The Pomp Podcast - 334: Ana Lorena Fabrega On How To Learn

Episode Date: July 13, 2020

Ana Lorena Fabrega is a former teacher who now spends her time focused on building products to reimagine education. In this conversation, we discuss what traditional education gets wrong, how to unlearn what you learned, the toxic school culture of memorization, the changing role of educators, the future of online learning, and how to raise generations of entrepreneurs, creators, and producers.  =============================== Our second sponsor is choice, a new self-directed IRA product that I'm really excited about. If you are listening to this, you are likely part of the 7.1 million bitcoin owners who have retirement accounts with dollars in them, but not bitcoin. I was in that situation too. Now you can actually buy real Bitcoin in your retirement account. I'm talking about owning your private keys and using tax-advantaged dollars to do it too. Absolute game changer. https://www.retirewithchoice.com/pomp =============================== Pomp writes a daily letter to over 50,000 investors about business, technology, and finance. He breaks down complex topics into easy to understand language, while sharing opinions on various aspects of each industry. You can subscribe at https://www.pompletter.com

What's up, everyone? This is Anthony Pompliano. Most of you know me as Pomp. You're listening to the Pomp Podcast, simply the best podcast out there. Let's kick this thing off. Anna Lorena Fabriga is a former teacher who now spends her time focused on building products to reimagine education. In this conversation, we discuss what traditional education gets wrong, how to unlearn what you learned, the toxic school culture of memorization, the changing role of educators, the future of online learning, and how to raise generations of entrepreneurs, creators, and producers. I really enjoyed this conversation with Anna, and I hope you do as well. Before we get into the episode, I want to quickly tell you about

our sponsors. The first is BlockFi. BlockFi currently has three separate products. You can buy and sell crypto with no fees. You can deposit crypto and get a US dollar loan against or collateral. Or you can use my favorite product as an investor and a user, which is an interest bearing account. You can deposit crypto or stable coins and earn up to 8.6% APY on your deposit. Later this year, BlockFi is also going to launch a credit card that pays rewards in Bitcoin. Nope, no cash back and no airline miles. You're going to get Bitcoin back for your purchases on the credit card. So head on over to BlockFi.com slash Pomp. Again, BlockFi.com slash Pomp and check out the interest-bearing account, US dollar loans, and their crypto exchange. Our second sponsor is

Choice. They're a new self-directed IRA product that I'm really excited about. If you're listening to this, you're likely part of the 7.1 million Bitcoin owners who have retirement accounts with dollars in them, but not Bitcoin. I was in that situation too, but not anymore. Choice helped me out. Now you can actually buy real Bitcoin in your retirement account. I'm talking about owning your private keys and using tax advantage dollars to do it too. Absolute game changer. You can now have a self-directed IRA product where you can buy Bitcoin, hold the private keys, and use your tax advantage dollars to do it too. Go check them out at retirewithchoice.com slash POMP. retirewithchoice.com slash Pomp. Lastly, don't forget that I write a daily letter to over 50,000

investors about business technology and finance. I break down complex topics into easy to understand language while sharing my opinion on various aspects of each industry. You can subscribe at pompletter.com. Again, pompletter.com. All right, let's get into this episode with Anna. I hope you guys enjoyed this one. Anthony Pompliano is a partner at Morgan Creek Digital. All opinions expressed by Pomp or his guests on this podcast are solely their opinions and do not reflect the opinions of Morgan Creek Digital or Morgan Creek Capital Management. You should not treat any opinion expressed by Pomp as a specific inducement to make a particular investment or follow a particular strategy, but only as an expression of his opinion. This podcast is for

informational purposes only. All right, guys. Bang, bang. I've got a very special guest today. Anna is going to walk us through why we all don't know how to learn and what we can do about it. So thanks so much for doing this. Of course. Thank you for having me. That's a good way to put it. Like what we're learning, what we're not. Absolutely. All right. Let's just start with your background. You spent a long time teaching. You went to a bunch of different schools. Like just walk us through where were you born and kind of how do we get to you being a teacher initially? Yeah. So I'm from Panama, but because of my dad's job, he worked at a multinational corporation. So we moved around a lot. So I was born in Panama. But after a month, we moved to Colombia. Then we moved to Venezuela. Then we moved to India. Then we moved to Mexico, then to Brazil, then back to Panama. And then I studied in the US. So really, I went to, you know, I moved around as a kid. And by the time I was 15, I had been to 10 different schools because I also went to different schools in the different countries that I went to.

And I guess that a lot of my ideas about education and all my questions come from my experience having attended 10 different schools and how, you know, I didn't really see that many differences in all the different schools that I went to, even though they were all, you know, once some were non-denominational, some were really religious, some were more traditional, some were more progressive, some were American, the other ones were national and still learning looked the same. So that's what kind of like I started thinking about this. And then I decided to become a teacher.

I love working with kids. And that also was when I started to see what was happening in schools and how it wasn't really working. And finally, last year, I decided to leave in order to explore different alternatives and kind of raise questions that get more people to think about how little learning is happening in the traditional schools. Got it. And so when you started teaching, what grade were you teaching and kind of what does that

look like from the teacher's seat? Most people listening have never been a teacher. They've just been in the student aspect of that relationship. But what does that look like? Right. So when I decided to study education, I went to NYU and I did childhood education and special education as my undergraduate. And one of the things that I think is really valuable about teacher training is that they make you student teach a certain amount of hours. I can't remember right now, but it was a lot. Like for two years, I was in five different schools just observing, you know, the whole teacher-student interaction and what it looks like. And that, you know, I was in multiple grades. I studied elementary school. So I was in first, second, third, fourth, fifth, sixth

as a student teacher. And really that's where most of my learning came from, from observing mostly the kids and how they were learning and how they were not learning. And then when I got my first teaching job, it was in Boston. My husband was doing his MBA and I was just teaching at a small school a small private school in Boston and I taught first and third grade in that school and then I moved to Panama and I started working and that's where I worked for four years at a big American school and I taught third and fourth grade so really my age group the one that I enjoy working with the most are like nine and ten year olds and I like that age because they're not too young so they you know they're kind of like but they're still not too cool for school so it was

the perfect age and I enjoyed it a lot. Okay. So this is a weird question, but why is learning important, right? So you spent a bunch of your time thinking about how we learn and what we learn and what the structures are and everything, but just the core question of why is learning important, especially at a young age, but even as we get to be adults and things like that, how do you think about it? It's interesting that you ask that because that's what kids ask when in school. They're like, why, why do we even have to learn? And, and that's when you start to notice, oh my gosh, like we're doing things wrong. Because if a kid is asking you, why do we need to learn? It's because they're not seeing the benefits of, of learning. And, and that's one of the big issues

here that in schools, learning has been kind of like removed from students. And it's, it's something like imparted by a teacher and something that happens inside this structure. So I think it's really interesting that to me learning is really what happens outside of school and it's super important because that's what that's when you start to see kids interests and and what kind of things they're inclined to and and what are the kind of things that they could end up doing in the future so to me it's not really like about what what we're teaching them and what they're learning but more about like if they're learning right and and unfortunately what I noticed in schools is that there's very little learning because they don't even they see it very detached

from them um and and once you start to give them this space and the time to actually you know take charge of their learning then it's completely the process is completely different you see kids motivated wanting to come back and then going through tangents and creating things that you wouldn't have even thought that an eight-year-old could do or a nine-year-old could do right and that to me is really learning. And once they keep coming back for more, then that's when it's really important. Like that's when things are going well. So the reason why I wanted to record this episode is Paul Graham recently wrote an essay all about like learning to unlearn. And he basically highlighted saying, hey, every single person that I talked to pretty much learned how

to memorize and kind of beat the test, but they didn't actually learn to actually learn. And so I said, look, let's go talk to somebody who is literally an expert at why is that? And so maybe you can start out just, let's highlight issues that kind of the traditional schooling system and the current mechanisms. Like why are we all built to learn the way that we do learn through that school system? Like what are those issues? Yeah. So, so the thing is that traditional school as we know it, and this like compulsory, like compulsive schooling was something that was created 120 years ago and for a very different purpose and a very different time. So back then, it was important to train kids to become assembly line workers for, you know, it was the industrial

revolution. So they had to work at factories. We also had to train kids to be in the military. So kids had to learn a specific set of things and they had to learn how to follow instructions for the jobs that they were going to have back then. The problem, so it worked back then. The problem is that the years started to pass and pass, all the other industries started changing, you know, as expected, except for education. So, you know, if you look at a picture of a classroom and the way things were done 120 years ago, and you look at a picture now, you're going to see basically the same thing. Maybe you'll see more technology, you know, here and there, but really the structure and the way that we are teaching in traditional schools hasn't changed. And the

problem with that is that nowadays we need kids that are creative. We need entrepreneurs. We need kids that are willing to carve their own paths and figure things out without instructions. Yet in school, we're still training them to be assembly line workers, you know, to operate under instructions. Like kids barely know what to do if a teacher doesn't tell them like, this is what you need to do now. We are still having kids, you know, comply to rules and be obedient. And the whole nature of a school right now, it just goes against everything we know about how kids learn, right? So if you think about school, you can't really talk, you know, teachers tell you all the time, like, you're not here to socialize, you're here to learn. So, you know, the instinct

of a kid is to talk. So they go to school, they can't talk. The instinct of a kid, they're so active, they need to be moving. In school, you need to be sitting down for eight hours, you know, except when you go to recess, and there's plenty of evidence showing how, you know, all the ill effects of sitting down for so long. In school, you know, they have to be listening to a teacher and listening to a lecture. Like, that's not how kids learn. Kids need to be active and creating things and making mistakes and trying things out. So all these things go against the nature of a kid and against how kids learn. Yet we continue to do it just because the system hasn't changed in so many years and many people don't even question this just because it's the way that we

you know we were all in the system and and that's just the way it is and many people are scared to raise questions and to kind of like try something different many people are like well what I can't play with my kids education like what if I try something different and they don't end up learning I'm like they're not learning right now so really it's about exploring something different so so That's the main issue, if you ask me, that we're still training kids for jobs that don't exist. A stat that I saw the other day that was just very alarming is that two-thirds of the kids that are in elementary school right now will end up doing jobs that haven't been created. Really, we are teaching them for a future that doesn't exist yet. Instead of focusing on teaching

from a curriculum that may or may not be relevant, we should be teaching them how to learn on their own and how to figure things out and how to create things, right? Because that's probably what they're going to end up doing. So I think it's Neil deGrasse Tyson, who he's got this story that he tells, and I'm getting the second hand from Polina, so forgive me if I mess it up. But basically, he tells the story of he's walking behind a mother and her son, and they're on the road, and there's a big puddle and as they're walking by the little kid naturally kind of goes towards it and he's about to make this big leap and he's going to jump right in the puddle and the water's going to go everywhere and all stuff and the parent basically pulls the kid away from it

right and his whole thing was like look the kid wants to go figure it out like the kid has to learn when i step in it the water shoots out it gets me wet like there's all of these things that happen but then there's also the parent being like i don't want to clean it up i don't want to deal with this and whatever. And so it feels almost like, to your point, like there's this element of conditioning kids to not be kids to some degree. And so my question to you then is like, why was the system structured that way in the beginning? Right. So it hasn't changed, but when this system was originally built, like why was it so lecture based and kind of built the way it was? Is it a control thing? Is it just like, they didn't know any better? Like, what do

you think there? Yeah, well, they didn't need for people to come up with, you know, to be creative and to come up with ideas like that was not the purpose the purpose was for kids to follow instructions and for that they had to be very rigid and they had to like kind of have this authoritative role so that kids would comply and that was the whole purpose and and it worked really well like you had all these kids you know the teachers the fountain the fountain of wisdom and the one that tells you what to do and this and that and and it worked back then for those jobs But now I find it so interesting, like kids, are they getting trouble if they question something, you know, and even if they do it in a respectful way, like teachers still have this, not all, but many teachers still have this notion that they are the authority and anyone who challenges authority, like it's wrong. And I'm like, I did it very differently in my class. I was always like, you guys question everything. If something doesn't make sense, like respectfully, you can raise your hand and say, you know what, I don't agree with that. Or I don't, you know, I want to dig more into this or I, you know, I have a different opinion. And we need more of that. But that's the big no-no in school, right? It's not part of the obedience and compliance kind of like culture in a school, which is really damaging for the kind of people that we want, you know, to raise.

So the other thing, and I don't have young kids, right? So I'm not as well versed on this, but it feels like there's the structure of the school is very driven on obedience and like, sit in your seat, be quiet, we're going to tell you everything, you know, like you're describing. The other thing is, it seems like all of a sudden, there's been this explosion, especially in the United States, of ADHD prescriptions, and kind of like, we're also going to just drug the kids into behaving to some degree. And, you know, pretty much if you talk to anyone over the age of like 35, they'd be like we all had adhd like by today's standard like we all had adhd and but we didn't get drugged and so maybe like what did you see in the classroom and kind of what do you see now

with uh with just that aspect of trying to control kids um i don't even know if i can talk about this but i'm just going to um if i had actually you know paid attention to the psychologists and the parents that would come to me and be like my kid definitely has adhd like we need to prescribe him right and the teacher kind of has the same and I was always like no like had I said yes to most of and I'm telling you I taught in this past like four years the amount of times that I had a meeting to discuss if we should put the kid in medication and it was really my saying because the teacher is the one I would have had like 10 kids in medication for ADHD and to be perfectly honest yes they were extremely active but in my mind that is normal I don't know if it's because I was like

that and I got prescribed Ritalin the entire thing because I couldn't stop talking I couldn't stop moving to me that is normal and if you walked into my class something like interesting was that you would have kids I don't know who I was talking about this um to this but you would have kids like reading standing up or you and and it's because I they would ask me like can I stand up and read I'm like sure like if that works for you go ahead like I don't care if you're sitting down or not like like that doesn't make sense to me like some kids were on the rug as long as they were doing what they were supposed to it doesn't matter you know we would have frequent breaks where we were moving because I know how important it is for kids to move. I am the kind of person that when

I need to be creative and when I need to come up with things, I need to go on a walk. I cannot sit in front of my computer. So I cannot expect that from kids who are even more active than adults. Right. So to me, that is just so messed up. It's so messed up that, that when you walk into a classroom, you're like, Oh, what such a well-behaved room, all the kids are sitting down like this. To me, I'm like, Oh my gosh, poor kids. There's very little learning going on in here. You know? Yeah. And so I guess like when you're a kid, right, when you're nine, 10 years old, like you can yell and scream and complain or whatever. But like if your parents say take the medicine, you take the medicine. If your teacher says sit down and shut up and listen, like you pretty much do it. You may fight it. You may be good at fighting it, but ultimately you succumb to the authority because you want to ride home. You want to eat dinner. Like, you know, you don't want to get spanked or, you know, I guess you can't even do that these days. Right. But like all of those things. So that still persists, though, as you get older as well to a degree where it almost feels like there's this world of people saying, I want to learn, but it's supposed to be painful. I need to sit and study this book and read from front to back. That's the only way to learn. And so is it a thing where like adults are just much easier to like kind of suck up the

pain and they just do what they have to do? Or is it literally that we're conditioned since we're so young that that is the path and that is the only path? I really think that it's that we've been conditioned to believe that. And I'm glad you bring that up because I can give you examples of how I saw the complete opposite in my room. So one of the things I really believe and I talk about a lot is that you cannot enforce learning. It doesn't matter how hard you try, you cannot force somebody to learn. What you can do,

and not a lot of people take this approach, but I did and it worked, is you can inspire kids to want to learn. So really, and we can talk about how the role of the teacher has changed throughout the years, but the most effective teachers are those who do a good job selling the idea of learning. You kind of make kids be like, I really want to learn about that. That looks interesting. You know, you make it like for them to be curious about it and want to come, because if you try the other approach, they are going to repel it. Nobody likes to be told what to do. Right. Especially when it comes to like learning. So one thing that worked really well for me is that I've never used rewards in my classroom or like a behavior chart. And this is really common for teachers. And I don't blame them.

I mean, once when you're in a room for seven hours a day with 24 kids, different personality. I mean, it's chaos. Like it really is chaos. And then you have the set of parents of each kid, which is even more chaos, right? So I don't blame teachers for thinking, oh, I'm going to go and have a behavior chart and, you know, pump every time you misbehave. That's one point in this and that. Here's what I've noticed. That doesn't work.

Like it may work in the short term. The kid may learn, okay, I'm not going to talk right now. But the moment the kid has a chance to talk, the kid will do it. And the relationship that you're establishing with the kid is a really negative one. They see you as the enemy and they don't want to do anything that you're telling them. in, you know, like learning. So what really worked for me is I would give them lots of choices and together we would come up with the things that we thought that were appropriate in the classroom, the things that weren't. And I would always tell them, like, I trust you until you give me a reason

not to. And we established a culture where kids didn't feel like I had the control over the classroom and the rules. And because of that, I had very, very little behavior issues in my room. And every time the principal would walk by or teachers would walk by, they're like, what do give these kids I'm like I give them choice and I trust them and we've established you know a relationship where I'm not like the authoritative figure I'm like I don't want to say a friend because I wasn't a friend but you know I was someone that I was approachable and they saw that my intentions were for them to learn and that works really well and for parents as well like you know establishing that the behavior problems just really diminish it feels like uh you know I

wasn't the best behaved kid, even all the way through high school. And, uh, I remember you'd walk in certain rooms and the teachers who wanted to be more authoritative, like you're like, literally, what can I get away with in here? How far can we push the teacher? Right. And even when you're literally like a teenage boy, you feel the same way. And it's even worse when you're younger, but then there was teachers that would literally on day one be like, Hey, here's the deal. We don't have behavior issues in here because I trust you. You trust me. Like, we're just going to work together and you're going to walk out of here learning things I'm going to learn things from you like we're cool and it was almost like this uh mutual respect to some degree and that I think

people kind of get used to that maybe when they get older into college and stuff but it sounds like you were able to take some of those same mechanisms and bring it all the way down to kids as young as you know nine ten years old and it had the same impact yeah and then just being really honest with them like I cannot even tell you the amount of times that kids were like so why are we learning this and I'm like I have no idea because I've never used this in my entire life and sometimes I would be like let's forget about this let's try something else like obviously I had you know to a certain extent because I did have to follow a curriculum but I was like you know don't if they have a question and they don't understand something and you can just be honest with them

like you need this for this and when you explain it and they see the relevance then they start to understand I remember I had this kid who was like they had to learn and memorize like all the states in the U.S. And this kid's like, Ms. Fab, like, I've never been to the U.S. I don't know when I'm going to be. I live in Panama. Like, I don't want to learn the states. I want to learn the provinces of Panama. Wouldn't that be more relevant? And I'm like, you're totally right. Like, you're totally right. Like, why am I going to force you to learn the states in the U.S.? You're right, you know? So it's when they see that you have this approach and, you know, another answer could have been like, no, because you have to. And I'm the teacher. And you know what? You don't get to question this.

Like, this is what you're learning. You can expect that they're not going to learn at all. So, and it's like really using your common sense and thinking about what you would have wanted as a kid in order to be, find learning appealing, right? Yeah, so we talked a lot about like the structure of learning, right? But what kids are learning, and I think kind of what you're getting at here is there's this toxic school culture that you've talked about before, which essentially is just, I'm as the teacher going to regurgitate all this information, you're going to do your best to retain it in your brain for a finite amount of time. The test is next Friday, don't forget it between now and Friday.

But on Saturday, you don't have to remember anything like you pass the test, you're good, move on. And it almost feels like we kind of wasted between now and Friday memorizing something that you literally will never use or retain that information. So maybe talk a little bit about this like toxic school culture and kind of how you see those issues today. Yeah. So I find it, there's like a lot to unpack here, but I find it really interesting that when people, because it's, I mean, at this point, everyone knows that to a certain extent that there's very little learning going on and the kids are not remembering things and the kids are not retaining and kids don't want to go to school and they don't like learning or school. people know this but the reaction of like those policymakers and the people who do the curriculum and this and that is okay kids are not learning okay let's you know we need to raise the bar and we need to add more homework and let's make the school day longer and let's you know just more rigor more rigor more assessments let's test them and i'm like what like how did we get to this

conclusion like that's not the problem is not lack of rigor the problem is that kids don't care and they don't have to because of the way that we're doing things right and if a kid doesn't care it doesn't matter how many standards and how many tests and how much you try to drill information they're not going to learn so since you know you know that was the approach um and since the no child left behind policy was put in place like we've had this obsession with like metrics and measuring learning and and standards and high stake testing and to me that has made everything absolutely worse. You know, just the environment in a school when it's time for the, you know, high-stake testing is just insane. Like, if anyone actually saw the inside of a school,

they would be like, this is not humane, not for the teachers, not for the students, not for the parents. Like, the whole thing is messed up. And it's exactly what you said. You see teachers quickly trying to, like, cram all the information before, you know, this big test. like kids are stressed out. There's anxiety all over the place. And then right after the test, kids don't recall a thing. So it's like, we just wasted all this time, like prepping for a test and, and, you know, getting kids, telling kids, quote unquote, this is a high stake test. Like, this is really important. Like your, you know, school experience depends on this. Kids, how are they going to perform well with all this pressure? Right. And I've realized many things through this

One, that the grades don't really tell us much. Like you can have kids that do really well in a test because they figured out the way to do well and they've learned nothing. And then you have kids who actually know the material and you know from having conversations with them and from seeing what they've accomplished, but then do really poorly on the test

because they're not good test takers. I took the SAT three times and oh my gosh, thank God I never thought like, Anna, you're dumb. No, I just, I always knew, like I'm just not a good test taker. Like this whole thing doesn't work for me. So I just think it's like, to be just perfectly blunt here, like our priorities are all messed up, you know, like, like all this, like when you remove all that testing and all that, you know, like standards and all this, then that's when you have more opportunity to start to see learning happening. Right. And there's, I have a story with this.

So my first two years, I did exactly, you know, what I had to do, right? I would teach from the curriculum. I would deviate often, to be honest. Like I was never that teacher that taught everything from the curriculum, but the kids were happy. The kids were learning. Parents were really happy. So it was working.

But then by the third year, I was like, I'm done. Like, I can't keep, you know, from day one prepping kids for this test. Like, we're just, no, this is not fun. Like, I just don't see any relevance. So the third year I decided to rebel and I was like, I'm going to do things my way. I'm going to pull things from Pinterest. I'm going to just, you know, if I see a unit that kids are not going to use, I'm going to just skip it and teach kids things that are not even in the curriculum, like personal

finances, you know, things like that, you know, and I was with another teacher that had the same mentality. So we were able to do this together and it was awesome. But then it came time towards the end of the year for the big test, right? So in my school, we did something called the map test. and it's this it's a standardized test that kids do in math reading and writing so they take it at the beginning of the year and they score a percentage and then the program gives you like a projected growth that the kid needs to meet by the end of the year what's interesting is that

the teacher's evaluations are tied to student performance so if your class doesn't perform well or the kids you know the percentage of kids don't meet that targeted growth then you know you can get fired like it's it's your job right your job is in the line so it was kind of a you know risky move that I was like I'm just not going to teach these things and then when the time for the test came I was like I'm not going to do test prep like I haven't been teaching these things throughout the entire year I'm not going to like mortify my kids for two weeks doing test prep like let's just see what happens time of the test comes the kids take the test and when I go in for my end of the year evaluation the principal I was like I didn't even know what to expect I was like oh my gosh but

I kind of knew that I was going to leave the school soon so I was like oh well um and then the the principal was like, well, she, cause kids from kindergarten all the way to 12th grade take this test. And she was like, Anna, your, your class scored the highest in your third grade class in reading and in math. So in two of the three categories out of the entire school. And I'm like, wait, what do you mean? She's like, well, your kids, most of your kids, like 90% of your kids either met or exceeded their targeted growth. So, you know, please tell me how, how did you do this test prep and I'm like do you want to know the truth actually this is the first year that I decided not to follow the curriculum you know like to the you know the way I usually do and

I did not do any test prep and I didn't even like mortify the kids they just went in and and they did clearly really well so this tells you that it doesn't really like the like cramming and teaching for a test won't necessarily, you know, provide good results, right? My kids were learning plenty in different ways, and they were able to do well in the test even better than previous years. So that's just an example of that. It almost feels like there's a lot of studies now at this point about like kids who are more well-rounded, whether it's in sports, in school, whatever, rather than say to a kid like, hey, you're going to be a doctor at age two, right? And like every single thing you do in your academic career is geared towards you being a doctor. Like they

actually end up not performing as well as doctors than the kid who most of their career learned all of these different skills right was interested in a bunch of different things kind of explored it all ends up being the doctor but they're just pulling from a much more like vast information uh like database it sounds like that's kind of what your kids were doing right is they were more well rounded going into this rather than just trying to optimize for how do i get all the right answers on this test, that well-roundedness ends up being a greater advantage. Yeah, so absolutely. We were doing things that were more related to the real world, right?

So they were learning, actually, because they could see the relevance. And I was not teaching the skills, which is what was really interesting. But then it goes with what I believe, right? Like, that was a perfect example. Like, I wasn't teaching this hardcore skills. We were doing projects. We were going outside. We were exploring the things that they were telling me that they were interested in.

And the skills just kind of like come along, which is really interesting, right? Like you don't need to explicitly teach many of the things that we do in school, right? So here's what I've noticed. When a kid is interested in something and the kid wants to learn about something, they will figure it out, especially now with computers. Like you will see them like, oh, Ms. Fab, I need to figure this out. They would go to the computer, figure out all the facts. Then they would come the next day and they're like, I read the entire history of World War

II. And I was like, Whoa, okay. I didn't even ask you to do that, but you sure. That's great. So when the kids are interested and they want something, they will figure it out. That's what I've noticed. So ironically, by like stepping back and kind of like open it up and leaving it to them, that's more productive and kids will actually get more done than if we try to intervene and tell them exactly what to do and how to do it. I, uh, one of my favorite videos on the internet is a I think it's a mom and she's sitting in her kitchen and she's like recording her what looks like maybe five six-year-old son uh around the corner he's at the dinner uh table and he's doing

his homework and all of a sudden he says Alexa two plus two and Alexa says back four right and and of course everyone on the internet's like you can't do that right you get everyone like freaking out I'm like that's the smartest kid in the class like I love that that is hilarious I love that i love that that's when kids would be like miss fab um i need to look up this word do i do i have to use the dictionary i'm like no like no please use the computer and they're like oh because my previous teachers would tell me i had to use the dictionary i'm like no who carries around a dictionary nowadays like you have a phone in your pocket you're gonna look this things up don't use a dictionary unless you want to but no you know you just you need to embrace the fact

that kids have all these tools to their disposal and this is a little bit of a threat to teachers because this means that teachers no longer have to be you know their role is no longer to deliver information right especially with when this information is available online like the role of the teacher really now is to be a facilitator and to provide you know the space and the conditions for kids to create things right and to be a source of motivation really that's the role of the teacher nowadays but it's really difficult to make this transition and teachers still want to just you know be the ones in charge of everything the problem is that when you do that the kids are just not learning because you're removing the learning from them right the more space and the

more liberty you give them then the more learning is going to happen so one of the things i love that you talk about is like how do we raise kids to be creators entrepreneurs producers like things or people who can create things right and so like what is that solution we talk about the problems but like what is the solution or what does that design look like for how kids can learn yeah so again in school a lot of what kids are doing for 12 years like that's a long time is they are again following instructions and really like working through this worksheets and like made belief projects and things that are just real in the school environment like that's the reality. Like very rarely do you see kids actually going out and solving a problem in the

real world or things that are relevant, right? So it's interesting because to me, a good education is one that where kids leave or they graduate, you know, being extremely aware of what they're good at, having had plenty of experience creating and building different things and failing and then trying again and getting feedback until they nail something. And then, you know, and having that desire to keep learning. And those three things are not happening right now. And the one, the one that we're talking about right now is like, how do you get more kids to create? Well, giving them the opportunity to create things. So I recently like sent out a tweet storm with David of Y Combinator and how, you know, I just find it fascinating that model. Cause that's how kind

of like how I envision kids, you know, a school nowadays, right. If you want to call it a school, but a place where, you know, kids go and they're put into teams, depending on what they're interested in, they have this idea, they balance of ideas, and they just start building things. And then every two weeks, they have check on points, and they get feedback. And then, you know, they see what works, they test it, and then they build again. And, and, you know, they need more opportunities to do these things and just build and create and create. And we don't give them that space in school and school, they're sitting down learning from a curriculum. So I'm really interested in creating that space. And, and, you know, before COVID happened, like I was already

thinking about doing it in the online space just so that kids from different countries could just join. And then it's a space for kids to create different things. They come in with a problem that they want to solve and I help them and I provide them with the resources so that they can work it through and come up with a prototype and solve a problem that they're interested in, a real problem. And I feel like I've seen how through that process, they're learning so many things. They're learning how to do research, how to talk about their ideas, how to incorporate feedback and change things. And to me, that is the kind of learning that is going to be more valuable for kids in the future, right? Forget about what's going on in school. We've already

talked about how that's like, we're not preparing kids for the future. But if we open more centers or creative studios, or like I'm doing, online spaces for kids to just go in and execute their ideas and try them out, two things are going to happen. One, I do feel like we're going to have more kids that are 15, 16, like with their own companies or with their own products out there, because they're going to have tried so many times. And I don't know if you've seen a kid when they're into something, they won't stop until they get to what they want to. So it's a matter of providing them the space and the resources to create and create and create and create. And that's kind of like a maker space, right? For kids. So that's kind of what I'm

envisioning that kids need more nowadays. And hopefully more people start doing things like this? So one of the things I've always been fascinated by is I think a disproportionate amount of CEOs and founders of very large tech companies as kids went to monastery schools. And I am definitely not an expert on these monastery schools, but my understanding is that it's very much less rigid. It's more kind of this group project-based type learning. It's a little bit self-directed by the kids. What are you interested in? What are you not interested in. And also one of the most fascinating parts I was reading about is like the way that they address the students, right? So your students were calling you Ms. Fab, like they would just use

first names, right? And almost treat the adult as a peer in some way. I think a lot of people get scared by that. They're like, oh my God, how could you ever, you know, kind of break down the hierarchical structure, but also it looks like it works. Like there's a certain type of person that comes out the other end of that process. And so it almost feels like what you're talking about is taking that type of more free flowing, less rigid structure, but focusing it specifically on like creation, right? Like, how do you build? How do you build? Is that a fair kind of assessment? Yeah, yeah, absolutely. So I'm a big fan of Montessori schools. And, you know, there are other kind of approaches that are similar, that are very student centered, and that the kid is

doing most of the learning, like Reggio Emilia, you have Waldorf. So there are, I'm a big fan. And that's actually where I'm pulling, you know, many of my ideas from, because it's around this idea that we want the kid to learn. So what can we do for the kid to want to learn? And I feel like it's, you know, it's a lot more fun. Kids enjoy going to this kinds of schools a lot more. What I fear though is, and which is one of the reasons why I'm trying the online space, is that the most privileged kids are really the ones who get access to this kind of educational experiences, right? And this experiments that are going on. And the ones that are the least advantage are the ones who kind of like get stuck in this system.

And that's something that's constantly in my mind. I obviously don't have an answer for that. But one of the things that I was thinking is, well, I really believe that, you know, more and more people are gonna have access to an internet connection in the future, right? Like it's just becoming more and more common, even in remote areas.

And of course, this is not to say everyone, but I feel like I'm really interested in exploring the online space because I have a feeling that we can recreate this Montessori-approached learning experiences in the online space and have access to more kids, right? And to kids that, you know, may not have a Montessori school close wherever they live. But definitely, I think their mind is in the right place. And I'm a big fan of all, you know, all the experiments that have been done around that space.

And help me understand how online education with, like, young kids works, right? So kind of two data points are, I got a bunch of friends who have young kids that are in kind of early elementary years. And all I keep hearing is like, there's no way that my kid can sit in front of this computer and zoom all day. Like they're just not going to do it. They already have a hard time sitting in class, let alone on my couch where there's a TV and you know, all this other stuff going on. Then the second thing is it also feels like part of the value for young kids going to elementary school is like the interaction with the teacher, right? The teacher can be very kind of hands-on with the kids etc so the little it feels like that gets lost online so how do you just think

about like online education and children yeah so there's a there's an important distinction to make here um when it comes to online education and um online education when done right it works beautifully and it is not what we're seeing right now that schools are doing right obviously because of COVID, like from one day to the other, like teachers and schools have just had to like improvise and transition to teaching virtually. But to me, that's not online learning, that is remote online learning, which is very different. And I'll tell you why. When you structure a course that you want to teach online, you do it with the frame of mind, you know, you keep in mind your virtual audience. And you you're not trying to recreate traditional schools in the online

space. That's what we're seeing because of COVID. And that's what I call remote learning. But when online learning is done right, you design the entire course and the entire experience with the virtual audience in mind. And you use the technologies and you do this and you structure it very differently. And I'll give you some examples of people that are doing it really right and that I've seen how well it works. But what we're seeing commonly and what you're saying that your friends are telling you that if I were a kid, I don't even know what I would have done because I cannot sit in front of the computer the entire day, no,

is that schools are just trying to recreate what they've always been doing online, right? So that definitely doesn't work. Like we're talking about how that didn't work in a brick and mortar school when kids are like sitting in front of a teacher. What do you think is going to happen when you put them in front of the screen?

Like most of my best friends are all teachers and I still keep in touch with them, all the ones that worked at my previous school. And it's just crazy to read that chat because the poor, you know, teachers are like trying to manage six hours a day of back-to-back online classes. Obviously by the third hour, you've got a group of kids that are up to zoomed out. Like they don't want, they don't want to pay attention. They're like first, second graders, like what? Like that makes no sense. Right? So the whole point of online learning is to concise the

time so that kids are not in school for seven hours. Like kids don't need to be in school for seven hours. They probably still are because it works like a daycare system at this point, but really like kids online should be just having direct instruction one hour one and a half hours and then the rest of the time they should be learning in unstructured ways and have time to go out and socialize with other kids and go to music class and sports and this and that the problem is that we haven't gotten to that point yet especially because everything had to happen so quickly so um two really good examples that opened my eyes to what a real good online course is um well david perel who i know you know um he started this online course called

right of passage. And I also work with Tiago Forte, who has this thing called Fortelabs, and he teaches building a second brain, which is a productivity class, but also with this approach to online education. And I think that it works really well because none of them were educators before. And so they did not have this preconceived notions of what a lesson should look like and how to structure this for a traditional face-to-face environment. They just sat down and they said, okay, we want to create a course that's really engaging, that's going to be online with a virtual audience in mind how can we make a difference so they haven't grabbed something and put it online they just created a whole new way to teach online and it's structured very

differently from what a course in person would be and it works incredibly like I am impressed with how many people want to come back with the way like how everyone's learning and and it's incredible so this really ties with this idea that I don't feel like like like there's no way to fix schools I really don't think. I think that we just have to rethink the whole thing with what are our priorities right now? What do kids need to know nowadays? What are the kind of jobs that kids are going to have in the future? What technologies do we have available that we can use? And then using all that, come up with a new way to teach and learn. And that can be done online, but it's not what we're seeing right now. What we're seeing right now is outrageous, which is what you're

saying, like having kids sitting in front of a computer. I am concerned. I don't even know what's going to happen. How much of this do you think is for those online courses that they're teaching, like the students are older, right? Meaning that they're just adults and like they are in a different place in their life and have a better base of knowledge than a nine-year-old or 10-year-old. Like, does that play into it as well? Or do you think that literally it's just a different way of teaching that actually gets different results? Well, I had no idea how this course was going to be structured when I decided to enroll. Like, I just thought I was going to learn how to write for Modern Times. I had all these ideas about education that I wanted to put out there. And I

was like, sure, I want to take this. I was expecting a asynchronous, I think that's how you pronounce it, kind of course where, you know, they just upload different videos. You have to go through the modules and there's like a forum and this and that. Like, that's what I was expecting. And then I was like, after the first session, I was like, whoa, I need to think of a way to bring this to kids. And that's exactly what I emailed David that day. I was like, this was incredible. Like I cannot believe the interactions, how I was put into breakout groups with different people. And I actually felt like we were in real person talking. And then, you know, he uses the flipped classroom approach, which is that the videos or the lecture, you watch a video in the afternoon

or at any time that you can. And then when you show up to class, then you're just discussing what you learned. You come in with your writing, you get feedback, you get to socialize. And that's the way that we should be structuring this kind of thing. That's really dynamic. So that's kind of what I tried to replicate with our summer camp. That's what we called it. We started with a pilot just because we're testing all these ideas to see how it would work with kids. And I have for a week, a group of kids that were nine through 11, and they would join this virtual space. And I kind of try to emulate that same structure that they were using. And it worked beautifully. Like it was insane how the kids were totally engaged. At first, they were a little

skeptical that I wasn't telling them what to do but by the second day they were doing you know they were all engaged working they had like the chat they were throwing in the comments we would put them in breakout groups and they were like giving each other feedback like it just you know it was incredible what they accomplished and this is not the kind of engagement that you see in online remote learning that's going on in schools right now and and I really think that I mean it works it works for kids the one component that I haven't been able to figure out is that the courses that they teach to adults, they can be, you know, massive.

Like you can have 150 people to 500 people in a course and people are engaged because they're adults. With kids, I am not so sure. I had 12 kids in my pilot, right? And I'm just still trying to figure out because I do feel like they need that one-on-one and that personalized attention. So I'm still trying to figure out that component,

but it works. Like that method, I saw that it works. How can adults capitalize on this? Meaning that there's a lot of people that are listening who say, hey, this is all great for my kid, but I'm still interested in learning myself. How can they continue to learn as they get older, given that they grew up in a system that you believe, and I tend to agree with you, can and will be changed? But for adults to continue to learn, how do they do that? Yeah. Well, first, they need to be open to this idea of unlearning much of what they learned in school. For example, this course,

Rite of Passage, that I took with David basically made me unlearn the way that I learned to write and the way that I taught my kids to write in school, which was painful for kids and for me as I was following the curriculum. When I entered this class, it was like a completely different approach, like completely different. Grabbing what they taught you in school, do the opposite. it so and it helped me and hey I am publishing I am writing I started voicing my thoughts and it opened my eyes to this idea of being a citizen of the internet and having access to all these people and this idea so my best advice is for and I kind of want to get kids into this but I'm still trying to figure out the logistics and the security component but to become a citizen

of the internet just become an you know have your online persona and start finding the courses that you find interesting and then writing about these things and putting your thoughts out there or making videos. But I really believe in this idea of publishing. By publishing, you get to meet other people, you get to put your ideas out there, connect with like-minded people and organize your ideas and you keep learning. I'm addicted to learning at this point because I just keep finding things as I am writing and posting and reading. So I think the best way is to use the internet and leverage the internet right now and and find those communities of online people that are forming that i i didn't really believe in before but now i really do because i've seen how

they work so one of the things you mentioned is like you took the course where there was uh kind of the exchange of information and now you're putting it into practice right you're creating you're writing you're doing all this kind of stuff and it feels like that's a common thread whether it's a nine-year-old kid yourself right or somebody who's 60 years old and still wants to learn is this creation piece of it. So how do you feel like that fits in on the online learning side? You mean like, how do you learn? Like, rephrase that question. Like, how do you learn? So like, if you're a young kid, or you're a 60 year old, right? There's this whole idea of like, hey, I can go online, I can read all this stuff. But then I've got to actually go and the creation

part is a big part of the actual learning itself. And so how does that fit into just consuming information on the internet oh oh yeah absolutely so so that's a big thing because now with all this you know information accessible anyone you can you can you can actually fall into the rabbit hole just consume consume consume but a big part of it is producing things and there's so many ways to be a producer nowadays you know like you can do videos you can do podcasts you can be a designer you can write about it so what i've been trying to incentivize the kids that I'm working with is, well, what do you like to do? Like, are you really passionate about taking photos, like a photographer, you know, photography? Are you really passionate about writing? Are you

really passionate about, you know, talking and, and based on their interest, then figure out how they can, you know, produce and, and, and put their thoughts out there in whatever medium that they like. Um, and with computers, it's really, you know, it's, it's become a lot easier. So really getting, and adults can try this too. Like what's the medium that you like? Like what do you, I started with writing, which is still really challenging for me, but then I started to try video and it turns out that I really like doing videos. So exploring and putting yourself out there and encouraging the kids to do the same thing until you find what's the best way that works for you to share all the things that you're

consuming. I have to imagine that kids, especially when you ask them, what do you like to do? There's some form of social media that is the answer. And then when you ask them, what do you want to be when you grow up? I'm assuming that maybe not nine and 10, a little bit older, you start to get the, like, I want to be an Instagram influencer or Tik TOK star or whatever. Uh, how do you kind of, um, still help kids that it doesn't look like to probably most adults. It's like, that's a job opportunity or a path to pursue in life. I think you, me, and many others in the internet have

realized like, no, actually those people are doing quite well for themselves. Uh, it's a kind of like, how do you deal with kids who, uh, want to pursue things that are just like more soft skill based and more kind of content related more so than like, hey, I want to go and do something like a software engineer or something like that? My answer is go for it.

To me, and this is something that, you know, for example, my husband, we're very different. And he's like, well, when we talk about, you know, when we have kids, how are we going to raise our kids and this and that?

I'm always like, whatever they tell us that they're interested in, we're going to drop everything we're doing and we're just going to say, yes, you want to learn about that? Let's go ahead and nurture that.

because here's what i've noticed like if a kid is really interested in something let's say becoming a youtube star or becoming something and you encourage that obviously we're talking about things that are good for them right but if they say that they're interested in something like no but um so if you if you support them and you encourage that and you're there like it's not like you're gonna just drop them you're there kind of like observing and being a guide but you support their motion and you give them the resources you will be surprised with the things they can accomplish. And that is one of the big things that's lacking in schools, that kids, we don't part from the kid's interest. And for example, if a kid is telling you like,

oh, I want to learn about government. And you're like, no, no, we're going to learn about the middle ages because government, you're going to learn in eighth grade. It's like, wait, what? No, if the kid is telling you that they want to learn about something and they want to do something, you need to take advantage of that because that really happens. So whatever they say that they want to pursue um you you help them and then you you're there as a guide to show them what's the best way to do it and and make sure that they are you know doing something productive but you go for that like i i am a firm believer that it doesn't matter if you want to you know create lego blocks or be you know scientists or whatever it take photographs whatever it is that you want to do

you should be able to try it out right and and and kids are very excited when they try things out so give them the chance to do it. When I hear you talk, it sounds very similar to rather than in the old model where a teacher, there is no kind of option as to how else you can learn. The teacher is going to give you the information in this format. And like, it's all about what you learn. Really what it sounds like you're talking about is that evolution of the teacher's role to more of a facilitator and actually showing the kids how to learn, right? It's teaching them, here's how you use the computer. Here's how you actually go and do research and all that kind of stuff. and the what is almost less important than how is that fair you you absolutely nailed it that's

exactly right and the problem is that you know many many parents are scared to to to kind of like they don't really know how to manage this whole like kids using the technology and wanting to do research but the thing is like i'm like the parents have way more experience than the kids so instead of being like the enemy or prohibiting them from doing they're going to do it anyway so be an ally like sit next to them and be like oh you want to know how to research like let me show you the right way to research let me show you why you know when kids ask me like Ms. Fab why do teachers hate Wikipedia so much like what's so bad about Wikipedia I'm like there's nothing wrong about Wikipedia like the thing about Wikipedia is that sometimes people will post things that are

not correct but hey let's try it out so you you don't you don't just like disregard what they're saying you teach them how to use the platform correctly you teach them how do you do research If you teach them how to use Wikipedia, like you just wrote an article about global warming, you want to add it to the Wikipedia page that talks about global warming, let's go ahead and do it. If they put it down, let's see why they put it down. Like that's a learning opportunity, you know? So it's, you know, and kids are encouraged, they're motivated because they're like, I

can contribute to the body of knowledge that's out there that anyone can read. Like what's more motivating than that? So instead of saying no and like help them with their curiosities, help them do their, you know, teach them how to do the research. And, and because we want, they do need help in order to do things well. Right. But, but we're not really giving that help right now. So I feel like that's really important to kind of like walk them through the things that they're already exploring. What are the technologies that you think help facilitate all this? Obviously we're doing this on zoom. I'm assuming zoom is a big piece of a lot of it, but what are some of the

other technologies or platforms that you feel like are going to play a big role in helping all this online learning? So at this point, I've wanted to keep it very simple because I realized that really, again, the online, like the online space is just for interactions to share what you've created to socialize and get feedback, right? So to me, that's the main purpose. So Zoom works really well, like this video conferencing. I feel like a lot of the rest of the learning gets done outside, you know, of, of the interactions here. Um, but I haven't explored that many softwares. The things that I, if I had kids right now, I would get them a Mac and I would be like, okay, this comes with iMovie. Go ahead and explore this week, explore iMovie. You know,

you get to make trailers, you get to make movies and then learn how to edit and you can learn how to edit by going on YouTube and figuring out with a computer, with a Mac, you also get like a garage band, go ahead and explore. Like you can create your own music. You can write, you know, make a podcast like try that out with that you also get all these design things where you can try like if the kid likes to design like all these things you get from just a computer like you want to try blogging sure let's go ahead and try blogging so to me it's not really about like softwares out there like i i haven't been trying that many i don't feel like it's as relevant i think it's just kind of like using the applications that you have accessible to create the whole point is just

to be making things and putting them out there what do you think are the risks of um kind of changing the way that kids are learning? We've talked about a lot of the positives in you, and I think are pretty convinced that like, this is a good direction to head in. But what are the risks or the downsides to pursuing this type of education? You mean like the alternatives, right? So I'm not going to have a lot to say here, because every time I think of something negative, I'll do my research. And I'm like, ha, I found a way to figure this out. So that's not a problem anymore. But many parents are like, okay, Anna, like I buy into that. I kind of want to try it out. But what if, you know, I realized later on that I do want to put my kid into school or

that I do want for my kid to go to college, you know, and like, what am I going to do? Well, here's what I've realized with kids that, for example, go to Montessori elementary schools, and then elementary school ends. And then that kid has to transition to a more traditional school. It is true that you will see a little bit of, I mean, it's different, right? The kid is used to learning in their own way, unstructured, like, you know, follow their interests. And suddenly, like they transition to a place where they're telling you what to do, they're telling you what to learn, they're telling you how to learn that and how to show that you learned that. Obviously, you will see like a little bump there. And some parents get discouraged. And they see

that as, oh, Montessori schools did not prepare my kids well. And no, it's just that you're putting them back into a structure that is really challenging to learn in. So I mean, that's one of the things that I see, like if you start off with like, let's say an online learning experience, and then you try to put your kid into traditional school, you may notice that. So that's one thing. And then the other thing that they're like, well, what if I want for my kid to go to college, right? Like, and I pursued this alternative path. And I did my research and colleges actually are, you know, they accept homeschooled kids, they accept kids that have done some other forms of education. I'm assuming that you do have to show some kind of like progress or, but I do know

that my unschoolers, I don't know if you've heard of that term, like the unschoolers. So yeah, you have like word schooling and homeschooling and unschoolers. So unschooling is basically like, you don't have a curriculum and you're homeschooled, but it's just what the kid decides, right? So it's very like the extreme, the other extreme, but even unschoolers can get into college if they want to. So those are the two things that I see how those could be like little bumps. and then also if a kid is home and doesn't have the support of a parent to be kind of like they're facilitating the experience and you don't have to be 100% involved but kind of like there then I do see that as challenging right some parents like really have to go to work and have to deposit

their kids somewhere which is kind of the function of schools and for that I that's also kind of like an issue with this kind of like alternative educational experiences yeah and it feels like I've got a couple of friends who that they're definitely feeling the pain of that right now where they're like oh man this like dealing with a six-year-old all day is like really tough and kind of this idea of like hey the teacher is actually the one taking care of them for some period of time and I guess the other piece of it too then is like if you think of like a socioeconomic status standpoint right people who work service jobs and kind of lower socioeconomic status are the ones that are more likely to need the child care that school

provides, because both parents are working, both parents are going to a job and stuff like that. Yeah, one of my favorite forms of like alternative education is something called micro schools. Have you heard of micro schools? They're becoming to, you know, they're becoming more popular nowadays. And I really think that this is kind of like the model of education that has a lot of potential to take off. So micro schools are a form of homeschooling that's done by one parent or one educator in different neighborhoods. So let's say that we live close by and I say I'm a teacher and I want to teach.

So I open a micro school in my house and it's like five to six kids and your kid comes over and the other neighbor comes over and then we create a curriculum. And it can be either, so it's kind of like a homeschooling, but with more kids and facilitated by one person, right? Like either a teacher or a parent

that has the time and wants to do it. And what I love about this is that you can either do it your way, like you could get your own curriculum based on the needs of the community. You know, if it's like a Spanish community, you can add Spanish to the curriculum and so on and so forth.

And it's in a very nurturing space because it's at a home and you have, you know, you're not by yourself being homeschooled. You have other kids that you're interacting with. But also like there's companies like, I know there's like Wonder Schools and there's Prenda Learn and there are a few others

that they're micro school centers that they help you set this up and they provide the resources in case a parent or a teacher wants more guidance, right? And I feel like this and the price, obviously, is nothing compared to an elementary school. I feel like this way is a way more organic way for kids to learn. It gives parents the ability to be able to go back to work and knowing that your kid is at a safe place with someone in your neighborhood. And kids are more engaged because it's only a few hours

and they're doing things that they find exciting. It's a lot more personalized. So this trend is growing, and I feel like it's easy to replicate in anywhere, right? You just need a home, someone willing to do it, and then either you do it on your own or you ask for the resources from this company. So I feel like that is probably more sustainable than, let's say, homeschooling for parents that cannot afford to stay home. Yeah, that makes a lot of sense, actually.

It sounds pretty cool. As we go to wrap up, what is your one piece of advice for parents that are looking at kind of these alternative ways of learning for their kids? Yeah. So to me, the whole point why I'm doing all this is because I feel like a lot of these things, people kind of have in the back of their mind because we've all been through some form of schooling and we've all experienced all these things. But unless we bring them up, people don't quite think about them. A lot of parents don't think about them. But when we do bring them up, and this is the feedback I've been getting from people who read my content, is that it starts to kind of light up something, right? And you start

to think about your child's education in a new way. And even if you cannot pull your kid out of the traditional school system, which is very likely that many parents are not going to be able to, you can at least start to weight the learning that happens outside of school even more than the learning that's going inside school, right? You can start looking at the grade and knowing like, oh, this doesn't really mean that my kid is learning. You can start using the time after school to create, you know, maybe some learning experience where they can, you know, work on their creative side. If your kid tells you that they're interested or ask your kid, what is, what are you interested in? Let's explore that, you know, kind of like, like explore this creative side of kids,

because if you've heard this conversation, you already know that, that schools, unfortunately, are not digging into that. They're not digging into kids' creative side. They're not digging into kids' interests. So try to find a way to compensate for that when they come back home, right? Or, you know, try to find alternative, maybe online experiences where kids can have like that complimentary side and nourish that side. So hopefully like that's something that people who listen to this are going to start considering. I asked the same two questions to end each episode, then you get to ask me one to finish up. But the first one is, what is the most important book that you've ever read? Ooh, that's a challenging one.

so probably um the war on art have you heard that book by steven pressfield um it just talks about resistance and and i feel like this is something that i i came into it you know thinking of students and how i could help them you know kind of battle this resistance that they have every day in order to raise their hand because we've conditioned them not to and to say the things that come through their mind and then i ended up just learning a lot of things myself from the book and and i you know it's kind of like those books that i just revisit all the time and i bought multiple copies and give it to my friends so so that book is just really really good i could i could mention more but anyway um the war on art yeah the art the art of war wait let me i'll tell

you in a second let me just check okay uh the art of war i think is uh sun tzu is a different book she's quickly googling duh yes the war of art the war of arts okay got it um second question more fun one aliens believer or non-believer on aliens yes my husband's gonna be like what i i do not i do not he he's been i do not believe in aliens why i just don't i just don't i feel like if there were aliens they would have already kind of like invaded or done something about it how do you not know they're here um no no i mean if there are aliens they're probably like what in the world like like what's going on right now like all this is happening because of the bat everyone's stuck home like that i do think often like they're probably like oh my god this humans

but but your husband believes and you don't well he's been kind of you know sensing giving me the sense that he does that that there are a few things that point out and i'm like i don't even want to engage like absolutely not i can tell you do believe in them because of your reaction yeah i it to me it's a mathematical thing right it's just like the world is so big or the uh the galaxy and kind of the space and everything is so big and expansive that like the probability is that there's aliens uh the big question is are we here at the exact same time they are in terms of you know let's say humans we've got a nice couple million of year run uh existing on earth like are aliens here or did they come before us after us who knows but there's got to be intelligent life

somewhere okay wait that's a different question yes i do feel like there are other living creatures out there i just wouldn't categorize them as aliens but for sure for sure i do feel like there are other living things out there all right you're forgiven you are forgiven um you could ask me one question to finish up what do you got for me oh okay only one let's see um what do you think that kids should be learning nowadays like what's something that you didn't learn in school that you're like i i think kids should be learning this instead of all the other stuff there's two things uh and they're somewhat related uh no not bitcoin actually uh personal finance though for sure. I feel like a lot of the societal issues that we have are built on the premise that 50%

or more of the population doesn't understand how money works, how the financial industry works, simple things like why you should pay off your credit card at the end of every month, right? That isn't so much like this is going to change society, but like it will have a material impact on kids specifically. Also the damage of taking on hundreds of thousands of dollars of debt to go to college and like very simple things that once you understand them you're like oh that makes sense but we just don't really educate people on uh and the second thing is um i do think that we should do a better job of like teaching entrepreneurship and with the idea of being kind of similar what you're talking about like the creation and all that but it's uh you learn

so many things other than just business right you learn leadership and how to manage people and interact with people in a business setting you learn negotiation you understand marketing the operations, right? Like all of these different aspects that go into trying to build a company or like a product that it doesn't matter if you end up actually wanting to own businesses when you get older, or you go and you work at a business, like you will be a better employee because of it. And you will also be a better business owner because of it. And so it just feels like it's like one of those well-rounded skills that exposes somebody very quickly to a lot of different aspects of, of kind of the world. And so, you know, a lot of people are like,

why would you force kids to start businesses? I don't think it's necessarily like start a business as much as it's like, what do you want to build, right? I think kind of your point of like being a creator, I definitely agree has a lot of positive impact to it. Awesome. Well, I'll make sure to include something like that in my future school.

So when you have kids, you bring them over. Awesome. Where can people find you on the internet? And where do you want to send them any webpages or places where you're writing or anything? Yeah, so I have my personal website. It's analorenafabrega.com. that's where I write you know I have a blog there um I send a weekly newsletter which you

can also subscribe um there and the link is afabrega.com um it's called Fab Fridays it goes out every Friday on childhood education but really I cover like education overall um I recently started a YouTube channel with some of the tips that you gave the other day um in the conversation with David Perel and um and I'm very active on Twitter so so yeah those are the places where you can find me what's your uh twitter username for people yeah anna fabrega 11 what where i got asked 11 what's the 11 for my birthday is february 11 and i run like my name is anna my sister's name is anna and my mom's name is anna so we're all anna fabrega so i just added the 11 so we could i love that i love that i feel like uh twitter names with numbers in them always have some kind

of meaning, right? So, but you got to ask what the, what the number's for. Absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah. Just my birthday, February 11th. Awesome. All right. Well, thank you so much for doing this. I think people are going to learn a ton and we'll have to do it again in the future. Pom, thank you for having me. This was a great conversation.