C is a girl ten years of age, first recognized as bright when a survey was being made in a certain school district, to discover children of exceptional intelligence. Her IQ has stood at 164 on two tests made several years apart. Neither of her parents is educated, the father being employed in a tailor's shop. They are immigrants. C's home surroundings are those of a typical tenement, in the city slums. Her sister and two brothers all test above the average intellectually. This case represents the few instances in which an extremely gifted child is found with uneducated parents, in a poor home. Such children prove that the intellectual ability revealed by tests does not come from home surroundings. It is not possible to observe the family in this case beyond the parents, as other relatives live in Europe. D is an eleven-year-old boy, who tests at 167 IQ. He is very large for his age, and of exceptional firmness and stability of character. His father is an army officer of high rank, and his mother is a college graduate. He is one of seven children, only one other of whom has had mental tests. This sister's IQ has stood at 189 and 188 on two tests made a year apart. There are many eminent relatives on both sides of D's family. His parents had not thought of him as very exceptional. These cases serve to represent the group of gifted children in our schools. Since about one in every 250 children is as bright as Child A here described, it is evident that among millions of school children there are many of this calibre to be found. The higher the intelligence, the rarer the child, of course, as may be recalled by glancing back at Figure 1, p. 279, in this chapter. Of the cases described, A, B, and D are typical of the bright, as regards occupation of parents, and other social conditions. Child C is very exceptional in this respect. Child B is exceptional in having a severe visual defect, and has been mentioned here especially to show that Experimental Education of Gifted Children in the United States intelligence does not depend upon perfection of the special senses. For a considerable number of years there have been consciously attempted selections of the most capable children in our schools, for purposes of education. In 1919 Freeman sent a questionnaire to all cities in this country of 25,000 population or over, inquiring as to special provision for the gifted. He learned that a considerable number of school administrators recognized the existence of gifted children, and attempted to provide for their special needs, usually by establishing special classes for rapid advancement. In several instances the work was on a sufficiently modern basis, so that mental tests were used to select the children. Most recent information on this point will be found in the forthcoming publication of The National Society for the Study of Education (see reference 11, Chapter XIV, Bibliography). Among the first of the classes to be selected by mental tests was that reported by Race in 1918, from Louisville, Kentucky. Here several young children with a median IQ of 137 were segregated, and made very rapid progress, covering the prescribed curriculum of the elementary school at about twice the ordinary rate, without more than ordinary effort. Race found them to be healthy, well-balanced, and capable of work much beyond the average. In the years following 1918, several detailed reports of similar work appeared, among which those of Whipple, of Specht, and of Coy are of particular interest. All of these class-room experiments showed that children selected as very intelligent by mental tests are capable of much greater progress in school than is possible for them under ordinary conditions. The influence of such studies is already felt to some extent, in educational administration. For instance, at the Conference on Educational Research and Guidance, held at San Jose, California, in 1922, Dickson stated that during the year just passed, about 11 per cent of children in the elementary schools of Berkeley and Oakland had been given special opportunity suited to their superior endowment. mental Class-room experimentation with highly endowed chil- Experidren has been reported since 1916 in Germany from Berlin, Hamburg, Breslau, Mannheim, Leipsic, Frankfort, Charlottenburg, and Göttingen particularly. In Germany, as in this country, this work has gone forward in cities, because it is only in centers of population that a sufficient number of the very gifted can be found conveniently located to form special classes. The desirability of identifying the gifted who live in rural communities has been discussed with urgency in Germany, where the need to foster that nation's mental power is now very great. No solution of this administrative problem has yet been found. After the World War, republican Germany abandoned the policy of educating children according to the socialeconomic status of their parents. To find and to train the gifted, wherever existing, was seen to be a primary condition of national rehabilitation. As there are many educational psychologists in Germany, the work of selecting the Hofnungskinder (children of promise) has proceeded rapidly and systematically. It is probable that to-day Germany is giving more official administrative recognition to special education on the basis of innate mental endowment than any other country. In the majority of reports it appears that the selection of pupils is made by mental tests, supplemented by teachers' judgments as to strength of character and physical stamina. Germany cannot afford special education for those strong in intellect only. The child must be strong in every way to warrant the investment. Children annually or semi-annually selected thus from the Volksschulen, are given a special course of study in |