#882: How to Teach a 3-Year-Old to Read and Rethinking Education — Tim Coaches Niels Hoven of Mentava

Niels Hoven (0:00)

Optimal, minimal.

Tim Ferriss (0:01)

At this altitude, I can run flat out for a half mile before my hands start shaking. Can I answer your personal question?

Tim Ferriss (0:25)

Niels, nice to see you. Thanks for making the time. Looking forward to this.

Niels Hoven (0:28)

Thanks so much. I appreciate the chance to be here.

Tim Ferriss (0:31)

Absolutely. It was fun for me to take a trip down memory lane in a sense, because I remember exactly where I was when we first had our very initial long conversation about Mentava and I got super amped.

I was in British Columbia walking around a friend's cabin. I remember exactly right next to a river, freezing cold outside, snow on the ground, and digging back into the website, looking at the testimonials, watching some of the videos of kids. I was like, yes, I remember very clearly why I invested so long ago. It feels like ages ago. It was quite a while back, and we will get to the bio. I actually want to use part of this working session to go through the bio as I have it here, intended for me to read because I think the wordsmithing may apply to other places. Including the website, including potentially paid acquisition. But before we get to that, let's hear it from your mouth. What is Mentava? What is the latest draft of your quick explanation of what Mentava is?

Niels Hoven (1:39)

The latest draft is that Mentava is software that is designed to let kids learn as fast as they're capable of learning.

Instead of just at the pace assigned to their age. The first product we have is our early literacy software which is designed for kids preschoolers. This young is generally three to get to a second grade reading level.

Tim Ferriss (1:59)

What is a second grade reading level? Let's just say I'm a first time parent and I have no idea what that means. What is an eager to learn, reasonably smart second grader doing with their reading by the end of second grade?

Niels Hoven (2:10)

Our finish line is basically able to read easy reader books on your own. So think Green Eggs and Ham, Hop on Pop, The Elephant and Piggy series.

Tim Ferriss (2:18)

I'm still reading those.

Niels Hoven (2:19)

The conscious competence level of being able to read.

Tim Ferriss (2:23)

Okay, got it. And what are some stories?

And I recognize these are not RCTs, right? So for the people out there who are going to try to needle everything, a lot of these are anecdotal, of course. But you also have data in terms of performance on the app, right? It's not just a subjective measurement. But could you just give some stories related to kids learning to read faster than one might expect?

Niels Hoven (2:50)

We had a set of two-year-old twins who were reading Hoppin Pop, Green Eggs and Ham, these early reader books before their third birthday.

Tim Ferriss (2:58)

That's the video that I saw where they're standing.

Niels Hoven (3:01)

Oh yeah, you just retweeted that video.

Tim Ferriss (3:03)

Yeah, the parents were projecting the game onto some large screen. The two twins were basically just playing and competing with each other to read while they were so excited to be doing it.

Niels Hoven (3:16)

It is really adorable. It's funny, there's so much fear around, but if I give my kid these academic opportunities when they're so young, are they going to stress out? Are they going to freak out? But no, it's actually fun. Kids are these little sponges. They want to learn everything.

Tim Ferriss (3:30)

Why don't you tell one or two more stories and then I want to hear how Mentava came to be, but not the Iliad version like the abbreviated version. But maybe you can give a few more examples, because people might say, well, okay, fine, you got the Wonder Twins, but we need more than the Wonder Twins. What else have you seen?

Niels Hoven (3:49)

We had a three-year-old who learned to read in about three months. We had a kindergartner who was behind, and his mom asked us, can we use this software to help him catch up?

She came back to me a little later and said, yeah, he's reading now. The teacher says she's never seen a kid catch up so fast. The teacher didn't actually say this, but I could read between the lines. I could tell that the teacher really wants to say, but her kid was just a terrible reader. The teacher didn't say that. The parent was like, but I could read between the lines. I knew what she wanted to say. And the teacher said she'd never seen anyone catch up that fast. And the thing that actually really stuck with me from that one was the mom was saying the kid used to come to her and tell her, hey mom, there's this kid in my class who's so smart. He's able to read and do all these things. And then she said he came back to me the other day and said, mom, I can read like he can read now.