Jack Wall (Kildare South, Labour)
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261. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills the methodology employed and or its agencies in measuring intelligence quotient in the context of assessing primary school teaching; if his Department considers that the accepted international methodology involves the bell curve; if his Department's procedures incorporate the bell curve; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [2801/14]

Ruairi Quinn (Dublin South East, Labour)
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Teachers and psychologists use a variety of test instruments to assess the cognitive ability of pupils in primary schools. These instruments are based on the statistical premise of the bell-curve representation of the distribution of cognitive ability across a representative sample.

IQ testing is not used to assess teaching in primary schools. While the quality of teaching might affect student IQ, it is only one of a number of such factors and it would be difficult, if not impossible, to attribute cause and effect to any one factor.