E. D. Hirsch, Jr.’s new book, The Ratchet Effect: Shared Knowledge, Shared Values challenges “the child-centered romantics who now dominate our early education” They are “deeply wrong,” he argues.
In The Ratchet Effect: Shared Knowledge, Shared Values, best-selling author and educator E. D. Hirsch, Jr. uses decades of falling student test scores and an array of eye-opening research studies to make a strong case for “equality of educational opportunity.” He deftly challenges those he labels as “child-centered romantics who now dominate our early education,” adding – with study results as important evidence – that those who favor the widely accepted child-centered education curricula are “deeply wrong.”
Dr. Hirsch, 96 years old, is the founder of the Core Knowledge Foundation, publisher of The Ratchet Effect… He is also a professor emeritus of education and humanities at the University of Virginia. His new book comes several decades after his classic bestseller Cultural Literacy: What Every American Needs to Know, in which he similarly urged America’s public schools, particularly in preschool through grade 8, “to educate our children using common, coherent, and sequenced curricula.” Today, more than 5000 schools worldwide, including more than 1700 public schools in the US, use Core Knowledge Foundation curriculum materials, in line with Dr. Hirsch’s recommendations in history, geography, language arts, mathematics, science, and the arts.
Using scientific evidence from recent studies, Dr. Hirsch speaks persuasively in The Ratchet Effect…, strongly favoring a “shared knowledge” approach to early childhood education, not the widely accepted “child-centered education process.” Children, he contends, “should be given a definite curriculum framework and common readings … rather than their own choice of reading matter.” Further, he says, “History and recent science combine to say that the ratchet effect must become an explicit progressive goal of modern schools and other national institutions.”
Dr. Hirsch is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. In addition to The Ratchet Effect… and Cultural Literacy, books by Dr. Hirsch on education include: A First Dictionary of Cultural Literacy; the Core Knowledge Sequence; What Your [First Through Sixth] Grader Needs to Know; The Schools We Need and Why We Don’t Have Them; The Making of Americans; and How to Educate a Citizen. With these books and his other writings, Dr. Hirsch has persisted as a voice of reason making the case for equality of educational opportunity. His books and writings have influenced educational thought and practice in the United States and in other countries.
Royalty earnings from all Core Knowledge books by E. D. Hirsch, Jr. go to support the nonprofit Core Knowledge Foundation. Dr. Hirsch receives no remuneration from the Foundation.