Twelve Years of Apples

In "Learning in Depth," Kieran Egan muses about a school curriculum that is based on depth rather than breadth.

Kids should be given a topic during first grade -- apples is his first example-- and learn about it for the next 12 years. She would first make lists of apples and taste different apples, and her portfolio would grow. She would "become active in compaigns to preserve rare apple varieties;" later, she "knows the locations of the major orchards of the world as well as their owners, costs of production, profits, and transportation problems." Other kids would learn about birds, the circus, railways, the solar system, "and so on."

Egan asks us to "Imagine what school would be like if we implemented such a project on a large scale." My imagination tells me that the kids that are curious, inquisitive, independent will do well; the kids who are especially conscious about grades will wonder about how many artifacts need to go into the portfolio for an A; and most kids who are apathetic now will not suddenly have an epiphany of interest given the topic of "the circus."

I agree that teachers and schools should make a move to value depth over breadth, especially in the context of testing requirements that winnow the curriculum. And I really admire the notion that you are encouraging the kind of deep research that encourages students to make connections between static objects and the world. But Egan's hopes are not just unrealistic, but silly. What happens if I really don't care much about circuses, but love insects, the topic of my friend Manny, who like licorice? Does the 10th grade English teacher help each of her 150 students go futher in depth with each of the 150 topics?

The kind of 12-year committment Egan describes is more like an avocation. Kids will learn deeply about things, will spend countless hours on specific topics... but rarely on randomly chosen topics. In my experience, those avocations, even in high school, tend to be things like "vampires," and "wizards," rather than "apples." That's not to say, of course, that someone might put together a great portfolio on "vampires," but the number of kids who could follow through on vampires from age 6 to age 18 would be, I venture to guess, small.

There are better ways to value depth over breadth. A teacher could ask a student to read three books in a year about a single topic, or by a single author. A teacher could create a writing class around the topic of a single topic, "air," "water," even "apples," and ask kids to investigate facets of the issue. A school department could have a "theme" for a year. In my school, for instance, the social studies department is focusing on "genocide" next year.

Egan says that such programs have already begun. In Japan, for instance, "students make fortune cookies, slip a piece of paper with a topic inside, then randomly choose a cookie -- and their topic." It wouldn't be long before some young wit writes "boobs" on the slip. At least there might be more interest in that than "circus."