Can Literacy Be Saved?

The crisis in American elementary-school literacy has been apparent for decades. Thankfully, E. D. Hirsch’s Core Knowledge curriculum, developed by the distinguished educator in the 1990s, has given us an excellent response and antidote.¹ By providing a carefully sequenced K–6 curriculum with an emphasis on phonics, arithmetic, and challenging history and science components, Hirsch and his associates have restored serious content and common sense to early schooling, giving at least a fighting chance of mitigating the century-long dumbing-down initiated by John Dewey and the “progressives.” If only our teachers’ colleges and schools of education (and philanthropists) would attend to Hirsch’s magnificent, public-spirited body of work and the achievements of schools that have adopted his curriculum!