Common Knowledge^™
The Newsletter of the Core Knowledge Foundation

Dr. Hirsch succinctly chronicled the hue and cry throughout the education world in recent years denouncing the horrors of testing and the overemphasis on accountability as a result of NCLB. But, as he deftly points outs, the real villain is not accountability or even the idea of testing, but rather two other, underlying issues. One is the time, money, and energy spent in classrooms throughout the United States on intensive test preparation that wastefully focuses on teaching comprehension strategies that are doomed to have, at best, only a small effect on improving children’s reading comprehension or test scores. The other cause for concern raised by Dr. Hirsch is that the testing associated with NCLB uses too many yardsticks.

Under the current law, every state is tasked with developing its own tests of reading and math achievement. Furthermore, each state is responsible for establishing a “cutoff” score on these tests that defines what constitutes proficiency. Attention to this issue appears to be gathering momentum among educators, politicians, and the media.

Among the many interesting points highlighted in The Proficiency Illusion, the Fordham report points out mind-boggling discrepancies between the levels of difficulty of state tests.

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One of the most famous of all phonics rules is “When two vowels go walking, the first one does the talking.” This rule has been taught in many phonics programs and in thousands of elementary classrooms over the years.

Alas, it turns out that this much-taught rule works only about 50.4% of the time. In other words, it is not much more reliable than a coin flip.

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In early 2007, the Thomas B. Fordham Institute hosted Beyond the Basics, a conference convened to discuss the case for liberal education in the 21st Century.
E. D. Hirsch, Jr., was among the many prominent education experts invited to participate and contribute to the conference’s companion publication: Beyond the Basics: Achieving Liberal Education for All Children. The following synopsis of this publication was submitted by Michael J. Petrilli, Vice President for National Programs and Policy at the Fordham Institute.

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On October 2, U.S. Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings named Washington Elementary a 2007 No Child Left Behind-Blue Ribbon School. The Blue Ribbon School program is the highest honor bestowed by the U.S. Department of Education. Washington is an Official Core Knowledge School^® and a public choice school in the Rochester Public District Minnesota. The school has used the Core Knowledge program since 1996.

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You meant to register for the conference, but time slipped away. That’s why we saved you a seat! We know how busy the first few weeks of the school year can be, but it’s not too late to register.

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Core Knowledge Preschool will be in the Rockies! We will offer our Getting Started and Assessment and Planning trainings at the Crowne Plaza Hotel Colorado Springs on November 8–9, 2007. Deadline to register for Preschool Trainings in Colorado is November 2.

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