The Necessity Of Standards

In the first place, in order to judge an individual's intelligence it is necessary

to have in mind some standard as to what constitutes normal intelligence. This the

ordinary parent or teacher does not have. In the case of school children, for example,

each pupil is judged with reference to the average intelligence of the

class. But the teacher has no means of knowing whether the average for

her class is above, equal to, or below that for children in general. Her

standard may be too high, too low, vague, mechanical, or fragmentary.

The same, of course, holds in the case of parents or any one else

attempting to estimate intelligence on the basis of common observation.