Daniel S. Katz read the New York Times’ article “Is Your First-Grader College-Ready,” and he was not sure at first whether it was a spoof or for real. Evidently, it was for real. He introduces us to the useful term “Poe’s Law.” Wikipedia describes it thus: “a literary adage which stipulates that without a clear indicator of an author’s intended sarcasm it becomes impossible to tell the difference between an expression of sincere extremism and a parody of extremism.”*
It takes close reading a la Common Core for Katz to figure out that the article was for real, not a parody. Yet it still reads like a parody.
He writes:
So what is almost satirical about some of the approaches described in the Times?
It is one thing to talk to first grade students about what they want to be when they grow up. For students who are growing up…
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seldurio 