 16 23 24 47 11 4 15 85 2A Boys Girls Total 6 4 10 30 35 65 27 16 43 11 2 13 131 2B Boys Girls Total 22 12 34 28 26 54 12 10 22 119 3A Boys Girls Total 12 6 18 24 12 36 9 12 21 75 3B Boys Girls Total 9 4 13 5 7 12 29 4A Boys Girls Total 11 Total 99 158 255 210 78 800
above expectation. Many of these were the older children in the study, who were unable to read as well as the average child in the grade in which they had been placed.
An inspection was made of the school record cards of the entrants who were thirteen years of age at the time they were examBEADING ATTAINMENT OF CHILDREN 207 ined for admission to the ungraded classes. The original group included slightly more than 100 such children, but it was possible to find complete record cards for only 44 of them. Some of them had changed schools frequently; some had come from other cities; some had been discharged because of ill health; some were late in entering; and some were of foreign birth.
The entire group of 44 children entered the 1A grade between the ages of six and seven years, but they soon fell behind in their classes. After four terms in school 17 children were still in the 1A grade and 21 had reached only the IB grade. By the time they had reached the age of nine years all were retarded from one to five terms. At the age of thirteen years, when they were admitted to the ungraded classes, they were retarded from two to eight terms with a median retardation of five terms. Undoubtedly reading disability had been an important factor in their retardation. At the close of each school term those children in ungraded classes who have greatly improved in educational attainment are promoted to the regular grades or to opportunity classes. In Table II the reading attainment of 44 children, thirteen years of age, who
Table II Comparison of Reading Attainment of 44 Thirteen-Year-Old Children Admitted to Ungraded Classes with the Reading Attainment of 44 Thirteen-Year-Old Children Promoted from Ungraded Classes During the Same School Year Admitted to Ungraded Classes Promoted from Ungraded Classes Reading Grade Number Children Per cent Children Number Children Per cent Children 5B. . 5A. . 4B. . 4A. . 3B. . 3A. . 2B. . 2A. . IB. . 1A. . Zero. 0 0 0 1 10 5 9 11 4 1 3 0 0 0 2.3 22.7 11.4 20.4 25.0 9.1 2.3 6.8 1 3 8 3 17 12 0 0 0 0 0 2.3 6.8 18.2 6.8 38.6 27.3 0 0 0 0 0
were promoted from ungraded classes during the same school year, is compared with the reading attainment of the 44 thirteen-yearold children who were admitted to the ungraded classes. In selecting this group of 44 children from the number of those promoted from ungraded classes for comparison with those admitted to ungraded classes, an effort was made to have two groups whose intelligence quotients were as nearly equal as possible. The same reading tests had been given to both groups: the Gates Primary Reading Test and the Thorndike-McCall Reading Scale. The range of reading attainment of the 44 thirteen-year-old children admitted to ungraded classes was from zero to 4A with a median reading grade of 2B; while that of the similar group promoted from ungraded classes was from 3A to 5B with a median reading grade of 3B. The results are shown in Table II. This comparison clearly shows that a marked gain in reading attainment is made by many children while they are enrolled in ungraded classes. The individual instruction and the remedial teaching which they receive there often enables them to make up their deficiency in educational attainment and to progress regularly through the grades.
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