If you are a student or parent or dropout and have a question about your own educational needs and how to survive in a world of terrible schools, you can use this e-mail address neednoed@yahoo.com to ask me a question. If it is a reasonable question I will answer it in blog form.

Learning to Run a Business
Tuesday, June 2, 2009

Dear Roger,

I am a cognitive science student at Rutgers and a big fan of your work in the learning sciences. I'm also interested in entrepreneurship. I have a question for you that may be appropriate to post in your "advice column" - how did you get involved in business, and how did you learn to succeed there? What do you think are the best ways to learn how to run a business?

Sincerely,
Daniel Greene

Daniel,

Let's start with the simple idea that you will not learn to run a business in school. Of course, there are entrepreneurship programs  that are part of MBA programs. In fact, I was involved in building one for Trump University and am now building one as part of new kind of MBA for La Salle in Spain. That having been said, a course can open your eyes to some things but it will not teach you what you need to know. The first lesson I learned when I opened an AI company in 1980 was that the purpose of a business was to sell it. I had no idea. I thought the goal was to build something good that made money. But, investors were worried about getting out before they got in. Selling is on their minds. You need to know this in a deep way and new entrepreneurs, especially those with a "do good" bent never get this. The second thing to know is that your customers are not likely to be imaginative or appreciate your creativity. People who start new businesses expect others to appreciate what they have created. They will need patience for the long wait that follows.

What should you do? Work for someone else who has started a new business. Help them by working very hard. Don't worry about what is in it for you. Most new businesses fail so there is probably nothing in it for you anyhow. Except the knowledge that can only be gained through failure. Fail many times, hopefully on other people's money. Then you will be ready to succeed.

Roger

Seeking Advice on Kindergarten
Monday, February 24, 2009

(My responses are in italics.)

Hi Roger,

I have enjoyed reading your book Coloring Outside the Lines which I found very insightful. It has inspired me to be a little more critical of educational systems (the US one I am putting my 2 kids through and the Jamaican one I went through and fantasize of sending my kids through). I will be sending my 4 1/2 year old to Kindergarten this Fall and I am confused and stressed out about it. I have a few options and I would greatly appreciate your opinion.

(1) Nuevas Fronteras, a Spanish-immersion school with 3 kindergarten class each of size 20 students. And in case you have insider information, this school is located in the South Washington County 833 School district (My Minnesota school district). I will not have this opportunity when my daughter is ready for Grade 1, as you can imagine. Not sure of the research related to immersion programs with kids less than 6 or 10 years old.

Foreign language immersion is great if and only if the child will practice that language seriously the rest of his or her life; by and large I think this idea is silly in a part of the country where there really is no second language.

(2) A small Kindergarten class (www.paideachild.com) with 10-12 other students with a teacher with 20+ years of experience whose philosophy is to focus on whole language and EQ development while following some innovative and fun curricula (Zoophonics, journal keeping etc.)

Certainly nothing wrong with this.

(3) Possibly a chartered school called Nova Classical (www.novaclassical.com) with a good reputation of academic excellence. Founders were influenced by the book entitled A Well-Trained Mind. A good classical education with uniforms (reminiscent of my education) and Latin instructions (which has benefits in recognizing word-meaning and spelling). Two Kindergarten classes with 20 students each.

Latin? you must be kidding; what for; these people clearly haven't a clue.

(4) I would consider a private Montessori school. I have just read the book by Tim Seldin entitled Raising an Amazing Child-the Montessori way, and I didn't realize the wonderful ideas on teaching kids practical living skill and encouraging awareness and respect for their environment. I am inspired to purchase some of the school products for my home.

Montessori works for me; if a kid has to go to school, this is the best choice.

(5) Let my daughter decide, but I suspect she would want to stay at Paidea, choice #2, her current daycare with a Kindergarten option.

Children of 5 can decide what toy they want to play with and should be allowed to choose between nutritious foods; apart from that, don't ask their point of view -- help form their point of view.

Thanks. I can imagine you're an extremely busy person, but I would really, really appreciate your advice.

Thoughtful mother of 2, and full-time biostatistician.
(Identifying information removed for privacy reasons, upon mother's request.)

How can I Help Change my University
Thursday, December 4, 2008

How can I help to bring the revolution to my university?  Usually when I talk to professors, they fail to see that there is a problem.  They usually think that copying texts by hand constitutes learning.

If we can't change the system, can we perhaps circumvent it by building a better one?
If so, how can I help make this happen?

Thanks for your time, 
Gabriel Pannwitz

 
Gabriel:

Professors have a vested interest in keeping things as they are. Their lives are easy. They don’t have to teach too much and they get to do their research. The “better” the university you attend, the more professors act this way. The system does not reward top professors for teaching, so why should they care? Some do, of course, but none care all that much, at least not so much that they would willingly teach a lot more courses, for example.

I gather you are in a German university, and I can’t say I know all that much about them. When I was paying attention to them they were way more rigid than American universities, so good luck with that. The good news is that I have begun to work with a Spanish university that does get it and will soon be offering story centered curricula at the Master’s degree level. Stay tuned for more about that.

Here is what to do if you are enrolled in a good U.S. university. It will work some of the time.

Immediately declare that you want to major in something that does not exist as a major. There is usually a procedure for doing this. The university will convene a committee to design your special curriculum. Ask them to include as many “reading courses” as possible. Typically they will ask you to suggest the readings. Then, you can design anything you want to do, including projects, and no one will really care. Further you can expect faculty to help you do it. Avoid all introductory courses, and insist only on taking seminars in your course of study.

This is the best I can offer until we have more story-centered curricula available online, which will be soon.

Good luck

roger

Thinking about homeschooling
Wednesday, December 3, 2008

Dear Mr. Schank,

I absolutely loved your book, Coloring Outside the Lines. I never knew how passionate I was about education - alternative education, in fact - until I read it, and I tell people about it all the time. Thanks so much for writing it.

I know you said that a child doesn't need to be homeschooled to be raised a "smarter kid," but with the prospect of moving back into Manhattan (with terrible public schools), coupled with being on the cusp of my second child's entrance into kindergarten (she is a break-every-rule, cannot-be-contained kind of girl), I'm considering it. Given that I was homeschooled for several years during elementary school (and still managed to go to Stanford for undergrad and law school), I see this as an incredible opportunity to experience life on a different level - but I'm not really sure what that would look like.

My questions to you are these: if you were to devise a homeschooling curricula, or even just guidelines, what would you do? Are you aware of any excellent materials already created? I know several people in favor of a "classical" education, but personally, the idea sounds incredibly boring. Your thoughts?

Alternatively, what do you see as an ideal childhood, educationally speaking?

Also, how would you balance the educational needs of kids with wildly different interests when there's only one teacher (namely, me)?

I look forward to hearing from you,
Elisa

Elisa:

Thanks for writing. Those are good questions and ones that are on the minds of many people these days. I am not against home schooling, not at all. But I am against what is typically done in home schooling. I will explain shortly, but first let’s talk about New York City.

Many people panic when they move to New York City because it seems that their only choices are expensive private schools or awful public schools. So first let’s talk about that. New York, especially Manhattan can be an awful place to try and educate your kids, if what you mean by educate is “send them to a school.” The good news about Manhattan is that there are so many different private schools that some of them are really not such awful places.  They do try to be innovative. So, my first piece of advice is check them out before you conclude that they won’t work for you.

But, that having been said, I believe that school is an awful place for any kid that is a square peg who wants to do things his or her own way. Since you have one of those, let’s talk about what I would do if I were you.

The good news is you are in New York. Why is this good news? 

1. There are a lot of other mothers in your situation. Find them. Do not do this on your own. Get a group of 5-10 other kids and have them meet regularly in various people’s house with maybe 3 mothers on duty (if there are 10 kids) at any one time. Why is this good? Home schooling is hard work. And, you don’t know everything. Find others who you can work with and form a team to divide up time and make everyone more effective.

2. The city has just about everything you need.

This leads me to my main point. What do you need? That is, what is a good curriculum for a kid who is going to be home schooled? First let’s say what it is not. It should not involve any attempt whatsoever to copy, imitate, or even try to approach what is currently being taught in school. That curriculum was designed in 1892 for another time and another set of students. It can’t be changed because politicians and others won’t let it change. But, don’t get caught in its trap. The main reason to home school is to get rid of the 1892 curriculum. Just do it. Ask yourself what your kid should be learning as if you had no idea what is being taught now. Would you seriously come up with algebra, the state capitals, or reading Dickens (unless of course you had been in such a curriculum yourself)?

Since curiosity is the natural driver of learning, the question is what your kid is curious about. Kids can only be curious about what they have experienced. The Museum of Natural History is a good starting point as is the New York City Subway System, The Today Show broadcast and the construction going on at any building site. Take the kids to anything you find interesting and start fielding questions. If there is no excitement move on. Kids get turned on by the oddest things. When they do, make that the curriculum until they are bored with it and then move on.

What does it mean to make something into a curriculum? It means creating projects that are just a little difficult for them to complete without some help. This help might mean investigating something more, or finding resources or simply asking and getting answers from you. In the end, the idea is to have them complete projects. These could be papers, oral reports, drawings, or creations of some sort, depending upon their age and the subject at hand. Your job is to make each project stretch their abilities (in language, in team work, in discussions, in technical or arithmetic details.)

Please avoid anything resembling a classical education. There is time enough for that. As you may recall from Stanford (an institution at which I one professed many years ago), professors really do not expect high school to have taught you anything anyway and teach it all over again. So, if a classical education is needed, and I am sure it is not, they can acquire it later on.

Let curiosity rule.

Don’t follow anyone’s home school curriculum. (There are none that I know of that are any good but I await responses that tell me otherwise.)

roger

2008 © Roger C. Schank