Report Card

William J. Bennett, the U.S. secretary of education, has done his homework well enough to pass on the basics even though he fails on the fringes. His “First Lessons: A Report on Elementary Education in America,” prescribes more demanding curricula, more classroom time and stronger parental involvement to boost the achievement of the nation’s youngest students.

The recommendations are novel because they target elementary schools, rarely the focus of the national education-reform movement. The remedies are rigorous, and rightfully so. That’s what it will take to open up young minds.

Reading is Bennett’s key to learning. In his ideal grade school, children would master phonics, learn from livelier primers, enjoy time to read silently and regularly borrow books from the school library and the public library. Writing lessons would be integrated with other subjects.

Mathematics classes would emphasize mastery and more problem-solving, and would introduce abstract concepts earlier. Science classes would emphasize the disciplined reasoning of the scientific method, more laboratory work and the excitement of discovery. Children would learn science by doing science.

History, geography and civics classes would replace the amorphous social studies. More formal study is essential, particularly in grades four through eight. How many youngsters can find the United States on a world map? Twenty percent of a group of 12-years-olds could not, according to a study cited in the report. How many youngsters can name seven of the last 10 Presidents, as Bennett would require?

The arts, foreign languages, computer literacy, health and physical education--Bennett wants them all. To fit them all in he urges a longer school day, a longer school year similar to Japan’s 260-day model rather than our 180-day tradition, and even year-round school.

Yet even holding classes seven days a week would not be enough. Attentive parents, the first teachers of every child, can singularly improve elementary education, Bennett writes, by participating at school. Conscientious single parents can instill the sense that education is important, according to Bennett, who was raised solely by his mother.

The secretary’s report deserves high marks for thoroughness, for its emphasis on reading and for its insistence that all children regardless of language or background can learn.

For all its strengths, the report does have weaknesses. The proposal to open the principal’s office to managers from fields other than education comes from left field and should be sent back. The strongest principals are keen educators and capable leaders.

His proposal to allow parents to choose the school that their youngsters attend would encourage white flight and an exodus of professional and middle-class minorities from all but the very best public schools. That would strand the most vulnerable students in the least effective schools.

The proposal to teach core democratic values such as respect for persons, property and truth, to promote discipline, responsibility, maturity, character and morality can be accomplished without the reference on which he would insist to Judeo-Christian traditions; that is better left outside the classroom.

“First Lessons” carries no price tag. Schools are state and local responsibilities, but only fiscally. Education excellence is every American’s responsibility. The attention generated by the current emphasis on education reform in statehouses and the White House should spread to every house.