WEEKLY DIGEST · TUESDAY, AUGUST 18
Greetings Eddies!
The dog days of August are upon us.
In ancient Rome, this phrase referred to the rising of the “dog star” Sirius with the August sun, and (relatedly) with suffocating heat, withered crops, and their dogs acting weird.
In modern times, we tend to associate the dog days with that sticky, late-summer lethargy paired with a creeping dread that the most carefree time of year is coming to an end.
I never tire of sharing Peter Gray’s psychology research showing that “back-to-school” season brings a sharp, predictable surge in student anxiety, and in extreme cases, even despair.
Fortunately, since you’re reading the OpenEd Daily, you already know that you don’t need permission to continue summer’s unhurried pace. You are free to follow your curiosity and embrace an open education year-round.
We asked our community whether they observe a formal “Back-to-School” day in their household and got a variety of answers. Regardless of whether you observe the occasion, we’ve got a jam-packed edition of the OpenEd Weekly to celebrate (yes, celebrate!) the dog days.
IN THIS ROUNDUP
Deep Dive: what our teachers and parents think of Miacademy
Book Review: Gray’s new book, Restoring Childhood, presents the diagnosis and the cure for the back-to-school blues
Podcast: school doesn’t have to be a 9-to-5 job
Community: twenty free clubs for OpenEd families, now open in the marketplace
Plus: We’ve got a rebuilt podcast page, sorted into playlists like Burnout, Unschooling, and Teachers Who Left, and the latest installment of “Kit & Ed.”
- Charlie (the OpenEd newsletter guy)
P.S. Looking for some new “back-to-learning” traditions your kids won’t dread? Enjoy this throwback to our back-to-learning edition from 2024.
DEEP DIVE
Miacademy, According to the Families Who Use It
Miacademy’s self-paced online curriculum is one of the most popular all-in-one programs among OpenEd families. It covers the core K-8 subjects plus electives, with videos, printable work, online practice, assessments, and a parent dashboard that keeps score. Starting this year, it’s also available in the marketplace.
We wanted to know what made Miacademy a good fit for the families that use it, so we consulted with our teachers and asked parents to share their experience on Facebook before compiling their insights into this deep dive review.
What they said: The general consensus seems to be that it is a versatile tool in the hands of the right child and the right family. If you are curating curricula for a self-motivated student, and need something that can happen without too much direct involvement, Miacademy is both comprehensive and largely self-running.
How it works: Parents build each child’s Learning Path from the parent portal. The child logs in, sees the day’s assignments, and starts without having to wait for a teacher. And because it is self-paced, a fourth grader can take third-grade math beside fifth-grade reading.
How to know if it’s a fit: As with every resource, your mileage will vary depending on the child – even within a single family. One mom “used it and loved it for one self-motivated kiddo” while their sibling got less out of it.
Our full review covers the rest: which children thrive on it, the settings worth changing on day one, and a free five-minute check that tells you early.
This Week in Open Education
BOOK REVIEW
Peter Gray’s Case for Setting Kids Free
Peter Gray’s new book, Restoring Childhood: How to Set Kids Free in the Age of Anxiety, is finally out, and the early reviews are strong.
Tyler Cowen calls it “easy to read and substantive,” and shares the three core contrarian conclusions straight from the book:
(1) Extensive research refutes the theory that effects of smartphones and social media account for a meaningful portion of the decline in teen mental health in the years following 2010.
(2) Smartphones and social media can have both beneficial and harmful effects on teens’ mental health, which tend to cancel out when averaging.
(3) Future research should focus on understanding better the ways teens use these tools and how to help them maximize the benefits and minimize the harm.
– Peter Gray, Restoring Childhood
This may come as a surprise, but the data is hard to argue with. Teen suffering peaked around 1990 by several measures that phones can’t explain. And European mental health was unchanged during the same years American rates climbed, on the same devices. So what is to blame?
Gray has spent a career arguing that children need unsupervised time, real risk, and long stretches of self-directed play, and that removing those things did more damage than any device. Restoring Childhood makes that case in book length.
TRENDS
The head of a self-directed microschool takes on the twelve strongest objections to letting kids drive their own learning (starting with the one every skeptic reaches for first). (In The Thick Of It)
Two hours of AI-driven academics a day, with no teachers – only guides – and tuition up to $75,000. Alpha School’s model is drawing lots of attention. Natalie Wexler weighs what it gets right against what she would still want to see. (Natalie Wexler)
Some high schools are swapping calculus for statistics, but one policy expert says that trade quietly sorts kids into two groups (and names which group ends up working for the other). (Education Next)
Italian researchers found that students who opened a social media account by age twelve made less academic progress than the ones who waited until fourteen. Correlation or causation? (After Babel)
TOOLS
OpenEd marketplace partner Savvy Learning explains how to turn broad academic goals into daily, bite-sized habits that target foundational skills like phonemic awareness. (Savvy Learning)
Planetarium: Welcome to the Museum – a 112-page, museum-sized guide to the universe by an astrophysicist and woodcut illustrator – holds a 4.9 star rating from 900+ reviews. Ages 8 to 12. (Amazon)
A free hub of resources for the new school year, from advanced math practice to parent worksheets for managing screen time. (Khan Academy)
The psychological quirk that causes most color-coded schedules to fall apart. (Christy-Faith)
Brett Pike wants parents to stop raising kids for college and start raising them for freedom. (Classical Learner)
COMMUNITY CORNER
Clubs Open, Rhythms Win, and What Finally Cracked Reading
Clubs are open. Twenty free clubs opened for registration this morning – Dungeons and Dragons, Learn to Code, Watercolor Painting, Pokemon, Escape Room, History of Japan, and more, spanning K-12. Each runs a month, meeting once a week live on Zoom with OpenEd’s Community Teachers. Sign in to the OpenEd platform, open the marketplace, and filter by Clubs – spots are first-come, first-served. Welcome Week kicks off August 31. Details here.
Set schedule, or go where the day takes you? We asked as program years start, and nineteen parents answered. Almost nobody picked a side, and four of them independently reached for the same word: “Rhythms.” In other words, a flexible schedule, but with some structure. Read the thread.
What finally worked for a struggling reader. Out of 38 answers, the most commonly-cited resource was All About Reading. But nearly as many parents mentioned methods over specific tools: months off, reading aloud, or just waiting. Read the thread.
THE OPENED PODCAST
Should School Be a Full-Time Job? (The 2-Hour Homeschool Schedule)
Sam Griffin and her husband built their own business so they would never have to work a nine to five. Then one day they did the math on their four kids’ school-plus-homework-plus-extracurriculars schedule.
“And we kind of looked at each other one day and we’re like, our kids work a nine to five though. We didn’t want that life. And now our kids are going to school from nine to three. Then they do homework, then they do extracurriculars. They are working a nine to five. They are working the life that we didn’t even want.”
– Sam Griffin, on the OpenEd podcast
Five years after pulling them out of traditional school, the Griffin family gets core academics done in about two hours a day (thirty minutes for her kindergartner, closer to three for her ninth grader).
Also in the episode:
The wakeboarding class where kids do an hour of physics, an hour with a world champion wakeboarder, then an hour of practice
The standardized test she gives every year for her own peace of mind, from a company she has no affiliation with
Why every one of her four kids ended up in theater (one car, one rule: everybody does the same activity)
ICYMI: We sorted every episode on YouTube into thirteen playlists – Starting Out, Burnout, Reading and Dyslexia, Unschooling, Jobs and Trades, Teachers Who Left, and more – so you can start with whatever you’re dealing with. Browse them.
KIT AND ED
Show Your Work
AI just disproved a famous math conjecture. Kit and Ed are working through the implications.
PARTING QUESTION
Which of Your Fears Never Came True?
Last month we asked the veterans which homeschool fears never came true. This week we’re sharing a roundup of the most-liked replies.
What was yours? Read them all and add yours on Instagram.
That’s all for this week!