Episode 145: Personalizing Education with Matt Bowman of OpenEd

Matt Bowman is the founder and CEO of OpenEd, an education platform that has served over 100,000 students nationwide. After teaching sixth grade and watching his own five children struggle with standardized education, Matt left a successful career as a tech executive to solve a problem close to his heart: Why does school force every unique child into the same mold?

For over 15 years, OpenEd (formerly My Tech High) has partnered with public and charter schools to offer families unprecedented flexibility in choosing what, when, and how their children learn. In our discussion, Matt and I talk about how he came to start OpenEd, how it’s grown, and his book, Open Education.

 

Topics Discussed:

• Bringing the internet into the classroom in 1996

• How the10-14 age group is overlooked

• The impact of COVID on personalized education

Resources mentioned:

• OpenED website

• Open Education: The Process

• Join the Educator Forever Network

• If you’re enjoying this podcast, please leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts.

Related episodes and blog posts:

• Episode 144: The Power of Listening with Christine Miles of The Listening Path

• Online Course Creation Tips for Teachers: Using Your Expertise to Get Started

• Episode 133: Reimagining Education through Makerspaces with David Martelli of Guild Hall Learning

• How to Layer Flexible Careers for Teachers to Work Full-Time Online

 

 

 

 

Read the transcript for this episode:

Welcome to Educator Forever, where we empower teachers to innovate education. Join us each week to hear stories of teachers expanding their impacts beyond the classroom and explore ways to reimagine teaching and learning.

Lily Jones  0:00  

Matt Bowman is the founder and CEO of Open ED, an educational platform which has served over 100,000 students nationwide that lets families customize their children's learning experiences. After teaching sixth grade and watching his own five children struggle with standardized education, Matt left a successful career as a tech executive to solve a problem close to his heart, why does school force every unique child into the same mold for over 15 years? Open ED, formerly my Tech High, has partnered with public and charter schools to offer families unprecedented flexibility in choosing what, when and how their children learn. Welcome. Matt, so nice to have you here.

Matt Bowman  0:37  

Hey, great to be here with you today, Lily. 

Lily Jones  0:41  

So I would love for you to take us in whatever direction you want through your professional journey.

Matt Bowman  0:45  

Oh, that'd be great. I started my my career, actually, when I was 17. I started my first education company, 

Lily Jones  0:53  

Cool.

Matt Bowman  0:53  

I like to share that because I was born to two educators. My mom actually taught business and type she was a, you know, a keyboarding teacher in high school, and she ran FBLA, Future Business Leaders of, you know, Association. And so I got to give her some credit for helping raising me with an idea, you know, the idea to think like entrepreneur. And my dad was a college professor in technology and engineering, and so our our house was always filled with computers and new stuff, right? This was back in the 80s, to date myself, and so I I wanted to become a teacher, and I started my career as a sixth grade teacher up in Washington State, nice, and I read about your background and all those things that you said that you know, you wish you could have as a teacher exactly what I felt when I was there. But I loved, I loved sixth grade. It was so much fun. I taught, you know, all subjects for the couple years. And then we did some team teaching. And then we moved to a six seven school, and really had a fun time. You know, in the six seven school was fun. There was, you know, the 120 or 30 kids all mixed only amongst the four teachers in a wing. So we got to know kids, got to know, you know, each other. And I was a really great, great environment. So that's kind of my education start, yeah. But as I continue that, you know, a couple key things that happened during that time. I got a grant to bring this new thing called the Internet into my classroom in 1996. 

Lily Jones  2:35  

Yes. 

Matt Bowman  2:36  

So that was a long time ago, and and it was fun. Most teachers didn't want technology in their classroom. I was one that wanted it, right? So it's kind of an interesting opportunity for me. And I saw kids just love it, just really engage with it. And so I thought, oh, there's something to this. You know, technology and education and online learning. So I've been doing it ever since, also during that time, during the summers, I was working on my master's degree and had a professor to really well two parts of that master's program, which you might appreciate. One is that I focused on the 10 to 14 year old, forgotten child. Really we treat that group so differently. They're either too old for elementary too young for high school, but we kind of don't know what to do with them, and so that 10 to 14 year old age group is often their needs aren't met in many ways. And so I spend a good amount of time researching and doing a lot of work around how to help the 10 to 14 year old age. 

Lily Jones  3:42  

That's so interesting. I have a 10 year old and a 13 year old. So okay, the Forgotten child zone right now.

Matt Bowman  3:48  

Yeah, tell me a couple things about them. What are some things that stand out to you on those?

Lily Jones  3:53  

Yeah, I mean, like, I would say my daughter definitely she's a 13 year old. Like she's definitely in the in between, right? Like she's going into eighth grade. Sometimes she seems like a tiny child. And then sometimes I, like, talk to her like a grown up, right? It could be in the course of 20 minutes, yes, yeah. And then my 10 year old, he is going into fifth grade. And I don't know, I mean, I'm the youngest of three, he's like, the baby, you know, like, I still see him as probably six in my mind, because he's like, not great. And so he's just very sweet. He's still, you know, really kid like, but also like, gaining some more independence and wanting to do more things on his own. So, yeah, it's interesting.

Matt Bowman  4:34  

Oh, I love that. And just to dive on that, just a little bit you have, you'll have the benefit of having both a girl and a boy go through those age groups, and you'll notice, and you probably already do, that the 13 year old girl can act like a 22 year old sometimes, right? Yeah, sure. And yet the her her peer boys probably never do. No, no, absolutely. Absolutely, there's definitely this gap between, you know, boys and girls during that time that's also super interesting. You know, some of the things that I say in our in my book, as I tell that part of the story is, you know, you can have a kid that's six, four or four, six, and they're developmentally normal, right? They're, they're, they're just great. Or some are driving cars and some are playing with cars. Some are playing with dolls and some are dating like that. That span of maturity, of and even considered, you know, developmentally normal, is so broad that it's and that was part of the genesis of where we, you know, we have five children, and we saw them as they got older, through that age group, just needing something different than each other, and realizing other families probably experienced that same thing. And so that's where we started this program to really help families access personalized education resources that are tailored to the needs of each child, instead of just they all fit because their birth year and ZIP Code match. That makes no sense when you think about it as from an educator point of view. So anyway, going through my masters, focus on that age group, and then also, one professor was really big on establishing like really make high quality choices within public ed. And as you know, in the 90s, it was the vouchers and charters and magnets and schools within schools movement that you know is now 30 years old in that sense, but he really was advocating that we think about, how can you create choice within public ed, instead of it just being a wealthy private choice or a free public choice, and so I really have that's been a core principle of ours, is to always find ways to create choice within public ed instead of just making families. You know, wealthy families can do any choice they want anytime, but it's the middle to low income that doesn't have all that choice. And so can we create some choice within public ed that helped them? So that was the genesis of of our organization.

Lily Jones  7:14  

Yeah, awesome. So tell us a little bit more about Open ED. What do you offer? How did it start? Versus where is it at now, give us a list. 

Matt Bowman  7:22  

So we're headed into our 17th year. 

Lily Jones  7:25  

Congratulations. That's awesome. 

Matt Bowman  7:26  

That's kind of fun. And so I love teaching after five years, because I got a job offer, and it's funny, you know your story around finding jobs for teachers elsewhere, I moved into the tech industry to run an online education program for that company, training engineers around the world, right? And so that was a great, a great segue into, and I love, I was there 13 years at this tech company, and just loved it. But always, you know, wondered, what you know, can I go back to, you know, pure K 12 education, so, just adult education. And so again, my wife and I, as we saw our five children start growing up, the oldest one said, hey, I want to do something different for my education. I think it was in seventh grade, you know. And as a former teacher, I was like, What do you mean something different? Public Ed is public ed, right? That's for everybody. And so a charter school open was open at first charter school in our area was opening when he was, I think, seventh or eighth grade, and he said, I want to go there. My friends go in there. And that sounds cool. And we're like, charters like, I remember studying those when I looked at the public, you know, the public choice models back in the 90s, but hadn't really seen it in action. So we're like, Yeah, great. And so he went, and our second son then went, and we thought, okay, we're all in we're all we're charter school families. We're gonna go. And then our third went and hated it.

Lily Jones  8:55  

 Interesting.

Matt Bowman  8:58  

And guess what, Lily? All of a sudden, we had this real internal struggle. Do we move him back to where he wanted he wants once goes to his regular district school? But if we do that, aren't we saying that we're we think that school's bad and we should move our other two kids, right? You can see that?

Lily Jones  9:17  

 Yeah, sure, sure. All kids are different.

Matt Bowman  9:21  

How come you're moving one, but keeping the other two? Isn't it bad if you're moving?

Lily Jones  9:25  

 hmm, yeah,=. 

Matt Bowman  9:27  

 The older two love it, and they're great, and it's working well for them. The third is not. So we're going to move him back to the district school, right? So that little complexity was super interesting. And then as our younger than our our final two are two girls, and as they got to that age, they're like, No, I I just want to stay with my district school. And so we're great. And they did that for a few years, and then one of them really struggled, and said, Hey, can I do something online instead? So we actually hybrid, you know, did a hybrid model. She only part time online. And the rest in person. And then our youngest, you know, got to that point where she had seen us doing all of this with families in open ed, and she's like, you know, I think that would be fun for me, too. And she ended up doing, again, a hybrid model. She did open it in the mornings, met her friends for lunch at high school. Cool, stayed for a couple classes, and then she was a three sport athlete there, awesome. That sounds great. It was a perfect, perfect mix of it. And you'll laugh at this that most: most of her peers didn't even know she wasn't there in the morning. They're barely waking up by lunch. Sure, sure, they see her in the lunch room or going to lunch with their friends at noon. They don't know where she's been for the first few hours. It was hardly zero impact in terms of that, but yet, huge impact on her, because she was able to just, do you know, she worked on her associate degree online in the morning, and that was her work, yeah. And so she and I, and my and my wife, the three of us, spent a lot of every evening together because her friends were stressed out on homework, and we had a great, you know, great couple years with her that that stage of life. So that's super interesting how all that can ebb and flow, because every job is unique and provide them something different. And, you know, again, we say in our book, the book is, give your child a voice in their education journey. Don't just declare it. And, you know, there's always boundaries, like, you know, it's not free for all. That's why our open ed logo is kind of a open circle, parentheses instead of a closed O is the it's the concept of, there's some boundaries, but fill in the middle with whatever your child feels like will inspire them to learn. And that's super rewarding when you look at it that way.

Lily Jones  11:55  

Absolutely. And I think it's like, we know the power of choice and learning for humans, right? And even when I think about it as a curriculum developer of like, including choice in lessons and different options for different kids, and having kids have agency over their learning. And I think this is an interesting frame of like, and also the structure in which they learn. You know, it's not just what happens in the classroom, but it's actually like, how do I do it? It could be so many different combinations, just like you just shared.

Matt Bowman  12:22  

Yeah, I totally agree. Yeah, super fun. Yeah.

Lily Jones  12:25  

So tell us a little bit more about OpenEd. So what does it offer?

Matt Bowman  12:29  

 Yeah. So Open ED, we contract with school districts in various states to on their behalf, provide a personalized education program to families. So we worked for, you know, between the the family and the district to provide services to that family that the district just doesn't know how to provide, source curriculum from everywhere on the planet, find the technology each child needs, manage all of that, provide teachers for check in and tutoring and support districts, you know, bless their hearts, just don't know how to do that. That's not their DNA, and I don't fault them for that at all. I praise the districts who partner with us for realizing they can't do that well and need some help. And so we come in as a contractor for them. Serve the family, we provide them curriculum, access to local community things, whether it's be, you know, piano lessons, horseback riding lessons, if they go to, you know, museums and zoos and planetariums and, you know, we help facilitate covering the cost of all that for them so they can truly have this enriched, personalized experience based on the child's needs, you know, and then they we have accountability and structure so that the district is always compliant with their attendance and reporting and tracking and and that's what open it is. And again, it's just been such a great program, mixing all the benefits of personalized education, but it's free to families. So we're being about eight states this fall, another five to eight more next year, just as we keep growing since COVID, as you know, the mentality, the mindset of parents, has shifted when it comes to their education for their children, they're starting to just realize maybe it is time that I think about it a little differently and not just default to one. We always say, if the default public ed is the right fit for your child, great. We're not bashing on that, nor criticizing it, just be intentional about that decision, and if it's not working, know that you have options, and know that there's support, there's there's paths, there's all kinds of things that you can do. The other big driver in the last year, a year and a half, Lily is AI, so, strangely enough, and you know, I'm sure you get this, it's the idea that the unsettled. Lily Ness that comes with an unknown future that AI will disrupt every industry makes parents say when they hear themselves say to their child, go get your diploma, go to college, get a career and retire, they're like, I can't say that anymore. Sure, yeah, throwing a wrench in it. So if I can't say that anymore, what am I going to say? And it makes them kind of say, Okay, I need some I didn't sign up for this, like parents didn't all say, I want to be education designers, but we're saying to them, sorry, you need to be now it's time. The the motion is there, the uncertainty of the future is there? It's time to say, Okay, what should I do to help my child be successful now and as an adult in the future, I used to think that standard answer was good enough. It's not anymore.

Lily Jones  15:57  

Interesting. Yeah, that's so interesting, hearing it from the parent perspective too, and how it's changed. And I think I relate to the COVID part too, because it gave people a whole sense of a different way of doing education, right? And it gave parents a sense of what was or wasn't happening in their kids schools. And I think it gave kids a sense too that's like, oh, learning doesn't have to just happen in a school building, right? So having all those different opportunities,

Matt Bowman  16:22  

Yeah. And then add to that, the really motivated student demonstrated to their parent that schooling can be done in 20 minutes.

Lily Jones  16:32  

Yeah, oh, yeah. My daughter was like that. She was like, now I'm done. I'm gonna go climb a tree. I'm like, Great, see you in a few hours. 

Matt Bowman  16:38  

Yes. That also led to this idea that maybe we can do this more efficiently, and thereby opening up our children to as we advocate in the book, more play, unstructured play. Go, get exhausted. You know, I love this, the research that says your 10 year old boy needs to be exhausted before he'll begin learning, really, at a core level. So he should have two hours of recess before a 20 minute math, instead of the other way around? 

Lily Jones  17:10  

Yes, totally, absolutely. I mean, both my kids are very physical in that way, and my daughter, even now, she's 13, she's always like, on the trampoline, or she plays flag football, she plays basketball, and she's like, Oh, I just don't learn sitting down, you know. So she'll be, like, doing some kind of math thing, but like, on this pogo stick, all right, cool. Like, that's great. And she heard the phrase like kinesthetic learner the other day, and she was like, oh, that's what I am.

Matt Bowman  17:35  

Yeah, how genius at that age to already sense that she can learn differently than just one person sitting in a chair, that that's the only way to learn. 

Lily Jones  17:47  

Yeah, absolutely, yeah, it wouldn't have worked for her. Like, I remember going and looking at schools when she was a kindergartener, going into kindergarten and being like, my kids not and I taught kindergarten for many years. You know, I'm like, my kid is not going to sit down here.

Matt Bowman  18:00  

They do. Then what do? What do? What do your two children do for their learning?

Lily Jones  18:04  

Yeah, totally. So we went to this small teacher collective, and so they went there, both of them, my son's still there. And so it was a small school, and it was run by teachers, no principal, and now I'm on the foundation of it, so I helped to, you know, steer the school, but it's just a lovely student led, teacher led place, and the kids had freedom to, like, go out of the classroom and walk around the field if they needed to, or, you know, have class outside and do all these cool interdisciplinary learning experiences. So, yeah.

Matt Bowman  18:39  

Yeah. It's funny. You know, nationally, like 70% or more micro schools are started and run by former public school teachers. Yes, yeah, creating the micro schools? Yes. As to your messaging on you know that I read through before teachers get into education to inspire and and educate children, yes, and when they realize they can't do that, sometimes in a traditional classroom, they go start their own so...

Lily Jones  19:08  

Yes, yes. I think that that's like such a cause of burnout is having to act in a way that's not aligned with your beliefs, right? I remember as a teacher being like, well, if I, you know, had half the kids, or had an aide in my class or had some money for supplies. I could do all sorts of things to help meet the needs of these kids, but because I didn't like that was such a core frustration and that I think, like teachers never feel like they're doing enough, because their jobs are impossible, right? And so it's just really hard not to internalize that.

Matt Bowman  19:35  

It is. And I know that firsthand two of our five children, our first our oldest son, our third son, our high school, public school teachers, that's cool, and they we it was funny going into it, I said, Go in. Why is I, you know, eyes wide open on a couple things. One is that there is a potential for burnout if you don't. You know, do it in a different way, and approach your your your your role, differently. And so they did. They went in with, let's develop a cadence of self directed learning. Let's develop that cadence inside the classroom of figure out your journey, find your own projects you know, engage those that you need help with, and they're doing, they're both doing their classrooms that way, and are thriving and seeing their peer teachers pulling their hair out. Yeah, I mean, and, and they don't know why they say to other teachers, why don't you do it like we do it, you know, in a soft way. But they just, you know, it takes a mindset to just say, I'm going to approach this, this job, this experience, this moment, differently, but it is possible. It is possible in public ed today, as a teacher, to do things a little differently than you might think. Just takes a little courage and a little, you know, willingness to be a little messy for a time, but our, my two sons can testify it works.

Lily Jones  21:06  

That's awesome. I love that, yeah, and it's creative, right? Like, I think teaching is inherently creative, and when teachers are allowed to have that creativity and be able to bring in their passion and have the flexibility, like, that's when the magic happens, so absolutely possible, and hopefully everybody has the opportunity to make that happen, agreed. So I know you talked a little bit about your book, open education, and so can you tell us a little bit more about the book? I'm curious. I've read the book as well, but I'm curious. We can give an overview to people, and then also just like, what was the process like of writing it?

Matt Bowman  21:40  

Oh, for sure. So here's here's what it looks like if you find it on Amazon, open education the process. So the couple key themes in the book, one is that every child's different, and it's time you know, parents need to acknowledge that one size doesn't fit all for education either, just like you wouldn't force one size fits all on them with something else. You know, we're so willing to cater around food or interests or clothing or, you know, whatever. But sometimes we're like, education has got to be standardized, and so that, you know, that's the first principle, is that every child's unique. And let's, let's find, you know what we say in open education, the the broad category is tap into all the resources you can find to help your child succeed in education, knowing that one classroom in a district school is is a resource, but it's just one of many. And so if that's the one you choose go for it. Double down on it. Great. But note that there are other resources you can tap into in your home, online, in books, in the community libraries, whatever. So we say, take that open viewpoint of education, and it'll surprise you how many resources are available, even free, like we kind of rate some of them from free to low cost to more expensive. And you can choose, as a family, where you want to go on that spectrum to figure out what your you know, what your what your available funding is for your kids. So it's super fun to do that. We then kind of just walk through some steps parents can take to dabble in this world of open education. You don't need to pull the band aid off all at once. That can be overwhelming. Can be, you know, scary, so just take some little baby steps towards that. There's lots of things you can do to implement an open education mindset in your day to day life. One of the chapters I love we get a lot of good feedback on, is parents put your child ahead of your reputation. Yes, that's great. That one is so hard for parents, because, you know, Fourth of July is coming up, you're gonna be, you know, or whatever. You're gonna be on on podcast, or, sorry, you're going to be at barbecues. You know, we're on a podcast now, right before, and you're going to be at barbecues with grandma, grandpa, aunts, uncles, friends, neighbors, and they're going to say, what is it? You know, what's your child doing? And our reputation innately wants us to just have a really confident and acceptable answer. And and some, some people just say, Oh, they're doing great that, you know, whatever. But if they say, What are they doing in schooling, or if they're in the college age, you know, the the 18 to 24 so much pressure around they're just working. Oh, are you a failed parent? Because your child is exploring what's interesting to them before they go pay a bunch to get educated or licensed, and so that reputation struggle and insecurity actually puts kids education plans on the back seat, because the parents want to be able to say something. And it's fun, though, since COVID That kind of window is. Shifted, and we find people saying, Oh, I wish I could do that. When a parent answers, I'm helping my child explore an open education mindset, right? And the and many parents are saying, I wish I could do that instead of, why are you doing that big shift from six or seven years ago? Yeah, that's super interesting. We do then end kind of the book with open education pathways after high school. So we don't just leave you as a senior to then figure it out after but we really have some legitimate paths that you can think about and might save some kids some debt if they would read. You know, parents of 18 to 25, year olds will benefit from reading that section, at least be able to think differently about their child's about what advice they give them, what resources they provide them to help them succeed. A four year traditional academic university that's costly, that you go in debt for is less and less the right path, and more and more a riskier path. Entrepreneurship. We talk about apprenticeships, internships. Go, make your own signal, and you're going to succeed much better. And we like to joke you'll be debt free at 23 and not have that burden that makes you do something you don't want to do, just because you got into so much debt so young.

Lily Jones  26:29  

And again, having the freedom of like all the different choices, right? That it's not this one path that everyone needs to take, that we know doesn't work, whether it's for a kindergartener or for somebody in college or an adult, right? Like, no one path that works for anyone. And so I think part of that is like flexibility, also learning the skills to be able to navigate your life and find the right choice for you at that point in time, whether it's college, whether it's trade school, whether it's doing something entrepreneurship, you know, whatever it is, right, giving the options like, I think that's so much a part of it is exposure to options too.

Matt Bowman  27:04  

Well, and it goes back to your your point that we very much believe in is agency and choice matters in a learning environment. If you feel forced, compelled, that you have to sit in a college classroom for four years, whatever that can wait, that can drag on your on your psyche, on your soul, to feel like you're kind of in a prison mode, that you're forced to do that because society or parents or grandparents or neighbors say you have to, versus we say to you, know, start with your Why. If a college program answers your why go do it? Yeah, sure, sure. If it doesn't, though don't.

Lily Jones  27:48  

Yes, yes. I mean, it goes back to just like those expectations, or really tuning into like what you want to do, or feel like you should do versus what you're expected to do, you know, and internal versus external. And I think we all have all sorts of external pressures that, especially for young kids or young adults, are hard to sort through sometimes, and for parents too, right? Just like you're saying, like, well, I thought my kid was gonna go to college and then get a job and then do all these things, and it's like, maybe, maybe not.

Matt Bowman  28:15  

Maybe we can be nimble in some of those expectations. Yeah, one of the parts in the book is love, limits and latitude. That's a really healthy parental approach. Is you want to surround your children with love, but it's also appropriate to have limits, but you can't stop at just limits and love. You have to have some flexibility with you know, if you have a rule that on Saturday mornings you have to get your jobs done before you play with friends. But guess what? What if a friend shows up from out of town you haven't seen in 10 years? Mm, hmm. Are you going to stick with that limit that says you can't play with them? Because they're going to, you know, no, you're going to do some latitude. You're going to say, okay, there are times when these limits need to be paused and and bended or whatever, to make some latitude to play with a friend that's out of town. So, you know, we all need to live that way and and it's, it's sometimes hard to though, because we want to have a formula that's easy to follow, and it's going to create a perfect adult child. And guess what? That doesn't exist. So drop the expectation. And that was part of, you know, you asked about the process of writing the book. You know, this is my life's work. This is everything I've done since I started becoming a teacher, you know, at age 17. So the things in this book are everything I could ever dream of saying. And, you know, at some point, then it was, Well, Matt, that's a little bit too much. Tear down that idea, or let's organize that idea differently. But it's really just start with, you know, 10s of 1000s of families. Families I've worked with over the years with the open end informs so much of this. We've seen it in in action. This isn't just theory. This isn't just I read it in a textbook. This isn't I'm some sage on the stage that is spewing wisdom. It's Hey everybody, I've seen this. I've done in my own family, with five kids. I've done it. I've seen it with 10s of 1000s of families that we've worked with. If you want to do it, here's what we here's the common thread we've seen families do. And if you want to try any part of that, try it. Know that you can do it. Know that you'll be just fine. And even more so your child, if they're struggling today, will be happier tomorrow if you just give some of these principles a shot. 

Lily Jones  30:47  

Absolutely. Yeah, I love this. I mean, I love that. It's like this. I don't want to say culmination, because obviously your work is not done right, but it's like a culmination of all this learning that you've done through the years, and being able to put that into a book is so great and such a great resource for people. And I'm curious to, you know, a lot of the teachers that I work with, they maybe want to start something new, and they feel like, and I felt like this before, too, that it has to be all planned out, you know, I have to have my whole methodology, and I have to know exactly what I'm doing, and I have to have this fully formed approach. And I'm curious for you, you know, developing this approach over the years and then writing a book about it, was it fully formed at the beginning? Or how did it take shape? 

Matt Bowman  31:30  

Yeah, so, no, absolutely not. The idea is that, you know, you just start, you just and, and even we cite some research that says, the more structured you force learning to be, the less learning occurs. 

Lily Jones  31:48  

Yes, yes. 

Matt Bowman  31:49  

Like, what a contradiction.

Lily Jones  31:51  

I know. I'm like, eye roll and not nodding my head.

Matt Bowman  31:55  

We think that the and if you double down on math and double down on reading, you're going to get twice the the better results. And the opposite has happened, right? It double down on free play, double down on creativity, double down on music, art, band, sports, double down on those things, and then math and reading will will increase, right? Yes. How bizarre is that mentality? So, yeah, just the the idea that we can navigate that path. And I would tell teachers number one, again, the more rigid you make your plan, the less learning will happen. So then what you would want to do is embrace brief How can I get to a free float mode, free flow mode, when I'm so accustomed to structure and order and figure out the right balance where you like structure and order that is fluid in between, right and so that that's something that I would encourage any teachers to think about is create some broad structure that make kids feel secure, that they kind of know what's going on, but then create all kinds of flexible choice models and paths, like you talked about developing curriculum, and you have some options to go deeper, right, even just something similar like that. The other thing that we have found, and this goes so you know, to answer the other part of the question, when we started our program, we started with a focus on tech and entrepreneurship. That was kind of our theme thread that we were focused on, which I those? I love those topics. And side note, because I think they create the most interdisciplinary opportunity there is particular entrepreneurship. When you start a little business and you have kids start looking around, they're like, oh, I need someone that reads and write a lot. I'm going to choose that girl over there that is always in the books. And I need someone that will code something for my website. So that kid over there, you know, he or she knows how to make a website and all. And then I need someone that design, Oh, who's drawing all the time in their notebooks, and I need a little designer to make my logo and my website cool. So all of a sudden this interdisciplinary team forms very naturally, because in entrepreneurship, it's okay to say we're all different and have different needs, but somehow, in a classroom, it's not right and so but entrepreneurship unlocks that natural interest. You know that you can find those that are different than you and collaborate in a way that y'all run in your lane, and it produces something holistic, right? So 

Lily Jones  34:42  

I love that. Yeah, I worked on an entrepreneurship curriculum several years ago for middle school and high schoolers, and the whole premise was like, entrepreneurship as a way of solving problems in your community. And it was so awesome, like it was like they came up with all these great solutions to problems in their communities, and actually started these businesses, and got so inspired through the process.

Matt Bowman  35:02  

Well, that's what I would tell your teachers that you're talking to, is say, 20 minutes of math, 20 minutes of reading, 20 minutes of writing, interspersed two months, an hour worth of recess, and then go start something that solves problems in your community. Yes, that's the only structure you actually need to start a microscope, or totally, yeah, to do something is and you can find a million different math options, so every kid doesn't even need to have the same math option. One of my favorite things from taking that approach was kids, early on, would say, I'm just not good at math, and I would answer, that's my fault. I haven't found the curriculum that clicks with your brain yet. Sure. Give me a chance. It's not you, it's the curriculum. Yes, for sure. When you say that and say, Okay, have we found one yet? And you finally find one that they're like, oh, I can do math. Yeah. Because it's not the kid, it's the curriculum. We haven't found the right mix. For sure, it isn't that powerful to blame the adults in the curriculum instead of blame the kid. It's night and day difference in their confidence and their ability to learn, and then they just they fly right and hold them back when you find a curriculum that maps to them so a teacher starting a school, hey, don't pigeon you hole into one math curriculum or one textbook set open it all and that. You know, that's our mentality of open education. Tap into all the best resources you can find and then go solve problems in your community. That is the best way to create lasting learning.

Lily Jones  36:43  

Yes, that's so fantastic. And Matt, it's been such a pleasure talking with you. Can you tell folks where they can connect with you or where they can learn more about open ed?

Matt Bowman  36:51  

I have just couple URLs, open ed.co/book, that's where you can find resources about the book. And then you can tag over to our to our main website. I'd also say we're just launching open ed academy.com it's our first private pay option. So we are doing a private pay option, but we're trying to keep those costs very low so it's accessible to the masses. So open ed.co/book or open ed academy.com Those are great ways to start.

Lily Jones  37:19  

Awesome, and we'll put those in the show notes as well. Thank you so much. 

Matt Bowman  37:23  

Thanks, Lily.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai