CHAPTER I: PRELIMINARY CONSIDERATIONS PURPOSE OF HANDBOOK The problem of pupil progress and adjustment is one of major interest wherever schools are operating. It is of concern not only to school administrators, but also to the patrons of the school. Parents as well as teachers are eager that every child shall advance at a reasonably regular rate. Farley' found that pupil progress and achievement held first rank in order of interest for 5,067 school patrons. This handbook outlines procedures by which individual school systems, or larger units of school administration such as counties or States, can study the more general features of the school progress of pupils. For the most part, these procedures result in the accumulation of mass data, from which the general practices of the school system can be seen and interpreted. Comparisons among schools in the same school system, among school systems, or among larger units of school administration, may also be made. The procedures outlined are concerned with the collection of data on the age-grade and the age-grade-progress situation, together with a brief presentation of the methods used for relating scores of pupils on scholastic aptitude and achievement tests to their age-grade-progress classification. Simple age-grade statistics reveal the number of pupils in each school grade who are at normal age, are overage, or are underage for their grade. When a study of grade progress is added, the relation of the number of years pupils have been in school to their present grade placement reveals much better the effect upon progress of various policies of promotion or failure. DEFINITION OF NORMAL AGES FOR GRADES Variations in State laws, school district regulations, and the enforcement of attendance laws make for a certain amount of variation among school systems in the age of admission to and persistence in school. About half the States have laws which provide that the legal age for admission to the first grade is 6 years, whereas the laws of the other half of the States permit admission at 5 years of age. The laws for compulsory attendance differ more widely, the minimum compulsory age varying from 6 to 8 years. The age of 6 has become by custom the accepted age for entrance into the first grade. As interpreted by school administrators, this 1 Farley, Belmont. What to Tell the People About the Public Schools. Bureau of publications, Teachers College, Columbia University, 1929. (Contributions to education, No. 355.) * Compulsory school attendance laws and their administration. Washington, United States Department of the Interior, Office of Education. Bulletin 1935, No. 4. generally means that a child is eligible to enter first grade in September if he is 6 years of age or will become 6 years of age within a few months. Regulations defining the number of days or weeks after school begins during which a child may become 6 years of age and still be admitted to first grade in the fall or midyear are set up by many school systems. These regulations confine the admission of pupils to specified times of the year and protect the smooth functioning of school admissions. A few States make specific provision for this practice in the State school law or the regulations of the State board of education. For these reasons, educators have concluded that the normal age for entrance of pupils into the first grade in following the plan of annual promotion is 5 years 9 months to 7 years 3 months as of September 1. A range of normality equal to 1%1⁄2 years is necessary in order to allow to some extent for varying mental ability or school readiness of pupils. Where schools are organized on an annual basis the normal age limits for grades and various school divisions would be as given in table 1.3 TABLE 1.-NORMAL AGE LIMITS FOR CHILDREN IN SCHOOLS WITH ANNUAL PROMOTIONS Grade or school unit First year nursery school.. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11 12 2,214, 3. 3. 3. 4. 4. 412, 5. 1 year 9 months to 3 years 3 months. 5 years 9 months to 7 years 3 months.. 5, 5, 6. 6, 6. 7. 17, 17, 18. Where schools are organized on a semiannual promotion basis the normal age for entering first grade is 5 years 9 months to 6 years 9 months. The age range for each grade unit is less than in the annual promotion plan because it represents the work of half a year instead of a year. The nursery school and kindergarten do not usually follow strict semester lines; hence, these school units are not divided on the half-year basis. The normal ages for schools organized on a semiannual basis are given in table 2. 3 The practice of many State departments of education is to define the age of a child for purposes of schoo statistics as his age at his last birthday. For example, according to this method, a pupil is recorded as 8 years old from the time he reaches his eighth birthday until he reaches his ninth birthday. It is suggested that State departments of education, when possible, change their method of defining ages to conform to the practice here recommended. TABLE 2.-NORMAL AGE LIMITS FOR CHILDREN IN SCHOOLS WITH SEMIANNUAL PROMOTIONS Low 4. 8 8 years 9 months to 9 years 9 months. 9, 92. 171⁄2, 18. Although tables 1 and 2 give indirectly the definition of ages as used in age-grade-progress reports, for convenience a table defining ages for this purpose is presented as table 3, to which reference may be made in gathering age-grade-progress statistics. TABLE 3.-DEFINITION OF AGES [As used in age-grade-progress reports] Limit 1 year 9 months to 2 years 3 months.. 2 21/2 3 312 4 42 5 51⁄2 61/2 7 72 8 812 912 10 101⁄2 11 years 3 months to 11 years 9 months. 11142 12 1214 13 1316 14 1414 15 1516 16 1014 17 1712 18 1814 19 1912 20 11 CHAPTER II: SECURING AND TABULATING AGE-GRADEPROGRESS DATA SOURCE OF DATA FOR AGE-GRADE-PROGRESS STUDIES For the kindergarten and nursery school the information required is the date of birth, and school placement of each child. For elementary schools and high schools the data required are (1) the present placement of the child: (2) date of birth; (3) number of years in school in the case of annual promotion schools, and number of terms (onehalf years) in the case of semiannual promotion schools; and (4) whether or not the pupil is now repeating the work he took last year (or term). If the school has a system of cumulative records the information required can be obtained directly from such records. If the teachers keep a register, all the data may be found therein. In case the information is not available from these sources, the data should be assembled by teachers for the elementary grades and high school on a form such as Form I. The forms for annual promotion schools may be used at any time. during the year as they stand. The forms for semiannual promotion schools are constructed specifically for the first semester or half of the school year. By the appropriate adjustment in the age column of the forms, they can be used during the second semester. As given in this pamphlet, Forms II to X are constructed for enrollment during the school year 1938-39. The only change which needs to be made for use in subsequent years is an adjustment of the year endings found in the column "Date of birth." HOW TO TABULATE AGE-GRADE STATISTICS BY GRADES IN ANNUAL-PROMOTION SCHOOLS In annual-promotion schools the number of years in school refers to the number of separate years during which a pupil has gone to school, regardless of the regularity of his attendance. The present year or term in school is to be counted as 1 year. Beginners in the first grade would accordingly be classified as having attended 1 year. 4 |