"Mere facts" (Critical Guide, E.D. Hirsch Jr)

  The phrase "rote memorization of mere facts" may be the most vigorous denunciation of "traditional" education to be found in the progressive armory. The phrase describes an activity that compounds deadly pedagogy (i.e., rote memorization) with deadly content (i.e., mere facts).  

    In Romantic progressivism, facts are dead, but hands-on, lived experience is alive; facts are inert and disconnected, but understanding is vital and integrated. The nineteenth-century romantic William Wordsworth once said that we "dwindle as we pore" over facts "in disconnection, dead and spiritless," and he urged us to see facts imaginatively. For his American successors, mere facts are always disconnected, dead, and spiritless. Their "mereness" implies their inherent disconnection and artificiality. As soon as real "understanding" occurs, however, mere facts are transcended. 

   There is some validity in this conception, as there usually is in most views that are long and widely held. Understanding does mean connecting facts; isolated facts are meaningless. 
   Where the progressive-Romantic indictment of facts falls short is in the exaggerated idea that facts which are not directly and immediately connected with one's life are inherently fragmented and dead. That blanket accusation amounts to an antiverbal, anti-intellectual distortion. Facts are absolutely necessary to understanding. Whether they are dead and fragmented depends upon teachers and students, not upon the facts themselves, which are not only required for understanding but are sometimes immensely vital and interesting in their own right.

Antipathy to subject-matter content  

"break-the-mold schools" 
"facts, inferior to understanding"
"facts are soon outdated"
"intellectual capital"
"less is more"
"mere facts"
"rote learning"
"textbook learning"
"transmission theory of schooling"
"teaching for understanding"

Naturalistic pedagogy
"constructivism"
"cooperative learning"
"discovery learning"
"drill and kill"
"hands-on learning"
"holistic learning"
"learning by doing""multiaged classroom" 
 "open classroom"
"passive listening"
"project method"
"rote learning"
"thematic learning"
"whole-class instruction"
"whole-language instruction"

Tool conception of education
"accessing skills"
"critical-thinking skills"
"higher-order skills"
"learning to learn"
"lifelong learning"
"metacognitive skills"
"problem-solving skills"
"promise of technology"

Romantic developmentalism
"at their own pace"
"child-centered school­ing"
"developmentally appropriate"
"factory-model schools"
"individual differences"
"individualized instruction"
"individual learning styles"
"multiaged classroom"
"multiple intelligences"
"multiple learning styles"
"one size fits all"
"student-centered education"
"teach the child, not the subject"
"teach the whole child"
 

Antipathy to testing and ranking
"authentic assessment"
"competition" 
"culturally-biased tests"
"exhibitions"
"performance-based assessment"
"portfolio assessment"   


Others

"banking theory of schooling" 
"culturally-biased curriculum" 
"outcomes-based education" 
"research has shown"
"self-esteem"


 

Return to the main page : 

Critical Guide to Educational Terms and Phrases

  
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This was an excerpt from Hirsch's great book on education :

The Schools We Need 
 and Why We Don't Have Them.

Recension by Richard Askey :  
http://mathematicallycorrect.com/hirsch.htm  

Read some extracts (Amazon) :  
http://www.amazon.com/Schools-We-Need-Why/dp/0385484577#reader_0385484577