Literary classics get school push

Washington Times ^ | Wednesday, June 9, 2004 | George Archibald

[JohnHuang2]

Lynne V. Cheney yesterday gave fourth-graders from Arlington's Francis Scott Key Elementary School a quick tour of America's continuing struggle for human freedom and announced the administration's second selection of classic books for the nation's schoolchildren.

Surrounded by 18 9- and 10-year-olds before panels of the former Berlin Wall at Freedom Park in the Rosslyn section of Arlington, the wife of Vice President Dick Cheney caught the class off-guard with her first question: "Can anyone tell me what a minuteman is?"

[Travis McGee]

"A" for effort. I hope it goes somewhere.

[goldstategop]

We need to seriously revive the classics in this country. The world famous Penguin Classics paperback series is a good place to start. Any one can afford to build up a library of world literature that will last a lifetime.

[Born in a Rage]

We own the book "Sam the Minuteman". Sadly, it doesn't surprise me that not one kid knew what a minuteman was. They learn very little history in the elementary grades at public schools. I remember asking my nephew, who was in 6th grade at the time, what a Minuteman was (my son was studying the American Revolution in kindergarten and the subject came up) - he had no idea. It's a shame, it really is :-(

[DreadCthulhu]

Alexander Solzhenitsyn's "One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich" for high school students.

I remember reading that a couple years ago back in high school. It describe one day of a prisoner forced into the Siberian Gulags. Definatly one of the greatest anti-communist works ever written, and something everyone should read.

[bt_dooftlook]

The shame is the adults who have let the NEA and their political wing control the agenda and the curriculum for so long. If adults don't care about what their children are being taught, then they can hardly blame anyone else when someone who _does_ care steps in to fill the void...

[Travis McGee]

True. Along with a class describing how over 100 million forgotten souls perished in communist concentration camps.