PHYSICAL SKILL TESTS FOR SECTIONING CLASSES INTO HOMOGENEOUS UNIS By Granville B. Johnson University of Denver "the test is easily administered and can be given to twenty or thirty persons in the usual forty-minute gymnesium period. This test has a reliability coefficient of .97 and a validity coefficient of .69. Hence it is an adequate basis for dividing a class into sections or groups of equal ability. The only equipment needed is a sheet of ten ounce canvas about eight feet wide and twenty feet long, marked as shown in the accompanying diagram, gymnasium mats, and a scoring sheet. This canvas is laid over two standard 6 by 10 gymnasium mats placed end to end, and the edges are tucked under or fastened down to keep the surface smooth. The students may be lined up along one side of the chart where they can clearly see. The scorer may sit on the opposite side where he, too, cen see every linee The scoring is objective, and is décided chiefly by whether or not the subject's feet touch the canvas at the proper places and within the specified boundaries. The pattern, which is painted on the canvas, is a rectangle four and one-half feet wide and fifteen feet long, divided into squares eighteen inches on a side (see chart). This makes three lanes eight~ een inches wide down the length of the chart. The main outline of the rectangle and the lines marking the lanes are painted in black lines three-fourths of an inch wide. The second, fourth, and alter= nate squares in the two outside lanes are painted solid black. The squares in the center lane are not marked off as squares, but the first, third, and alternate spaces in this lane contain each a target twelve inches by three inches in the center of the square. There is an additional target placed outside the main pattern on the finish sidee There is another lano two feet wide marked in red down the centor of the canvas, divided half way by a cross line or red; this is used only in the rolling oxercises. The instructor should explain the purpose and the general nature of the test, and point out the markings on the chart, disregarding the red markings until they are needed. He should also explain the method of scoring so that the subjects may observe and score each othere To explain this he simply demonstrates the errors on which the scoring is based: Cegs, position, overstepping the bounds, lack of rhythm, etc. The mental picture of each exercise is presented