Education Next – Robert Pondiscio
“Fareed Zakaria’s bestselling In Defense of a Liberal Education worries that in the era of technology and globalization, “an open-ended exploration of knowledge is seen as a road to nowhere.” But in my U.S. News column this week, I suggest that if we really want to save the liberal arts, we should start in elementary school. Doing so would go a long way toward not just rescuing the liberal arts, but raising reading achievement. I had this thought while reading Dan Willingham’s terrific new book Raising Kids Who Read. Nearly every idea I’ve ever written about reading, I’ve borrowed or stolen from Dan—but none more important than this: Reading comprehension is not a “skill.” Once a child learns to decode fluently, he notes, the biggest factor in a child’s ability to read with understanding is knowing at least a little bit about the topic he or she is reading about.”(more)