Madhumitha Harishankar

Mondays like this are a blessing. My 3 kids were up at 630, husband took care of their morning routine while I slept in, they left with my sister at 830 to spend an hour outdoors then went to visit their grandparents (5 mins away), came back 10 ish, I bathed the youngest while the older 2 helped (aka made up water games) and bathed themselves, then everyone got dressed, prayers, breakfast, I put the little one to bed and now at 1130 we are ready to read a whole bunch of books and do some focused work together for a few hours. The joy in this morning feels so complete that I almost feel guilty.

@jessegenet @openclaw Please publish these materials and experiments you do somewhere!

Making useful markdown files out of an 1800’s math curriculum 🧮 Ray’s Primary Arithmetic ftw! Does anyone want these .md files for themselves? Thinking about starting a Substack to share homeschool materials I make with my @openclaw

@narendramodi This is probably the worst vaccine ever made after the Covid shot.

After the launch of the HPV Vaccination Campaign Against Cervical Cancer, spoke with my young friends who have been vaccinated today. This is a decisive step towards protecting the health of our daughters and mothers.

The innate goodness in children cannot be overstated. Infact, it serves as a guiding light when navigating the challenges of parenting them.

@HannahWardEdu Please do!! Thank young

Considering making a post about beautiful board books for babies that aren't annoying. The board book situation out there is ...meh, most of the time. There are diamonds if you know where to dig!

At bedtime tonight- It’s silent, I think the kids are almost asleep, my mind drifts off to all the troubled moments of the day where I raised my voice, showed irritation, was short .. My 4 year old suddenly breaking the silence - mom do you know how many germs there are in the world? Me: infinite? Him: that’s how much I love you. My 3 year old as if on cue: mom do you know where the sky ends? Me: it doesn’t end baby Her: yeah that’s how big my love for you is Me bawling my eyes out in the dark 🥹 kids are a blessing we dont deserve

@tanyaelisabeth This happened to me. Having kids has changed me beyond my wildest dreams or imagination. The pull to our children is so deep, all consuming and visceral.

Women have no idea how much they’ll ache to be with their babies until they become mothers. It’s a visceral pull, stronger than any ambition you thought you ever had. Your body will be screaming at you to stay, stay present, to be around your baby. Yet no one prepares women for it. We are told that birth is just another moment, just another part of life, and that life resumes just the same after labor. Motherhood they tell us can be done in between pumping sessions and meetings at work. But this is a lie. What we now refuse to admit is that motherhood rewires a woman. Mothers are not the same person they were before the birth. They now have a deep powerful pull to stay close to their babies. And yet this feeling, this instinct, is the only feeling women are ever told to ignore. If they’re unhappy in their marriage, they should leave. If they’re unfulfilled, they should “find themselves”. Every emotion is treated as good and valid,except this one. That’s the only feeling we are told to ignore. Feminism has told women to silence that God given voice and desire. What a tragedy it is that women now feel ashamed and embarrassed to be with their babies, that we feel we need to justify our choice to stay home, justify that we aren’t lazy, unmotivated or unambitious What a tragedy it is that women now think they owe the world more, even more than their own children.

@HannahWardEdu @chrisman @teachthemx3 @synthesischool Synthesis is tempting! I have mostly stuck to pen and paper so far because im worried about the blue light exposure at early ages but I might end up taking the hit for synthesis

@chrisman @teachthemx3 @synthesischool I might be a new kind of homeschool mom. The kind that's one room schoolhousey old fashioned for everything except the amazing AI math and fantastic can't beat it Synthesis Teams 😂

The more research I read in preparation for my dissertation, the more I feel that math teachers will be the first content replaced with intelligent tutoring systems or adaptive programs. Short of providing 1:1 instruction, this is the most effective way to increase mastery.

@_samantha_joy What a refreshing take

I'm reading Helen Keller's biography of her teacher, Anne Sullivan, and it's such an antidote to modern neurotic-mom culture. Anne Sullivan is incredibly harsh, even cruel, by today's standards. She is exacting, she demands excellence, even perfection, from Helen, uses shame and force and corporal punishment to compel Helen to learn and to behave. But the good that Anne provides—the beauty, the knowledge, the visibility and companionship, the life—matters infinitely more. It matters more *to Helen*, who freely acknowledges her teacher's flaws and "changeable moods", but sees the gifts she provides as more than worth the cost, and spends her life in close communion with Anne. "In [Anne Sullivan's] fingers words rang, rippled, danced, buzzed, and hummed. She made every word vibrant to my mind—she would not let the silence about me be *silent*." May every earnest educator receive such high praise! I think it's deeply flawed that so much of modern parenting advice is primarily focused on avoiding the bad—on never losing your temper, never pushing a kid too hard, never saying the wrong words etc. and so little is focused on the good—on the knowledge you could be imparting, the beauty you could be sharing, the life you could be helping your child to build. As a parent, I would like to limit the bad as far as possible, yes. I'm always trying to improve and mitigate against my flaws. But that is a side issue, at least for a virtuous, rational person. I don't think avoiding "trauma" should be the goal and purpose of parenting. Your flaws and mistakes simply don't matter that much in the end, not if you're also pouring your energy and vigor and soul into the good that you're building.

@HannahWardEdu What’s picture time!

My voice is back and my kids are so excited. They picked these books, we read them, then they set up a book still life with stuffie bunnies for picture time. ❤️ 😂 What have y'all been reading with your kids lately?

@shadcn Yeah seriously where are these options hidden now? Welp, I have the air

So during the holidays, a friend and I were talking iPhone Air and she said she did not get the new iPhone because Apple removed Portrait Mode. I said no. Hold on. I opened the camera app and said "Oh I see what you mean" 🤦‍♂️

@HippyMomPhD Wow what state is this in

Went to check out a new homeschool enrichment program. They collect great instructors in math, writing but also painting, sculpture, cooking, theater & offer them all in one location. It's a really great appealing model. I hope they'll be more of these popping up!

@NielsHoven How much time does a kid spend on Mentava per day on average to achieve good progress? Are there any offline materials that you prescribe they work on alongside?

I just had an onboarding call with a parent who said his 5yo kindergartener is struggling with reading. Parent: He's really having trouble memorizing the weekly sight words, like "look" and "there" Me: 🚩🚩🚩 Hmm, are they doing any sort of phonics instruction? Like sounding out words? Him: I don't think so 🤦‍♂️ I explained the difference between phonics vs whole word reading, pointed him to the Sold a Story podcast, and referred him to Teach Your Kid to Read in 100 Easy Lessons as a basic intro to sounding out words. I showed him Mentava's scope and sequence progression, which does teach words like "look" and "there", but not until about level 100. When kids already have a solid phonics foundation, words like "look" and "there" are easy to learn because they're only slightly ambiguous. "Look" will rhyme with either "book" or "kook", there are only two different ways it could be pronounced. "There" will rhyme with either "where" or "here", there are also only two different ways it could be pronounced. It's no wonder his kid is struggling to memorize words if he hasn't been given a strong phonics foundation to start from. It’s just crazy to hear that some schools still have no idea how to teach kids to read I'm hopeful Mentava can have an impact for this family, but what we've already seen is that it’s tough for 15-30 mins/day of quality instruction to overcome 7 hours/day of a teacher ingraining bad habits

@HannahWardEdu Thank you so much for your all your wonderful work! Eagerly waiting to go on an Amazon frenzy with your list :)

@mharishank I'll make an organized one today - great idea! Thank you 🙏🏻

Ooooh...the crystal...

@drew_bent @AnthropicAI Sees like at the biggest opportunity with the narrowest lens.

I'm hiring for my education team at @AnthropicAI 🍏 These are two foundational program manager roles to build out our global education and US K-12 initiatives Looking for people with… - deep education expertise - partnership experience - a bias toward building - technical and hands-on ⁃ 0-to-1 The KPIs will be students reached in underserved communities + learning outcomes.

@lichthauch On point in the most heartbreaking way.

The father of seven has not finished a thought in four years. he is just moving. feeding. driving. wiping. his brain is soup and his back is finished and he has no opinions about civilization he is too tired for opinions. and meanwhile civilization is growing out of him like he is dirt and he doesnt even notice because there is milk on the floor again. the childfree man has read eleven books this year about the decline of the west and he is the decline and the books are the evidence and he will understand this at fifty eight in a room that is very clean and very quiet

@mbateman Exactly my thoughts. I was so excited until I read the KPIs.

My emotional reaction to Anthropic forming an education team with a KPI of reach in underserved communities, and with a job ad emphasizing “raising the floor” and partnerships in the poorest parts of the world, is: a generational opportunity is being blown.

@DudespostingWs Legend dad

The Father who never left his son behind

@flowidealism @MrNicolasForero I got it, thank you!

@mharishank @MrNicolasForero can you make sure she gets one?

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