"Profound, vital and correct. Hirsch highlights the essence of our American being and the radical changes in education necessary to sustain that essence. Concerned citizens, teachers, and parents take note!  We ignore this book at our peril."- Joel Klein, former Chancellor of New York City Public Schools In this powerful manifesto, the bestselling author of Cultural Literacy addresses the failures of America's early education system and its impact...

"An important message, eloquently expressed." --Steven Pinker, Johnstone Family Professor of Psychology, Harvard University, and author of The Language Instinct and How the Mind Works "If we did what E.D. Hirsch said, and made sure that all students, regardless of race, income, or neighborhood, were exposed to a rich, challenging, sequenced curriculum in important subjects, schools could make a much bigger difference than they already do." --Ed McElroy,...

A child's mind is hungry for knowledge, stimulation, and the excitement of learning which school should provide—yet most American schools fall far short. From kindergarten through high school, our public educational system is among the worst in the developed world. In disdaining content-based curricula for abstract (and discredited) theories of how a child learns, our schools have done terrible harm to America's students. Instead of preparing them...

In this forceful manifesto Professor E. D. Hirsch, Jr., argues that children in the United States are being deprived of the basic knowledge that would enable them to function in contemporary society. They lack cultural literacy: a grasp of background information that writers and speakers assume their audience already has. Thus even if a student has a basic competence in the English language, he or she has little chance of entering the American

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A grade-by-grade guide designed to help teachers and parents select books to help children build on the fundamentals in the Core Knowledge Series.

"Give your child a smart start with the revised and updated What Your Fourth Grader Needs to Know How can you help your child at home? This book answers that important question and more, offering the specific shared knowledge that thousands of parents and teachers across the nation have agreed upon for American fourth graders. Featuring sixteen pages of full-color illustrations, a bolder, easier-to-follow format, and a thoroughly updated curriculum,...