Slow learners at school.

  • Department of Education and Science
Date:
1964
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Slow learners at school. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    16/108 page 10
    —_ Moreover backward children are more than usually vulnerable to an inexperienced or unsympathetic teacher and frequent changes of staff. An attempt has been made, in the foregoing paragraphs, to outline some of the main factors which contribute to a child’s failure to learn. One can distinguish between those children who have apparently limited potential and those who seem to have ability which they cannot use effectively. One can also distinguish be- tween children whose difficulties appear to need long term help and those who may be expected to respond fairly quickly to remedial measures. And while it is sensible to assume that children with limited potential need prolonged help, it must be recognised that the reverse is not necessarily true, namely, that the intelligent child will always respond quickly. Children are not easily classified and an overemphasis on any single characteristic such as IQ or attainment age may result in problems being oversimplified and categories being defined too rigidly. For the purpose of this pam- phlet it is proposed to use the term ‘backward’ or ‘slow-learning’ for children of any degree of ability who are unable to do work commonly done by children of their age. The word ‘dull’ will be used for those who have limited mental potential and the word ‘retarded’ for children whose poor educational achievements appear to result from factors other than limited general ability. In the context of this pamphlet ‘retardation’ is used to convey a general notion of underfunctioning without specifying whether such a condition is necessarily remediable or implying that an assessment of general ability is closely related to the extent and rate of progress possible in a specific field. These distinctions are important to enable the practising teacher to adopt suitable aims and methods. For dull children there will always be limited intellectual objectives even with the most skilful . teaching; for the retarded the aim will be to seek and to remove the causes of their backwardness. In Chapter 4 reference is made to remedial education, but elsewhere the emphasis is mainly on the needs of those children of limited ability found in special schools or in the lowest classes of ordinary schools. In discussions about backwardness it sometimes happens that backward children are spoken of as if they were a special type, and even today there are some teachers who assume that every backward child is a potential candidate for a special school. In fact dull children are not in a sharply defined category, but merely form the lower end of a far larger group with limited ability. Just
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