Learning Loss and the Knowledge Gap with Natalie Wexler author of The Knowledge Gap

Despite massive efforts, the wide gap between students at the top and bottom of the
socioeconomic scale hasn’t narrowed in fifty years. One huge overlooked reason Natalie Wexler ( https://nataliewexler.com/) believes is that elementary school curriculum requires teachers spend hours every week on decontextualized reading comprehension
skills, like “finding the main idea,” leaving little or no time for social studies and science.
But evidence from cognitive science shows that reading comprehension isn’t a matter of
“skill.” It depends far more on knowledge of the topic—and children of more educated
parents are able to pick up more academic knowledge at home.
To boost comprehension, then, schools need to immerse all children in content-rich
subjects, building their knowledge beginning in kindergarten if not before—the opposite
of what they’ve been doing. Now, with school closures exacerbating gaps between haves
and have-nots, it’s more important than ever to change course. And as a small but
growing number of schools are discovering, it’s possible to do that even during a period
of remote learning, with immediate benefits for students, teachers, and parents.