KaitlynGrantCulturalLiteracy

Article 1 The first article that I had to read was “What Johnny Should Read.” It was focused on the idea of cultural literacy. It made me upset to learn that there are students who, “can’t identify Stalin or Churchill, and ¾ don’t know that the Civil War was fought between 1850 and 1900.” This was shocking to me. I think that because I come from a school system that is very fortunate, I sometimes do not realize that there are those out there who didn’t learn the same things as me and that their literacy would be drastically different than mine.
 * Group 1**

What I got from this article was that schools teach more to make sure students pass standardized tests. They teach students how to, “sound out the words,” instead of teaching them concepts and challenging their minds. They focus more on scores than anything else. One thing I find myself disagreeing with in this article is the idea of cultural literacy. Culture is all around us. An inner city student is going to have a different culture than a suburban student. They may know different facts about their culture but that doesn’t make either one culturally illiterate. Maybe not every student is going to know American history but they may know Spanish history if they are Spanish etc. To me cultural literacy is too broad to be put into simple terms. This leads me to believe the critics of Hirsch. That experiences shape literacy.

do agree that Americans should know more about our own culture, but personally when I think to myself, I’ve learned things since elementary school and still can’t remember it all. However I can read a newspaper and understand and I can hold a solid conversation.

**Video** In this video, Nathan is interviewed and discusses what Hirsch meant with his writing. He explains that Hirsch doesn’t just want students to read, he wants them to read and then ask what did I just read? What does what I read mean etc? He believes that in order to understand what you are reading you need a background of knowledge so he created a curriculum for each grade so they know what they should be learning. This created a movement in schools. It is mystifying to Nathan as to why he’s unpopular. Nathan thinks that maybe his idea is not the same style as the school. I question some of Hirsh’s ideas like these critics. I understand his purpose but I have my own opinions to go along with it.