So what are they? What are the one thousand teachable things that every third grader ought to start learning so she’ll know them all before before she graduates from high school?

Here are twenty to get us started.

1. How to type.

2. How to speak in front of a group.

3. How to write clear prose that other people actually want to read.

4. How to manage a project.

5. The most important lessons from American history.

6. What the world’s religions have in common.

7. Evolution.

8. Formal logic.

9. The 15,000 most common English words.

10. Conversational Spanish.

11. How to handle big changes, with grace.

12. How to run a small business.

13. Basic chemistry.

14. Not arithmetic, but algebra.

15. A little geometry, a little calculus.

16. The most important lessons from ten other world cultures and their history.

17. Speed reading with comprehension.

18. How to sell.

19. Pick one: how to paint, write a poem, compose a song or juggle really well.

20. Understanding the biographies of 500 important historical figures and 200 fictional ones.