Childhoods of Exceptional People with Henrik Karlsson
Can we raise & educate more Einstein's & Shakespeare's?
Can we raise and educate more Einstein's and Shakespeare's into this world?
I had a fascinating discussion with Henrik Karlsson on the type of early childhood education received by creative and scientific geniuses like Pascal, Faraday, Alan Turing, Mozart, Virginia Wolf.
Henrik is a researcher and writer. He read dozens of biographies and wrote a fantastic blog on what did the childhoods of exceptional writers and scientists look like, and can we replicate that in society?
I'm super intrigued by the space of early childhood education, so I hope you enjoy the conversation as much as I did.
Best, Aastha
We discuss:
How genius kids were raised
The role of mentors in the lives of genius kids
Homeschooling and tutoring
Taking Children Seriously
Online learning cultures & apprenticeships
AI tutors
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Timestamps:
0:00 Henrik on writing
3:10 On raising children to be geniuses like Newton, Einstein, Mozart
8:34 Taking Children Seriously
9:44 Exceptional children are surrounded by the best in the world
14:01 Best mentors in-person vs. books as mentors
17:50 Do entrepreneurs like Elon Musk break the pattern of growing up in exceptional surroundings?
22:07 Henrik's biographies sample
24:36 Homeschooling until age 12
27:36 Mixed-age classrooms
29:41 Counter-examples: Exceptional kids who were not tutored
32:33 Online apprenticeships
36:16 Self-directed projects by Pascal, Maxwell, Mozart
40:05 Polgar on raising chess prodigies
43:38 Are genius kids happy?
45:39 Are there genius late bloomers?
48:11 Self-directed learning cultures in Sweden
57:32 Will AI tutors have an impact?
1:01:35 How does Henrik educate his children?
1:08:01 Homeschooling & Social Interaction
1:09:34 How to scale learning cultures?
1:12:34 Outro and Show Notes