Unlocking Potential: How Middle School MBA Transforms Young Minds

John Foster 00:00:00

When we're building curriculum, we don't think about the student.

John Foster 00:00:02

We think about the teacher.

John Foster 00:00:04

Why doesn't every kid leave high school with a, with a thorough understanding of calculus?

John Foster 00:00:09

We're teaching math the same way we taught it 100 years ago, and guess what?

John Foster 00:00:13

We're getting the same results.

John Foster 00:00:15

I like teaching things that kids will use for the rest of their lives no matter what they do.

John Foster 00:00:21

It's not whether or not you fall down.

John Foster 00:00:23

It's whether or not you pick yourself up.

John Foster 00:00:25

I want them to confront failure.

John Foster 00:00:26

I want them to see that it, that it doesn't kill you and, and that you just pick yourself up and keep going.

John Foster 00:00:33

And it's, it's just one more step along the way.

John Foster 00:00:35

It's not, it's not the terminal event in, you know, in, in your life.

Mark Taylor 00:00:41

Hello, my name is Mark Taylor.

Mark Taylor 00:00:43

Welcome back to the Education on Far podcast.

Mark Taylor 00:00:45

And this is my conversation with John Foster from Middle School mba.

Mark Taylor 00:00:50

Hello, my name is Mark Taylor, and welcome to the Education on Fire podcast, the place for creative and inspiring learning from around the world.

Mark Taylor 00:01:04

Listen to teachers, parents, and mentors share how they are supporting children to live their best, authentic life and are proving to be a guiding light to us all.

Mark Taylor 00:01:12

Hi, John.

Mark Taylor 00:01:13

Thank you so much for joining us here on the Education on Far podcast.

Mark Taylor 00:01:16

I think it doesn't matter where we are in the world.

Mark Taylor 00:01:19

The idea of what we're learning and why we're learning it and those skills that are going to set us up for the future, success is really important.

Mark Taylor 00:01:25

So I'm really excited to be chatting today specifically about what you're here to talk about.

Mark Taylor 00:01:29

So, yeah, thanks so much for being here.

John Foster 00:01:32

Oh, thank you for having me.

John Foster 00:01:34

I'm honored to be here with you.

Mark Taylor 00:01:36

So why don't we start Middle school mba, where did that come from?

Mark Taylor 00:01:41

Because I know you've sort of had your professional career, which is sort of taking you into this part of, this sort of world within this part of your life.

John Foster 00:01:49

Yes, well, middle school MBA was, as you said, I started as a, you know, in industry, and I had a career there as an engineer and a business manager.

John Foster 00:02:04

And along the way, I volunteered with Junior Achievement, which is a, well, it's in the UK as well.

John Foster 00:02:14

They, it was started over 100 years ago by a guy who was appalled at how little kids understood business.

John Foster 00:02:22

And so he, this, this organization recruits volunteers from the business world and has them go into schools and, and teach the Junior Achievement curriculum to kids.

John Foster 00:02:34

And so I, I, I participated in that as a, as a volunteer, and over time, I kept adding and tweaking that.

John Foster 00:02:41

Apparently I, I can't leave well enough alone.

John Foster 00:02:44

And at one point I actually, I just had my own curriculum.

John Foster 00:02:49

And so I was teaching that in schools and everybody loved it.

John Foster 00:02:53

And one day I was walking to class and I said to myself, why am I teaching 14 kids?

John Foster 00:02:58

I need to teach 14,000.

John Foster 00:03:00

And that's when middle school MBA was born.

John Foster 00:03:02

And I built all the tools that I always wanted to have.

John Foster 00:03:06

Instead of me drawing ugly pictures on the board and saying, imagine this moves here and changes like that.

John Foster 00:03:12

And we actually have a 3D digital model that so, so kids can actually see all the connections and you don't have to guess about what's going into their head because, you know, it's, it's right there in front of everybody.

John Foster 00:03:27

And so we, it just took off from there.

John Foster 00:03:31

That's where, that's where it all started.

John Foster 00:03:33

And the, the reason we call it Middle School MBA is because we're, we're actually teaching graduate level stuff to middle school kids, which, which at first seems kind of shocking, but on, on reflection, it's not so much.

John Foster 00:03:49

You know, we've.

John Foster 00:03:52

If.

John Foster 00:03:53

If you really boil things down to their essence and you connect them just right and you use the, the best available tools, you actually can teach these things at a very young age.

John Foster 00:04:05

And, and kind of the magic of Middle School MBA is we do it through the teacher who's in the classroom.

John Foster 00:04:12

Instead of the JA model, which is where I started, where an outside expert comes in and gives the class, we do a mind meld with the teacher.

John Foster 00:04:22

So the teacher has everything in their head, and then the teacher delivers it to their kids.

John Foster 00:04:28

And it's far more effective because, I mean, actually in the beginning, I had a great fear that a teacher that didn't have a heavy background in business wouldn't be able to, you know, to deliver this.

John Foster 00:04:44

But in fact, they're better than I am because they're actual teachers.

John Foster 00:04:48

They have teaching skills and they know every child in the class.

John Foster 00:04:52

So they know how fast that kid can learn new material.

John Foster 00:04:55

They know how much they know to begin with.

John Foster 00:04:58

It's just a huge disadvantage not to know those things when you walk into a classroom.

John Foster 00:05:03

And so it's really been remarkable how we can.

John Foster 00:05:08

It really does feel like we're in the teacher's head.

John Foster 00:05:10

In fact, that's our, that's our goal.

John Foster 00:05:12

When, when we're building curriculum, we don't think about the student, we think about the teacher, and we're thinking about being in their head.

John Foster 00:05:20

So it's it's been a remarkably successful.

Mark Taylor 00:05:25

It's fascinating you say that as a musician myself, I've, I've done lots of workshops in and CPD for teachers, and we do sambo, African drumming, that kind of thing, which I've done over the years.

Mark Taylor 00:05:38

And the majority of people are kind of.

Mark Taylor 00:05:40

But I don't know anything about music.

Mark Taylor 00:05:41

I'm really scared about teaching music.

Mark Taylor 00:05:43

And I started from the same sort of position that you did was the fact that, you know, we're teaching this to children.

Mark Taylor 00:05:49

So if they're going to understand it, we understand that you'll feel for fearful about it, but actually you'll be understand it as well.

Mark Taylor 00:05:55

And like you said, you have all the skills that you need because you're used to teaching, you know, the children.

Mark Taylor 00:05:59

You know, the way the setup of the school is.

Mark Taylor 00:06:01

It's actually much easier for you to do it once you've got hold of the curriculum and the understanding than it is for someone else coming in sort of off the street, so to speak.

Mark Taylor 00:06:09

So, so it's fascinating to hear you think the same.

Mark Taylor 00:06:11

Along the same lines.

John Foster 00:06:13

Exactly right.

John Foster 00:06:14

And, and you know, the, when you talk about the, the level of the material and, and people say, wait, wait, you're teaching kids subjective theory of value and business cycles and these kinds of things.

John Foster 00:06:27

We don't do that until much later.

John Foster 00:06:29

And my response is, why don't we, why, why have we been sitting around for 100 years teaching them the same thing?

John Foster 00:06:37

You know, why doesn't every kid leave high school with every kid with a thorough understanding of calculus?

John Foster 00:06:44

You know, it's, it's just that we're, we're, we're teaching math the same way we taught it 100 years ago, and guess what?

John Foster 00:06:50

We're getting the same results.

John Foster 00:06:52

And there are a shocking number of people who walk around saying, I can't do math.

John Foster 00:06:58

That's insane.

John Foster 00:06:59

Everybody can do it.

John Foster 00:07:00

It's just that we're just so poor at teaching it.

John Foster 00:07:04

Same for so.

John Foster 00:07:05

And one of the, one of the things that I like to do in schools is to say, okay, look, Mr.

John Foster 00:07:11

Principal, bring middle school MBA and plug it into your school, super easy to do.

John Foster 00:07:16

And then challenge all your other curriculums to reach that bar.

John Foster 00:07:22

And so in that way, you're not only amping up your business and economics education, but, but whoever else is clever enough to, you know, history or whatever and make a step change.

John Foster 00:07:36

Improvement.

Mark Taylor 00:07:37

Yeah, that's really interesting because I was going to sort of say that in terms of sort of bringing that into the curriculum.

Mark Taylor 00:07:42

Or bringing it into a school, is there some sort of sort of feedback or sort of thrust back a little bit?

Mark Taylor 00:07:48

Because it's like we do our curriculum this way.

Mark Taylor 00:07:50

We have to cover this.

Mark Taylor 00:07:52

You know, the system is set up so that we can do X, Y and Z.

Mark Taylor 00:07:55

And it works as it works, whether we think it's a good idea or not.

Mark Taylor 00:07:58

So to bring something in from outside and then to make that work, do you sort of need the principals to kind of really understand what that is to begin with, or is it easy to kind of sort of just sort of say no?

Mark Taylor 00:08:11

Look, this is going to be the benefits both in terms of you as a school, but of course also for the students involved as well.

John Foster 00:08:19

It all depends.

John Foster 00:08:20

It's a real mixed bag.

John Foster 00:08:22

But typically the principals who are ambitious for their kids are our customers.

John Foster 00:08:30

Really.

John Foster 00:08:31

I can just say the words middle school MBA to a principal and engage the reaction that I get.

John Foster 00:08:39

And almost right away I know if that's my customer or not, either.

John Foster 00:08:43

It's like, okay, I'm going to move heaven and earth to get this in.

John Foster 00:08:47

And by the way, I happen to know that I have two or three programs that really aren't getting me much.

John Foster 00:08:53

They're not very effective.

John Foster 00:08:54

I'm just going to, to substitute this for that.

John Foster 00:08:57

And, and that's a beautiful easy way to, to just, it's a win, win for everybody.

John Foster 00:09:05

But on the other hand, there, there are people who are exactly like you described.

John Foster 00:09:09

Well, we're full.

John Foster 00:09:10

You know, we've been doing this for years and we'd have to take something else out.

John Foster 00:09:14

We don't want to change.

John Foster 00:09:15

So there's, there's plenty of that as well.

John Foster 00:09:18

So I describe it as, as finding needles in the haystack, our customers.

John Foster 00:09:24

But the thing is, it's an enormous haystack.

John Foster 00:09:26

You know, there are, there are dozens of schools in, in every county.

John Foster 00:09:33

So I mean it's, it's a big world and that's just in the U.S.

John Foster 00:09:36

you know, there's, there's another 300 million native English speakers outside the U.S.

John Foster 00:09:42

so it's a, it's a very large haystack.

Mark Taylor 00:09:45

And so you sort of mentioned sort of the international element there.

Mark Taylor 00:09:49

How does it sort of work, like say, across sort of different countries and things?

Mark Taylor 00:09:53

Is it because of the, the principles that you're teaching and the way that you're doing it?

Mark Taylor 00:09:56

No matter what the, the actual curricular itself is in any given country, you can adapt it or you can insert it in a way that's going to be supportive Absolutely.

John Foster 00:10:05

It's like teaching physics.

John Foster 00:10:07

You know, it's, it's, it's the same everywhere.

John Foster 00:10:10

And, and so we have schools around the world, in Africa and Europe and wherever people speak English, they can adopt it.

John Foster 00:10:20

And yes, from the get go.

John Foster 00:10:24

I always wanted to teach principles.

John Foster 00:10:26

You know, you, you can teach a coding language, but, but that language is going to be obsolete in six years or maybe less as quickly as things move.

John Foster 00:10:35

So I like teaching things that kids will use for the rest of their lives no matter what they do.

Mark Taylor 00:10:42

And I know one of the important things to you is this idea of failure and failing over and over and just gradually keeping that, that sort of momentum going.

Mark Taylor 00:10:51

Talk to me a little bit about that, because I know certainly from my experience of teaching music in schools, but probably more importantly, my children going through school, that sense of sitting in the classroom and them feeling like they should know the answer already, they shouldn't put their head above the parapet or the.

Mark Taylor 00:11:07

Being inquisitive is not necessarily what they should be doing.

Mark Taylor 00:11:10

They should know all these things in advance.

Mark Taylor 00:11:12

How do you sort of, how does that sort of work for you?

Mark Taylor 00:11:15

How did you get that message across and sort of get people to understand it's such a positive thing and it's the way that we're all learning and growing?

John Foster 00:11:23

Well, you know, we, we do several things in that regard.

John Foster 00:11:29

One is, is just like preaching the message, you know, don't be afraid of failure.

John Foster 00:11:35

You're.

John Foster 00:11:36

It's not whether or not you fall down, it's whether or not you pick yourself up those things.

John Foster 00:11:40

But, but probably more importantly is we build the opportunity for failure in every exercise that we do.

John Foster 00:11:48

And we also put in what we call curveballs to try to throw the kids off their game.

John Foster 00:11:57

Like they'll be set up to do a negotiation.

John Foster 00:12:01

And they've reviewed their situation, they've analyzed the market, they've.

John Foster 00:12:08

They've come up with their strategy for the negotiation.

John Foster 00:12:11

And then they come sit down against their opponent and we hand them a note.

John Foster 00:12:16

That changes the game, you know, oh, your plane is leaving early.

John Foster 00:12:21

So you have 15 seconds less than you thought you did.

John Foster 00:12:24

Things like that.

John Foster 00:12:26

And so I've actually had a principal complain, john, you're setting these kids up for failure rather than setting them up for success.

John Foster 00:12:35

My response is, yes, I want them to fail now.

John Foster 00:12:39

I want them to confront front failure.

John Foster 00:12:40

I want them to see that it, that it doesn't kill you and, and that you just pick yourself up and keep going.

John Foster 00:12:47

And it's, it's just one more step along the way.

John Foster 00:12:49

It's not, it's not the, the terminal event in, you know, in, in your life.

John Foster 00:12:56

We, we even tell them, you know, when you, when you go to McDonald's and they tell you, okay, that'll be 7.95.

John Foster 00:13:05

Just ask them, well, would you, would, would you take 750 instead?

John Foster 00:13:09

And of course they're going to say no for very good reasons.

John Foster 00:13:13

You know, you've already consented to the price because it's listed on the wall and that person working there doesn't have the authority to, you know, to make a difference.

John Foster 00:13:23

But what, what it does is you practice making an offer and then you get rejected.

John Foster 00:13:31

And guess what?

John Foster 00:13:32

It doesn't kill you.

John Foster 00:13:33

You're fine.

John Foster 00:13:34

And you learn to make it in such a way that the cashier isn't offended and you continue with a transaction that's successful.

John Foster 00:13:45

That happens in a negotiation all the time.

John Foster 00:13:47

You say, well, I'd like to do this.

John Foster 00:13:50

And the other party says no.

John Foster 00:13:51

And you go, well, all right, let's talk about something else.

John Foster 00:13:54

Can we do it this way?

John Foster 00:13:56

So all these are tiny failures and so you become sort of immune to the, to the, the internal hurt of a failure, whether it's big or small.

John Foster 00:14:10

And, and you keep going.

Mark Taylor 00:14:13

And I think that's the real problem with the, the current system of testing and constant sort of grade boundaries and that kind of thing.

Mark Taylor 00:14:21

It's, oh, I've got 10 out of 10, I've got 10 out of ten, I've got an A, I've got an A star, I've got an A plus.

Mark Taylor 00:14:26

And then you suddenly, I got a nine and a half out of 10.

Mark Taylor 00:14:29

It's like I've, you know, my life's over, I failed.

Mark Taylor 00:14:32

My averages aren't going to be where they were.

Mark Taylor 00:14:34

Rather than that, yes, of course you want to do as well as you possibly can, but the pressure that you put on yourself and maybe even people around you to keep up that excellent standard, which is just unrealistic over time because you're going to do harder and harder things, you're going to be more and more different situations.

Mark Taylor 00:14:51

There's always someone bigger, better, cleverer, louder, whatever that happens to be.

Mark Taylor 00:14:56

And as soon as the whole concept, like say it's about conversations, it's about deciding what you need, it's about looking at things in a different way that just changes your whole atmosphere to life.

Mark Taylor 00:15:06

And I think from, you know, a well being, mental health point of view and an understanding of how life that actually works in reality, that's got to be a benefit.

John Foster 00:15:16

Absolutely, absolutely.

John Foster 00:15:17

You know, and the world isn't so black and white, okay?

John Foster 00:15:20

In math, 2 plus 2 is 4 and that's it.

John Foster 00:15:23

But in most other subjects it's a little bit grayer than that.

John Foster 00:15:28

And, and I think it's also helpful to know as a child that we don't know everything yet.

John Foster 00:15:37

You know, that there's still history to uncover and there's still different viewpoints to examine.

John Foster 00:15:43

And so you need a certain flexibility in your thinking, particularly if, you know, if you care about critical thinking.

John Foster 00:15:54

What we tell them is don't, don't believe anything until you can follow every step in the chain in your own head and it makes sense to you.

John Foster 00:16:05

Trust your own intellect and if it doesn't add up for you, then, then, then suspend belief for a bit, you know, so, okay, I'm going to hold on to this idea and realize that it's there and, and that maybe it's true, but I'm not committing to it yet until I know every, you know, every step in this chain.

John Foster 00:16:24

And so you, at the same time, you, you're flexible, but you also have a, you're building a clear picture of the framework that's totally true.

John Foster 00:16:38

And then within that framework, you have many more ideas that you're trying to place somewhere.

John Foster 00:16:43

So a flexible open mind, but also a questioning and doubting aspect to it to really round out a critical thinking situation.

Mark Taylor 00:16:55

And I think for me, whenever I lose sight of that or I feel like I'm not able to get that across in anything that I'm doing, I think back to those sort of younger children, you know, the toddlers who are just so enthusiastic about the fact they, they have a ball that they can play with or they've suddenly realized they can do X, Y and Z.

Mark Taylor 00:17:12

They're not thinking about anything else other than all the options that I can do with this new thing that I have in the world of possibilities.

Mark Taylor 00:17:19

And I know, you know, wicked and wired differently at that younger age as well.

Mark Taylor 00:17:23

And, and there's a certain amount of life that happens, but I think there's a key element there that as soon as you lose sight of that or you lose the wonder of what's possible, which you can keep even with that sort of more grown up understanding as we develop, then, then life becomes exciting.

Mark Taylor 00:17:38

And even now, I think some of the things that I've done, you take the podcast, for example.

Mark Taylor 00:17:42

It wasn't something I studied at school, it wasn't something I knew I was going to be doing in my earlier life, but now it's that I don't know where it's going to go.

Mark Taylor 00:17:49

I don't know who I'm going to be speaking to.

Mark Taylor 00:17:51

I'm excited about the possibilities and what we're able to share.

Mark Taylor 00:17:55

And like I say, if you can keep that going for as much of your life as you can, then it's always going to be exciting and it's always going to be growing, which I think is probably the other important thing.

John Foster 00:18:04

Yes, I think you should never lose that, that playful aspect of.

John Foster 00:18:08

But what else could happen here?

John Foster 00:18:10

You know, how else could we, could we manage this situation?

John Foster 00:18:13

Absolutely.

Mark Taylor 00:18:15

Take us into sort of how the, the system works.

Mark Taylor 00:18:20

So I, I sort of understand that sense of like say you get the principal, they're really keen.

Mark Taylor 00:18:25

You can understand whether they're sort of getting involved in that.

Mark Taylor 00:18:28

Once the school have kind of literally effectively bought into it, how does it then work in terms of then the teachers being involved?

Mark Taylor 00:18:34

What sort of resources are there, how do they access them, what sort of the online platform look like and that kind of thing.

John Foster 00:18:41

So it's, it's, it's, it's super cool how, how this goes because step one, the teacher goes, oh, wait, I can't teach this.

John Foster 00:18:51

This is, this is, this is way above my pay grade.

John Foster 00:18:54

This is, I didn't like this stuff in college, I'm not good at math, blah, blah, blah.

John Foster 00:19:01

And, and then as soon as they see the, the layout of the curriculum, you know, they, they spend 30 minutes with it, they go, oh, I got this.

John Foster 00:19:09

Okay, give me this.

John Foster 00:19:10

I'm going to, I'm going to, I'm going to give this to my kids.

John Foster 00:19:14

Because it's, it's, you know, it's like you said earlier, it's, it's clear enough that a 12 year old can get it, a teacher gets it super fast.

John Foster 00:19:24

And ever all the stuff comes in online, all they do is they, they log in, they get a dashboard with lessons, they open a lesson, all the stuff you need is there, and then they project that lesson on the wall of their classroom.

John Foster 00:19:38

And it guides, it's the teaching materials they need.

John Foster 00:19:42

It, it explains activities.

John Foster 00:19:45

We do a lot of activities like building parts and P&L's negotiating, pitching companies.

John Foster 00:19:52

But all of it's within a framework of very rigorous economics.

John Foster 00:19:59

Economics is sort of the abstraction of business, businesses, the, and that's how it all started.

John Foster 00:20:04

You know, Aristotle looked around and said, I see people buying things and selling things and using money and charging interest and hiring people.

John Foster 00:20:14

What is, what does this Commercial activity mean what is its nature?

John Foster 00:20:19

And he laid out the first principles of economics because that's what economics is.

John Foster 00:20:23

It's the abstraction of commercial practices.

John Foster 00:20:27

And so we give them that framework of economics that, that all of their activities are happening within.

John Foster 00:20:36

So it's, it's seamless between.

John Foster 00:20:40

They don't know the difference between business and economics.

John Foster 00:20:42

They just understand that supply and demand is part of how I get the prices that go into my P and L for my business.

John Foster 00:20:48

You know, so it's, it's extremely easy to implement.

John Foster 00:20:55

It's, it's really get credentials today, teach tomorrow, and, and it's super fun for everybody.

John Foster 00:21:03

The, everybody feels like they're punching above their weight.

John Foster 00:21:06

The kids, the teacher, we, you know, business is about interactions between people, and so we create a lot of interactions.

John Foster 00:21:16

And you know, when, when two kids are negotiating, everybody's involved.

John Foster 00:21:22

You have, there's a, there's a time, keep it there, because time pressure, there's always a thing.

John Foster 00:21:27

And, and the rest of the class is involved in setting the thing up and figuring out what curveballs we're going to throw to which kid.

John Foster 00:21:34

And so when these two kids sit down to negotiate for the rest of the class, it's like a cage match.

John Foster 00:21:40

You know, everybody is tuned in.

John Foster 00:21:43

And so it's, it's just a beautiful thing.

John Foster 00:21:47

Kids start adopting business lingo.

John Foster 00:21:50

They, they look at their other coursework more seriously.

John Foster 00:21:54

They realize, you know, this is, this is the real world and it's out there just ahead of me, and I have to prepare myself for it and, and be ready for it.

John Foster 00:22:03

I mean, that's their job.

John Foster 00:22:04

When, when you're 11, 12 years old, your job is to grow up and be an adult and take your place in the world.

John Foster 00:22:11

Whether you know it or not, whether you're thinking about it or not, that's programmed into your genes and, and so they just, they glom onto this.

John Foster 00:22:19

They see it as, as authentic and useful and they just dig in.

John Foster 00:22:28

It's funny, you never know which kids are going to be the most enthusiastic.

John Foster 00:22:32

Teachers say that all the time.

John Foster 00:22:33

They got, well, I have this very artsy, very into fashion girl over here, and all of a sudden she's like this tiger that's running businesses and driving negotiations.

John Foster 00:22:51

It's just, they're all just natural entrepreneurs and, and we give them the outlet to express it.

Mark Taylor 00:22:59

And I guess there are two things there that strike me.

Mark Taylor 00:23:01

One is the fact that, like you say, there's a, there's a DNA, there's a hot wire in there of Sort of natural growing up, which probably just flicks a switch somewhere on some people.

Mark Taylor 00:23:11

They're like, I can don't know why or how, but I identify with this in some way.

Mark Taylor 00:23:15

And there's also people who've probably been within the school system thinking, I'm not sure what this is all about.

Mark Taylor 00:23:21

I'm coming to school, I'm being told what to do, I'm doing everything I'm meant to do.

Mark Taylor 00:23:25

And all of a sudden you get this sort of creativity and this freedom and this ability to have your personality come through and to make it sort of real world related to what you're doing.

Mark Taylor 00:23:34

And then all of a sudden they're like, oh, I'm still at school, I'm still learning, but this is a whole different framework and something I can really sort of literally dig my teeth into in a really positive way.

Mark Taylor 00:23:45

And I'm getting credit and I can see how I'm learning as well.

Mark Taylor 00:23:48

And I think there's always that sort of, sort of flash point somewhere where you suddenly go, yeah, there's something here for me.

Mark Taylor 00:23:53

And if, if that takes them into that particular module, but then more importantly, like you say, into life afterwards, then it really is such a powerful thing.

John Foster 00:24:02

Yes, you're totally right.

John Foster 00:24:03

You, you, you hit that on the head.

John Foster 00:24:06

It's, it, it opens a different world.

John Foster 00:24:09

And it also another thing that it does.

John Foster 00:24:12

If you think about a kid, we live in this commercial world.

John Foster 00:24:18

We live in an ocean of transactions.

John Foster 00:24:22

And if you're 11 years old and you just see all these transactions happening, it's a bit like a blaster battle in Star Wars.

John Foster 00:24:33

They're just these pieces flying every direction, but they're all chaotic and crazy and unexpected.

John Foster 00:24:39

But once you understand the bigger picture of what's happening with that, all of a sudden the world becomes, it comes into focus more and it's, it's less chaotic and less scary and, and that feels really good.

John Foster 00:24:54

All of a sudden you're like, I see what's going on here and I know how to participate in it.

John Foster 00:24:59

And you know, I walk into a store and I don't just see the merchandise, I see, I see the salespeople, I see the marketing strategy.

John Foster 00:25:08

You know, I'm not just a victim being sucked along by an ad.

John Foster 00:25:11

I see the ad, I see what they're trying to pitch to me, I see the approach they're using.

John Foster 00:25:15

And, and it's just a, it's an entirely different way to look at the world.

Mark Taylor 00:25:20

And I think once you can see that bigger picture, there's Almost an excitement about actually getting on board with.

Mark Taylor 00:25:27

You think that's really well done and they've got me and I can see what they've done.

Mark Taylor 00:25:31

But even so, yes, well done.

Mark Taylor 00:25:33

I'm.

Mark Taylor 00:25:33

I'm going to put my money where my mouth is from that point of view.

Mark Taylor 00:25:36

But like I say, with a whole different feeling than just not knowing and just following it.

Mark Taylor 00:25:40

Like sort of blindness.

John Foster 00:25:43

Exactly.

John Foster 00:25:43

You know, it's kind of what they say about being sold something by a Lebanese guy.

John Foster 00:25:49

You know, he's like, I know he's picking my pocket, but.

John Foster 00:25:52

But he's so nice and so, so cheerful.

John Foster 00:25:55

I mean, I'm good with.

Mark Taylor 00:25:59

You sort of mentioned that this has come out of your experience in terms of business and the world that you were working in, but having sort of got into that sort of educational system and this particular sort of world.

Mark Taylor 00:26:11

Is there an education experience that you remember or a teacher that you remember that kind of.

Mark Taylor 00:26:15

You think, oh, yeah, that maybe they knew something along the lines of what you're talking about now, which sort of you can remember or you sort of took into what you've managed to create.

John Foster 00:26:25

You know, more in the spirit of the thing.

John Foster 00:26:32

I had a chemistry teacher when I was in the 10th grade named Mr.

John Foster 00:26:35

O Me, and he did demonstrations in class.

John Foster 00:26:41

On the first day of class, he took a piece of sodium and dropped it in a beaker and of course it made a big flash and flew across the room and.

John Foster 00:26:50

And.

John Foster 00:26:51

But then he.

John Foster 00:26:52

He taught us how to do unit analysis, you know, to.

John Foster 00:26:56

To balance equations.

John Foster 00:26:58

And, you know, I went through almost all of college with.

John Foster 00:27:02

With little more than being able to apply unit analysis to things.

John Foster 00:27:07

And he was just a great teacher.

John Foster 00:27:11

And one day at recess, I had kind of slacked off and he stopped me at recess and he said, what happened to you?

John Foster 00:27:19

I was.

John Foster 00:27:20

You started out as a house of fire and.

John Foster 00:27:23

And then all of a sudden you just.

John Foster 00:27:25

I don't know what's going on.

John Foster 00:27:26

You haven't.

John Foster 00:27:27

You're not doing much.

John Foster 00:27:28

And just the fact that he noticed, you know, I walked away from that.

John Foster 00:27:31

Oh, my God, he actually noticed.

John Foster 00:27:33

And.

John Foster 00:27:34

And I got back on the stick and started, you know, started turning out better work.

John Foster 00:27:40

And I know that guy just.

John Foster 00:27:42

He's always stuck with me.

Mark Taylor 00:27:44

I think if there's one thing I've Learned from the 400 odd episodes that we've done here on Education on Fire, it's exactly what you've said there.

Mark Taylor 00:27:52

It's the fact that there's a human connection and there's something about the person and the interaction which makes a difference, like I said, whether it's a subject related thing or whatever it happens to be.

Mark Taylor 00:28:04

And that happens and comes up so much.

Mark Taylor 00:28:06

And I think it's what you were saying, you know, probably the success of what you're able to create now is the fact that it brings up a different feeling.

Mark Taylor 00:28:14

The interactions with the people, whether it's their fellow students, whether it's the teacher, whether it's the school at large, or however the project gets put together, it's about those interactions.

Mark Taylor 00:28:23

And I think understanding that at the heart of everything you do just suddenly makes your experience of everything you do such a more rewarding thing.

John Foster 00:28:31

Yeah, you're right.

John Foster 00:28:32

And you know what, Even though unit analysis is not formally a part of business or economics, we teach it to kids because I think it's so incredibly important.

John Foster 00:28:42

We do a little sidebar and say, okay, look, here's how the co kids, you know, make math problems work.

John Foster 00:28:47

And, and so, yeah, Mr.

John Foster 00:28:50

O'Mealy is still built into to our curriculum.

John Foster 00:28:55

God, 45 years later or something.

Mark Taylor 00:28:57

Amazing, isn't it, how it sort of carries through and, and is there a piece of advice you'd like to share or indeed maybe you can frame it in a way, a piece of advice you might give your younger self now.

John Foster 00:29:07

Looking back, you know, it's, it's, it's be bolder and don't give up.

John Foster 00:29:15

And by that I mean, by bolder I mean act sooner.

John Foster 00:29:18

When, as soon as you feel like, I mean in business the first time you think, you know, maybe we should fire Joe over there, you should have already fired Joe.

John Foster 00:29:28

And when you think, you know, maybe I should move on to a, to a different job, you already should have done it.

John Foster 00:29:33

So don't, don't dwell on those things for six months or two years or something to get on about it and, and, and just, just never give up.

John Foster 00:29:45

There's no matter how daunting the situation.

John Foster 00:29:49

So if you can pivot, you can change direction but, but you can just never give up.

John Foster 00:29:53

You, you never know when you're going to get a break or when, when you're just going to overcome, when finally the, the obstacles will collapse in front of you.

John Foster 00:30:03

So just never give up.

Mark Taylor 00:30:05

Yeah, I love that.

Mark Taylor 00:30:06

And, and the being bold thing is something which some certainly strikes a chord with me.

Mark Taylor 00:30:10

It's in my life there's various different moving parts and opportunities and things coming and it is that sense of I'll just wait, I'll just see if this happens.

Mark Taylor 00:30:19

I'll just See if that happens and then maybe this will happen.

Mark Taylor 00:30:21

Like you say, there's something about the being bold about it because you kind of already know and also sometimes you need to do it to create the space for those other things to really come in and take hold.

Mark Taylor 00:30:31

And so I think both of those things become incredibly important.

John Foster 00:30:36

Yes.

John Foster 00:30:37

You can't get in your own way, you know, with, with self doubt.

John Foster 00:30:41

And I mean, so frequently the thing you need to do is the thing that you're scared of and you just have to go, you know, I'm an introvert by nature, but I do a lot of public speaking because that's how you reach people.

John Foster 00:30:58

And, you know, I just had to find my way to it and, you know, be bold.

Mark Taylor 00:31:05

Yeah.

Mark Taylor 00:31:06

And I think that fear often, and it's something which has actually come up in our family.

Mark Taylor 00:31:11

Our daughter's going through the sort of the end of her school life now and there's sort of lots of unknowns, lots of things going on.

Mark Taylor 00:31:17

And it's something that I sort of say quite a lot is the fact that the unknown part of it, which is often the scary part of it, is going to happen multiple times.

Mark Taylor 00:31:25

But when you sort of identify that that is what it is.

Mark Taylor 00:31:28

Because if you look back even in sort of her relatively short life, it's like, you know, there was a new school, there was a new class, there was a new teacher, there was a change of friends, there was a new club.

Mark Taylor 00:31:37

And you can kind of start to think, oh, yeah, I felt a little bit funny about all of those things.

Mark Taylor 00:31:41

But you know, within the first hour or the first day or the first week, suddenly it's like your best friend has arrived or a new favorite class or a new teacher or whatever.

Mark Taylor 00:31:49

And I think just being aware of all of those things can then give you the power to think.

Mark Taylor 00:31:54

Actually this is maybe slightly fearful or I feel slightly funny about it, but actually I know it's probably going to be a great success or at least it's going to be a great learning experience.

John Foster 00:32:04

Yes.

John Foster 00:32:04

And you, and you know, there's a, there's a trick that I love you can, you can trick your brain a little bit when, when you're approaching a scary situation.

John Foster 00:32:13

You know, they're, they're different hormones that your, that your body produces depending on the situation.

John Foster 00:32:20

And if you say to yourself, you're, you're, you know, you're coming to a, an unknown situation or an uncomfortable situation.

John Foster 00:32:27

If you say to yourself, this is going to be fun, it can change the actual chemistry of Your brain and the way it's doing things and all of a sudden open up a lot of opportunities for you that you otherwise wouldn't.

John Foster 00:32:39

It's a cool trick.

John Foster 00:32:41

And I think your brain doesn't necessarily know the difference between you can't lie to yourself frequently or you'll lose credibility.

John Foster 00:32:49

But that's a great one that I've used a lot.

Mark Taylor 00:32:52

Yeah, and I love that.

Mark Taylor 00:32:53

I think, especially in the modern world or where we are now, that sense of understanding the science and the emotion and the spirituality and.

Mark Taylor 00:33:02

And the whole way the world works.

Mark Taylor 00:33:04

Because I think, like you say, you can actually be smart with yourself to understand what's going on.

Mark Taylor 00:33:09

And, you know, some of these fears are there, you know, innately, because they were there for.

Mark Taylor 00:33:13

As a survival mechanism.

Mark Taylor 00:33:14

But we don't live in that same world anymore.

Mark Taylor 00:33:16

And, you know, if there is a bear in your garage, then you're going to want to be fearful about it and do something about it.

Mark Taylor 00:33:21

But just like, say, going to a different lunch hall, which might be a bit weird if you're younger, isn't actually going to put you in that same situation.

John Foster 00:33:29

Exactly.

Mark Taylor 00:33:31

Is there a resource you'd like to share?

Mark Taylor 00:33:33

And it's going to be anything from a video, song, film, book, podcast, whatever it might be.

Mark Taylor 00:33:38

And it can be professional or personal.

Mark Taylor 00:33:40

But something which you think would be interesting for people.

John Foster 00:33:44

Well, you know, there are a lot of great economics books that are very accessible, both economics and business.

John Foster 00:33:53

Peter Thiel has book called Zero to One, which is extremely good, very thoughtful, He's a very deep guy.

John Foster 00:34:03

And then there's Murray Rothbard has written tons of very accessible things on economics and history that put things in a light that you never recognize before.

John Foster 00:34:16

So anybody can benefit, I think, from reading those guys.

Mark Taylor 00:34:21

Yeah, I love that.

Mark Taylor 00:34:22

And I love the correlation there, like, say, about sort of a different light on things, because that's kind of the impression I sort of get from what it is that you're producing.

Mark Taylor 00:34:29

You know, we're still learning, we're still doing things in the educational setting.

Mark Taylor 00:34:33

But that different spotlight, that different way of doing things, I can see how.

Mark Taylor 00:34:36

How that's something that really identifies with you.

Mark Taylor 00:34:40

So obviously the acronym FIRE here at Education on FIRE is really important.

Mark Taylor 00:34:44

By that we mean feedback, inspiration, resilience, and empowerment.

Mark Taylor 00:34:49

What is it that strikes you either one of those words or a combination just from hearing that?

John Foster 00:34:55

Well, you know, for me, I like the expression that genius is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration.

John Foster 00:35:07

And so the resilience part of Hanging in there and continuing to work is, I think is, is just, just super important.

John Foster 00:35:19

You can't overemphasize, that is many people sit around waiting to be inspired, you know, do something.

John Foster 00:35:27

I, you know, I've done some writing too and, and one of the things that we say in writing is you can fix a bad page, but if you never write the page, there's nothing to fix.

John Foster 00:35:38

So, you know, button the chair, fingers on the keyboard, make something happen.

Mark Taylor 00:35:44

I love that.

Mark Taylor 00:35:45

And, and the work and the resilience I can identify with as well that, you know, the 10,000 hour rule of practice to learn an instrument or yes, become skilled at something.

Mark Taylor 00:35:53

You know, I've been inspired, I've been inspired many times, but I can remember more of those early mornings, late finishes, practice rooms, all of those things in order to get to the point of being able to actually deliver the thing I want to from that original inspiration.

Mark Taylor 00:36:06

And I think both sides of those coins, they're so important for people to understand.

John Foster 00:36:13

Definitely.

Mark Taylor 00:36:14

So this has been absolutely wonderful conversation.

Mark Taylor 00:36:17

I love the mixture of the real world with the education because it's what we're all about here.

Mark Taylor 00:36:22

It's that sense of we're here to learn, we're here to kind of give people the skills they need, but also the understanding they need.

Mark Taylor 00:36:28

And I think also to have these conversations that people listening can go, ah, I've been, I've been looking for something, I've been thinking of something.

Mark Taylor 00:36:36

I wanted to mix it up in some way or another.

Mark Taylor 00:36:38

Whether like say it's a principal who can bring it straight into a school, whether it's a teacher who can take it to a principal and sort of say, look, this is out here and whatever.

Mark Taylor 00:36:45

So what's the best thing for people to do?

Mark Taylor 00:36:48

If that's indeed what they're thinking, where should they go?

Mark Taylor 00:36:51

Where should they try and find out more?

John Foster 00:36:54

You just need to go to middleschool mba.com and everything you need is there.

John Foster 00:37:00

Sample lessons, curriculum outline.

John Foster 00:37:04

You can, there's a, there's a link.

John Foster 00:37:05

You can just click and send me an email if you like, whatever you like.

John Foster 00:37:09

Everything is there.

John Foster 00:37:10

It's, it's, it's just really easy if you, if you don't, if you don't want to talk to me, you know, you can, you can sign up right there online and get your credentials and everything is just so it's super easy to on board and everything you need is right there@middleschool mba.com Fantastic.

Mark Taylor 00:37:28

John, thank you so much for chatting.

Mark Taylor 00:37:29

I, I love hearing the story and the people behind the websites and the systems and things that people create because it just gives that personal element.

Mark Taylor 00:37:37

And I think that's been brilliant and come across so well today.

Mark Taylor 00:37:39

So, yeah, thanks so much indeed.

John Foster 00:37:41

Oh, thank you, Mark.

John Foster 00:37:42

It's really been a blast.

Mark Taylor 00:37:45

Thanks for listening to the Education on Fire podcast.

Mark Taylor 00:37:48

For more information of each episode and to get in touch, go to educationonfire.com Education is not the filling of a pail, but the lighting of a fire.