7534°-16

In order to show that many of the children who are chronologically ver age are also mentally over age, this group of children is distributed by grade and by mental age as established by the Binet-Simon test. This distribution is kept separate for those who are accelerated (Table 31), those who have not repeated (Table 32), and those who have repeated (Table 33).

In most city school systems, it is the practice to count two years to a grade in estimating the percentage of over-age children, but in the Richmond school system the custom has been to count one year to a grade. This basis necessarily makes the percentage of over-age children much larger than if two years had been used.

The distri

Therefore, for a child to be rightly placed in a grade his mental age ought to be the same as the normal chronological age of that grade. This does not mean, however, that this child is as far advanced as he ought to be according to his chronological age. For example, on Table 32 are shown 45 boys and 41 girls in the 1B grade. The normal chronological age for a child in this grade is 7 years. bution shows that 1 girl tests 6 years old mentally and is therefore under age; 32 boys and 28 girls test 7 years old and are therefore normally placed, and 13 boys and 11 girls test 8 years old, or one year ahead, and 1 girl tests 9 years old, or two years ahead, and are therefore over age.

On this basis, then, it is found that in this group of children 56.2 per cent are normally placed according to their mentality; 19.1 per cent are under age, and therefore below their grade mentally; 24.7 per cent are over age, and therefore above their grade mentally.

On the basis of chronological age and grade, it was shown that 48 per cent are of normal age; 16 per cent are under age or accelerated; 36 per cent are over age or retarded.

According to their mental ages, 56.2 per cent of these children are properly placed; while, according to their chronological age, 64 per cent are properly placed if the 16 per cent of children who are under age is counted with the normal group. On the basis of mental age, 19.1 per cent of these children are mentally below their grade. Therefore, 43.8 per cent of these children are not normally placed on the basis of mental age, while on the basis of chronological age 36 per cent are too old for their grade.

By distributing these percentages of children who test at age, under age, and over age into two groups, one containing the repeaters, the other the nonrepeaters, it can be shown whether one group receives a larger percentage of normal, under age, or over age mentally than the other. The results of this distribution are as follows.

The significant points to be noted about this comparison are, first, the group that repeated receives a smaller percentage of children who are over age or high mentally and at age or normal mentally than the group which did not repeat; second, the group that did not repeat receives a much smaller percentage of children who are under age or low mentally than the group that repeated. It is evident, then, that the children who repeat make up a great majority of the cases that are very low in mentality. Furthermore, there is a large percentage of children who are repeaters and nonrepeaters who could do work beyond the grade in which they are now working.

By studying the individual records of children who are over age and at age mentally and chronologically and picking out those who are both over age mentally and chronologically and who are at age chronologically, but over age mentally, the following facts are secured:

1. Out of 743 children, 268 are over age chronologically. Of these 268 children who are over age chronologically, 209, or 78.3 per cent, are over age mentally.

2. Out of 743 children, 344 are normal chronologically. Of these 344 children who are normal chronologically, 100, or 29 per cent, are over age mentally.

The most significant points about these figures are, first, the large percentage of chronologically over-age children who are also mentally over age; and second, the large percentage of mentally over-age children in the chronologically over-age group in relation to the percentage of mentally over-age children in the chronologically normal-age group. According to the test, 309 children, or 41.5 per cent of the 743 children, show ability in advance of that required to do the work they are now doing.

In summarizing, then, the following points should be noted:

1. Of these 743 children, 1.3 per cent have made more than normal progress, 38.8 per cent have made normal progress, and 59.9 per cent have made less than normal progress.

2. Of these 743 children, on the basis of chronological age, 48 per cent are of normal age, 16 per cent are under age, and 36 per cent are over age. Furthermore, 52 per