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186
Annual Report of the London County Council, 1912.
The uniform experience of the medical officers that the children fail with the tests for age above
10 affords satisfactory evidence of real deficiency, but it is to be hoped that as the data accumulate it
will be possible to find a corresponding series dealing with manual occupations in which many appear
to be far less behind the normal standard. The academic subjects reading and writing are those in
which the defects of children render them least able to continue in the ordinary schools, or, at any rate,
are those which lead to their being nominated by the head teachers as prospective candidates for a
special school education. An attempt has been made by Drs. Gowdey and Shrubsall to ascertain if
there was any relationship between the labour involved in writing a short narrative and the accuracy
of the report. In several schools a short passage was read through twice to the children who were
told to listen carefully as they were afterwards to be asked to write it down from memory, if possible
in the same words, but, if not, to write down the sense of the passage in their own words. The passage
having been read through twice the children wrote down their version. They were then told to read
it through carefully, and add anything they could remember that they had left out. The papers were
marked so as to record the number of facts mentioned, the number of Words used in the narrative, the
number of spelling errors, and the proportion of errors in spelling to words used. The correlations
between these were then calculated. The passage contained 60 words and was adjudged to present
33 separate facts. The figures from 37 children in one school will serve to show the nature of the
results.
Feature investigated.
Average
value.
Standard
deviation.
Age 11.50 1.45
Number of facts recorded in narrative 8.03 6.90
Number of words used in narrative 25.51 16.32
Percentage of errors in spelling 50.43 4.92
Correlations—
Age to number of words used Value of r.+ .20 ±.10
Age to number of facts recorded „ +.03 ±.11
Age to percentage of spelling errors „ —.24 ±.10
Facts recorded to number of words used „ +.80 ± .04
Facts recorded to percentage of spelling errors „ — .48 +.08
Percentage of spelling errors to number of words used „— .62 ±.06
Facts recorded to percentage of spelling errors for a constant
number of words +.02
From this it appears that while the facility of writing as estimated by the number of words used
increased with age, the accuracy of the spelling bore a less definite relation, and the accuracy of the
record appeared to be independent of age. There was no apparent relation between the accuracy of
the written narrative and the correctness of the spelling.
The nature of the spelling errors proved of considerable interest. There were a few examples
of almost complete word blindness, the written matter in these being entirely unintelligible, both to the
teacher and the pupil when he was shown his production after a short interval and asked to read it. The
bulk of the errors were either the omission or displacement of letters, a type of motor mistake with
which all who commence to use a typewriter will be familiar; an auditory misconception; or a
substitution of somewhat similar letters, indicating an incomplete acquaintance with the written
alphabet.
A few examples will serve to indicate these types
Word. Spelling in narrative.
Night sonhdt, nodi, namd, neaeff, snight, nigk, nitt, nitsej niet, nitheg,
neught, nitht.
Fire fime, ford, fith, fia, frie, fiar, fir, far, fiver, fior, fiah, firir,' fari,
fore, fror.
Burnt birn, benr, brin, bernt, bunt, barnt, bant, but, bent, bert, brurnt.
Many maven, menny, mene, mened, menne, meeny.
Children cadnn, cail, chirldnen, chrthirn, chibden, chand, chidans, chlind.
Were ware, whr, wa, wer, wen, weri.
Girl girll, girel, grl, gll, giall, gile, gols, cal, cail, gori.
Could camd, colud, good, cood, hood, cowd, cad, cul, cod.
Find fiend, finde, fine, fide, furd, formd, fored, fonad, ford, fild, fuord.
Engine engin, enjens, ingin, ing, engenl, ingan, heagne.
Most of the smaller words, which had been learnt as single ideographs, were correctly spelt. The
productions of the children in the special schools serve to show the difficulties which surround the use
of phonetic methods, and it is not improbable that the majority of pupils only progress so far as they
can learn and remember word wholes.
The record cards used in the schools for the mentally defective contain references to the family
history and the previous history of the child. Entries are made partly by the medical officers at the