Michael Strong (@flowidealism) / X

Michael Strong

17.6K posts

Michael Strong

@flowidealism

Founder @Socraticexp. 35 years turning school from your family's biggest stress into its greatest relief. K-12, Socratic seminars, 1:1 mentorship, worldwide.

Book a Free Shadow Day →

products.socraticexperience.com/enrollment-app…

Joined April 2009

Pinned
Michael Strong
@flowidealism
Jun 30
I finally did it. After thirty-five years of building schools, I sat down and wrote the whole story. It's called Radical Optimist, and it's out today. You can read it here: products.socraticexperience.com/michael-strong… I called it that because the thread running through my life has been a stubborn
6.1K
Michael Strong
@flowidealism
Jul 21, 2025
Observe any six‑year‑old carefully: • Building forts • Starting projects • Eyes full of wonder Observe that same child at thirteen: • Exhausted after school • Hours of homework • Scrolling social media to decompress The difference does not lie within the child. It
70K
Michael Strong
@flowidealism
May 26, 2024
A great rant on @slatestarcodex ‘s recent post on why schooling is mostly a waste of time: “Now that we've established that education is just daycare, let's discuss why. Over 30 years ago a group of parents decided to start a public school in my area. I thought they were mad. I
627K
Michael Strong
@flowidealism
Oct 21, 2024
I once founded a school for highly gifted children. We had 6th, 7th, and 8th graders passing AP exams. When I explained this to one father, he replied, “But won’t he miss 7th grade science?” People are absurdly programmed to believe that the system is necessary. Regardless of
LiorLefineder
@lefineder
Oct 20, 2024
Relatedly: "At the upper end of the IQ distribution, people can learn things rapidly. High-school freshmen in the Study of Mathematically Precocious Youth (SMPY), who had tested in the top one-hundredth of one percent, managed to get a median score of 727 out of 800 on an AP
177K
Michael Strong
@flowidealism
May 26, 2024
Replying to @flowidealism
(Continues) “Generally speaking, people who go into education are some of the most ignorant, lazy, easily propagandized, and sometimes lying strata of the population. Even some of the good ones go south once they are in a group. I used to joke that when you passed through the
81K
Michael Strong
@flowidealism
Jan 14, 2025
Some of my favorite students to work with have been “school refusers,” kids who simply refuse to go to school anymore. They have all been boys, all very bright, and just have no patience for the BS of school. I respect their integrity. I just spoke with a mom who is being
32K
Michael Strong
@flowidealism
Jul 5, 2025
Your funny kid doesn't need to be academic. Your warm kid doesn't need to code. Your creative kid doesn't need advanced math. They need a parent who sees their genius and nurtures it fearlessly.
16K
Michael Strong
@flowidealism
Nov 12, 2025
In Montessori classrooms, even young children work independently for 2½–3 hours, while some new programs require teachers to interrupt every four minutes for “engagement.” Long stretches of quiet focus build depth; constant interruption builds distraction.
25K
Michael Strong
@flowidealism
Sep 25, 2025
“But traditional school worked for me.” No, you survived it. Imagine what you could’ve done if your spark wasn’t dimmed for 13 years.
24K
Michael Strong
@flowidealism
Oct 27, 2025
If your child is bright, alert, energetic and so forth, and you gradually see the light leaving their eyes, they are starting fewer projects, they are less excited about school, they do not do all the cool things, when they start to be, I don't know, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, pull
22K
Michael Strong
@flowidealism
Nov 26, 2024
.@JMilei just posted on my wife, @magattew ‘s wonderful book, The Heart of a Cheetah! It is a fabulous read, a combination of her personal journey from a child in Senegal to US entrepreneur along with her intellectual journey from thoughtless anti-capitalist to an ardent
Javier Milei
@JMilei
Nov 25, 2024
FENÓMENO BARRIAL
21K
Michael Strong
@flowidealism
Jul 7, 2025
After 35 years in education, the most hopeful trend I see: parents choosing their children's well-being over outdated systems. Homeschooling, micro-schools, self-directed learning—families are rejecting the myth that government benchmarks define a child's worth.
8.6K
Michael Strong
@flowidealism
Nov 2, 2025
From year one to about year six, the single most important learning task at home is to help a child become a joyful, confident reader. Everything else is secondary. Teach phonics so your child can decode. Make reading real, warm, and positive, which was the original impulse
12K
Michael Strong
@flowidealism
Oct 21, 2025
Do not take your children away from reading to “teach” them history or science. A child who has read hundreds of books in science and hundreds of books in history before adolescence will typically “know” more science and history than their traditional school counterparts.
15K