Getting the Facts

Great piece on learning the facts of history, and the consequences of schools' failures to teach the same, over at EducationNews. Lots of stuff homeschoolers should take to heart, too.

The question remains that if we need to appoint an ambassador to the United Nations, is it OK if they know nothing about the world or the people in it, or the history of their own country? Do we want self-actualizing Senators and members of Congress who cannot read or write anything but personal fiction? Will we be in a good position to compete economically with very serious people in India and China if our graduates have specialized in songs for their IPod and new ringtones for their phones, while in a school which told them that information and knowledge—in other words, facts, people, dates, events and the like—were too trivial for them to bother with?

Bertrand Russell once said “the first task of education is to destroy the tyranny of the local and immediate over the child's imagination,” but just that tyranny has devotees among too many of our educators.

HT to Joanne Jacobs.