Ed Hirsch stated that “literacy is far more than a skill and that it requires large amounts of specific information” (pg 2). It is believed that the background information one holds is the key to their literacy. The higher level of background information one has, the higher level of comprehension the reader will achieve when reading something such as a newspaper. I think that to be literate, you do need to be able to look beyond the initial meaning of words; a reader needs to understand the context of the words and the implied meaning.
Hirsch created a list of things that an American should know to be considered literate. I will honestly say that after going through the list, I do not think Hirsch would consider me to be literate. Some things on the list I knew, some things I have heard before, but could not explain, and still other things I have not heard of before. Should that make me illiterate? I don’t believe it should. Many of the things listed might be considered old school, no longer touched on in schools today. Teachers are so busy teaching to the test, they only have a small window of time to touch on things like “water off a ducks back” or “haste makes waste”. It made me think of a class I took a few years ago when I was returning to school, a Middle East History class. I was the oldest in the class; most of the other students were fresh out of high school. They were able to apply their knowledge of current events from high school history classes to this Middle East history class. Looking at it now, I can say I did not feel very literate at that point.
I started to come up with a list of things that are worth knowing, trying to touch on many different areas and realized that first, who is really in the position to decide what you need to know? Who is an expert across the board to know everything about everything? Second, what might have been considered essential to know say 50 years ago, or even in 1988, might not be held at the same level of importance today. With advancements in science and technology along with changes in politics, if you think about the long list that Hirsch created and add on a new, updated list of what is worth knowing today, it would be an endless list, always changing with advancements of the new age. I think what you need to know to be literate changes with where you live and the generation in which you live, even with how literate you want to be.
I will end with a list of some things I feel are worth knowing, in no special order: past presidents, geography, North, South, East and West, seasons, planets, states and capitals, languages and cultures, Pearl Harbor, Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Big Apple, Noah and the Ark, Rosa Parks, slavery, abolition, nursery rhymes, duct tape, parts of speech, taxes, hybrid, inflation, recession, Obama, Obama care, Sarah Palin, Sadam, Bin Laden, slang, Wi-Fi, Wiki, HDTV, Apple, IPods/IPads, Elvis, Bill Gates, Shakespeare, Barnum & Bailey, Atari, X-Box, Wii, Johnny Cash, USB, laptop, notebook, periodic table, oceans, countries, mph, percentages, rates, laws, speed limits, Donald Trump, the Grand Canyon, poison ivy, sunscreen, energy efficient, holistic, aromatherapy, chemo, ADHD, AIDS, cancer, prevention, caffeine, synthetic…..
