The reading gap for disadvantaged children is mainly a knowledge and vocabulary gap – one that narrows when knowledge is built engagingly.
A Foundation of Phonics and Knowledge Is Key to Literacy
E. D. Hirsch, Jr. is the founder of the Core Knowledge Foundation and professor emeritus of education and humanities at the University of Virginia. He is the author of several books, including "Cultural Literacy," "The Schools We Need and Why We Don’t Have Them" and "The Knowledge Deficit."
Updated July 3, 2014, 10:53 AM
The New York City Department of Education recently did a three-year study comparing 20 schools. Ten used the Core Knowledge approach. Ten used balanced literacy. After analysis, the Core Knowledge results were deemed to be far better, to a high level of statistical significance. Any program using the same principles as Core Knowledge – systematic phonics plus coherent content – would probably yield similar results.
Balanced literacy is an attractive program. It includes some phonics, children’s literature, writing and activity guidance for teachers. Teachers confirm that they like it because it offers them and their students a great deal of choice.
Programs like Core Knowledge also turn out to be highly attractive to teachers and students. When teachers in the study were asked whether they thought a phonics plus knowledge program was better than other reading programs, 77 percent said yes.
So here are two types of program, both of which are attractive to teachers and students. One significantly outperformed the other in the New York study. Why?
The answer must be an informed guess, because the implementation of balanced literacy is variable, owing to the freedom of choice it offers teachers and students.
There’s less doubt about what went on in the Core Knowledge program. It teaches phonics explicitly and efficiently. Children actually like that, because they witness their own progress toward mastery. Well-taught phonics occupies half of the program’s time in first grade. The rest is devoted to reading, writing and knowledge gain.
Reading fiction and nonfiction, children stay on a domain unit like “Plants” or “Native Americans” for a couple of weeks during which they ask ever more probing questions about the subject, gain familiarity with it, and grow their vocabularies rapidly.
The reading gap between advantaged and disadvantaged children is mainly a knowledge and vocabulary gap. That gap narrows, and overall achievement is highest, when the general knowledge of children is built up engagingly by immersion in a coherent series of domains.
I believe the long-run advantages of such an approach are even more promising than the short-term advantages revealed in the New York City study. But I agree with the schools chancellor, Carmen Fariña. The study was too small. We need a bigger one – and one that gauges long-term as well as short-term effects.
Join Opinion on Facebook and follow updates on twitter.com/roomfordebate.