First Dictionary of Cultural Literacy Paperback – January 1, 1998

Potential Buyer's should note that this is the child user's version of the Dictionary of Cultural Literacy for children to use and easily understand as a grade-school reference. Amazon also sell the 1993 adult's version.

Serious students -- even young ones -- will find laughable errors in this poorly edited reference. Three examples follow:My fifth grade students, who routinely measure angles in radians to solve school problems, were amused that, on page 185, the author insists that "angles are always measured in degrees."In science class, the students learned (on page 214) that plants and animals are different organisms. Then, they learned (same page) that "a carnivor is an animal that..." and immediately found a highlighted section that says "Some plants, such as the Venus flytrap, are carnivors." This cracked up the kids who have just had an introduction to simple logic.Our favorite lesson came when the author taught us that light travels much farther in a minute than it does in a year! This we learned by comparing page 202 ("A light year is the distance light travels in a year, about six million miles.") with page 205 ("Light travels at about 186,000 miles per second..."). It didn't take the smartest fifth-grader to multiply 186,000 by 60 and report that light travels more than eleven million miles in a minute, but only six million miles in an E.D. Hirsch year (page 202).In fact, other errors abound, and the main use of this book in my classes has been to warn youngsters that "it ain't necessarily so" and to fuel our running contest to see who can find other errors in "What Children Need to Know."

As an "over-fifty" college graduate with occasional lapses (or suspicions of such lapses)the children's version of E.D.Hirsch, Jr.'s A FIRST DICTIONARY OF CULTURAL LITERACY is an excellent reference to confirm facts quickly and accurately. It is not a substitute for encyclopedias or scholarly references but does fairly accurately and succinctly confirm facts that comprise a fund of knowledge common to all Americans. Although it was originally purchased for use by our elementary age children, it is a reference that I turn to for quick confirmation.