March 8, 2025 • 57 mins
Dr. Pratt, a social media strategist and homeschooler, discusses his journey and insights on parenting and education. He shares his early reading skills, influenced by his mother's homeschooling and his father's street smarts. Dr. Pratt recounts his experiences with standardized testing, his mother's creation of a homeschooling curriculum, and his father's influence. He emphasizes the importance of community support for parents of hyperactive children and the power of positive feedback. Dr. Pratt also highlights his career, including his work at the Port Authority, his honorary PhD in philosophy of pop culture, and his contributions to Black Twitter and social media.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
TD Flenaugh (00:02):
Welcome now. Do you have young kids? Have you
thought about homeschoolingthem? Are you teaching them at
home? What are you teaching themat home? We're going to get into
this very important topic withour guest today, Doctor Pratt.
You don't want to everybody. Youdon't want to miss this because
he has insights. Okay. Hi, thankyou so much for joining the
(00:29):
falling for learning podcast. Iam TD linaugh. We have this
podcast to help parents andcaregivers with having the
resources, strategies and toolsneeded to make sure that their
children are on track forlearning and to stay on track
for success.
(00:52):
Okay, here we are. We are readyto begin. This is Dr Pratt. He
is a social media strategistextraordinaire, and he actually
happens to do some Homeschoolingwith his daughter. And we're
going to hear about all hisinsights. We're going to give
you information about how youcould work with him. Doctor,
(01:13):
proud, welcome. Thank
Unknown (01:16):
you. Thank you for having me. I do want to
hopefully let the audience knowthat I want to learn as much as
as they learn. So love to havefeedback after the the watch to
in the comment section to let meknow that I'm not the only
person on the planet dealingwith a hype rack to toddler, and
(01:37):
I think that's one of thebiggest issues, is that we're
parenting kind of in thisconcept that it's just us, like,
really only one everybody else'skid seems totally cool, and
they're learning at the rightrate, and they're meeting all
their metrics, and just our kidthat is complete, a complete
fool, like it's just ours, it'snot the rest of the world. So I
(02:00):
just don't believe that. I don'tbelieve it, but I think as a
community of parents who havehyperactive children, we're
we're doing a bad job ofsupporting each other and
letting each other know it'sokay, you're not alone.
TD Flenaugh (02:19):
Okay? So this is some some good insight. So he,
you know, is wanting somefeedback, please, some put some
comments in the chat, like, letus know if you're having some of
the same issues. Now we, I knowDoctor Pratt, because he is part
of a community that I and he'shis own community even. But
again, like I said, he does alot of social media work, and he
(02:43):
helps me with some of my work,of course. And we wanted to
always find out from our guestwhat made them fall in love with
learning. So tell us about youryourself. Oh,
Unknown (02:58):
wow, I wasn't expecting that as a good question. My
mother was a strong believer inhomeschooling in the 70s, so and
also was raised in a religioushousehold, so I'd learned to
read a Bible at an early age,and I learned early on that I
(03:20):
could get admiration oracknowledgement or even praise
if I read with emphasis, if Iread with a tone and or
aliveness. Am I reading theBible? People would clap and I
would Oh, so as I don't knowwhy, but as a child, that made
(03:43):
me smirk and smile. So I readthe Scriptures with you know,
different voices at four orfive. So back to your question,
though, what I guess made mefall in love with learning was
the power that I could have toinfluence adults by them
(04:07):
discovering that, oh, Martinknows how to read, and not just
that he can read the big words,and not just that I had this is,
this is going back to the I wasborn in the 70s. So there was a
a famous kid in the 70s had a TVshow and he looked like me with
chocolate like me and a big, bigcheeks like me. So people
(04:27):
thought I was him. Sometimes Ihad a big afro, as you imagined.
Okay,
TD Flenaugh (04:32):
71 Wait a minute.
So tell me who this child actoris, that they was Rodney l
Unknown (04:37):
Ripley or something rotten. I can't remember his
name. He had the, I have to dothe research, because I didn't.
The big, closest thing I can sayto him is like he looked like
Gary Coleman. He was the 70sversion of this
TD Flenaugh (04:52):
early celebrity.
Okay, so you were doing it,right? So back in the, you know,
we know people use that for thegram now, right? You were, you
were exactly. It is that you'redoing it for that audience,
getting that little lift up
Unknown (05:03):
for you in the real world, in front of the
librarian. So I would always goto the library books, and they
would be, oh, you can't take outMoby Dick or whatever book I
want. It was like a Christie orsomething. I was some adult
book, right? You can't take thatout. I'm saying, Can I read? If
I can read for you, can I takeit out? It's Oh sure,
TD Flenaugh (05:23):
negotiation, okay.
Unknown (05:25):
And I read, he like, and I just didn't read, you
know? I read she was worried,chocolate with big cheeks, big
afro, and just, you know, so, soit's very much for me when I saw
Hollywood, understand thatlittle chocolate, black boy on
these shows, back then, it wasthe TV shows, comedy shows. I
(05:49):
was living that life, in reallife, in getting things I wanted
because I could, I couldn't justit wasn't because I was a
problem child or acting outchild. I was actually doing with
society. I was exceeding thelevel of expectation society had
for me. Because again, this isthe 70s, after the riots. Burned
(06:10):
out hood in Newark, New Jersey,you know the empty apartment
buildings. And I would go toplaces that were learning
institutions, or learningplaces, or courthouse or
whatever, and they would besurprised that this child, who
the community looked like thenews would say, you know, it was
(06:31):
just we were dilapidated. Wewere we were depleted. We had
lived in the
TD Flenaugh (06:35):
60s. So you keep Oh, so this okay. So tell us
about like you said, theneighborhoods were burned in
the,
Unknown (06:42):
yeah, the Newark, New Jersey, back then. This was
after the riots, which the riotsof, I think it's 69 or six. So I
was born in 71 so I when I cameto the planet, it was hell,
hell. It just happened. So, so Igrew up thinking that abandoned
apartment buildings andmattresses outside and broken
(07:06):
glass was normal. That's what Ithought. So when I went into
those institutions that werethere to serve the community,
they were shocked that we couldbe educated. So that's when I
fell in love with learning,because I realized I could go
further in my child mind, that Icould normally if I showed up as
(07:28):
a learned student or a learned,learned person. And that that
power I at some point later onin my life, but not now. I
relish that power. At somepoint, I discovered that it was
all power and good power. Butfor, I would say, 10 years of my
(07:48):
life, I realized I could getanything I wanted on the planet
by being educated.
TD Flenaugh (07:56):
Wow, this is such a different answer.
Unknown (08:01):
You didn't expect to meet loose the the black Lex
Luthor,
TD Flenaugh (08:09):
this is a spin on this, you know, like most people
talk about, you know, a parentreally getting them into it,
yeah, like that was amazingthinking about where they can
get you the power, like you'redefying odds, or, you know,
what's expected of you. Saythat, again, defining odds,
defying odds, yeah, no, yeah. Imean, that's like, that's,
(08:31):
that's a great idea, like,right? Because sometimes, you
know, kids don't get that fromlearning. And I talk a lot, and,
then, you know, I talk about inmy book too, like, we really
have to be careful about themessages we send to kids,
because sometimes we're sendingthe message that reading,
writing, things like that areboring, are a punishment, and
(08:52):
you were learning how to getpower from it. Now you did tell
us that you learn how to youwere reading at four and five.
Like, now, how is that possible?
Are you just a genius? Or whatdo you remember about that
process, about learning to read?
Unknown (09:05):
You know, I never questioned it. I grew up with
two parents who read, you know,who are readers? We had a
library in the house. Ourapartment. First apartment we
had was, it was a apartment. Butback then, our apartment was, I
would say it was, it was twobedroom. Well, no, it was
(09:26):
probably like a three bedroom,but we had two other room, the
father's office, and so it waslike a four bedroom with two
bathrooms, okay? And it was in ahouse in New Jersey, so it
wasn't the square apartment. Itwas like a house, second floor
of a house. So we had extrarooms, a living room, a dining
room, you know, we have a space,and in those spaces my parents,
one of the biggest thingsbesides plants, was books. Okay?
(09:48):
We had subscription toeverything, you know, life time,
Ebony, essence, jet. So Iinformation was. Was available
to me, in a way. And like everySaturday night, my father would
take me to the to to a newspaperstore. Back then they had
(10:10):
stores, yeah, that was allmagazines and newspapers. So he
would get the New Jersey starledger Saturday night, okay, so
he could have access to theSunday News. Mm, Saturday night.
So you know, in thisconversation, you're asking
questions. I'm thinking thinkingabout things that I haven't
really thought about for awhile. And I'm realizing
(10:32):
patterns my desire to haveaccess to information started,
you know, was I was inheritedbecause I was around two people
who didn't have college degreesbut had a higher level of
success because they understoodhow to read the tea leaves, so
to speak. So my dad had New YorkTimes Wall Street Journal and
(10:56):
the Sunday star Ledger in NewJersey, and he didn't get the
times. He only got times onSunday, he brought both
together. He bought the New YorkTimes and star ledger Saturday
night, it was available to youand the the Wall Street Journal
he borrowed from a local officethat would throw you out every
night. He would literally go tothe garbage and get the Wall
(11:19):
Street Journal every night to beable to read what happened on
the wall on the street the day.
So he was getting old, he wasthere Right. And then when he
got financially secure, he gotwe Wall Street Journal was a
regular thing. So actually, mynickname in high school is the
Wall Street Journal. Oh my
TD Flenaugh (11:36):
goodness. So that's, yeah, interesting. Like,
I
Unknown (11:38):
was a nerd. I was a complete nerd that that was
blessed to have older friendswho protected me, okay, but, but
getting to your question, Idon't remember why I learned to
read, other than the biggestdesire I had was to keep getting
(11:59):
the accolades so I keptperfecting my learning.
Wonderful.
TD Flenaugh (12:04):
So this is also something I talk about, is like
having that positive feedback,because sometimes we give kids a
lot of negative feedback, like,you know, like, you did this,
yes, that wrong, but we givethat positive feedback like,
that is something that's reallygreat. Great. I don't know. I
hear an echo. I don't know ifyou hear echo, but I do.
Unknown (12:26):
No, I don't. I just I you're lower. Now, now,
unfortunately, all of a sudden,my neighbors are outside my
window.
TD Flenaugh (12:33):
I can't hear anybody. I just hear that
there's kind of an echo. Sosorry about that with the sound.
So one thing that stood out tome is you also were saying that
your parents didn't have collegeeducation. And, you know,
sometimes people areintimidated, like they're like,
I don't know about that muchabout reading. I don't know
(12:54):
about reading or whatever, but,you know, just having your kid
around reading and talking aboutwhat they're doing. And some of
it's kids books, but some of itis, like, adult stuff, because
kids are interested in stuff.
And a lot of times we're like,mind your business, or you don't
have to worry about that. Thekids are very interested. And we
need to, you know, feed thatembrace in ways. Yeah, embrace
(13:15):
the curiosity. So can you tellus a little bit about your
educational journey. You knowthroughout your life,
Unknown (13:25):
yeah, so two quick stories, or maybe three. In New
Jersey, they tested you. So Iwas homeschooled. My My mother
really believed inhomeschooling. She did not
believe in the education system.
She was an ex Black Panther, soshe really was, like, not about
(13:48):
this life of giving. I want tomake sure my mic. I just
realized, maybe you're here toecho, because my mic is so far
down. I just realized. So but mymother really believed in
educating the community from thecommunity, not allowing the
school system to educate you. Ihowever, you know, wanting the
(14:12):
accolades, need to go to school,so we battle like battle. When I
say battle like a lot of this isreminding my three year old now
we battled in a sense of Iwanted to go to school, and I
would find reasons, legalreasons that like neglect. I
(14:32):
accuse my mother love educationat at five, I said, the state of
New Jersey says, If this childis not go to school at school
age, you are committingeducation to Google that you
know what she did, found that inthe reading yes in the library
back then. Think about thelibrary was Google back then. So
(14:54):
the librarians, they knew theanswer to everything. See. You
TD Flenaugh (15:00):
ask the library to tell us why you should go to
school, or how did that comeabout? That's crazy. Like, no,
Unknown (15:06):
let's see what I learned about adults. Here's the
thing I learned about adults,especially in the 70s, if a
black child, and I say thisbecause I don't even around
black people, so I don't knowabout Spanish, I don't know
about Italians white, but if ablack child went up to an older
black person and said, Excuseme, sir. It respects like, oh,
nice little respectful, sir.
Okay, yes. What can I do for youlittle child? And I would say,
(15:28):
is it okay if my parents keep mehome from school and don't let
me go? Oh, no, no, it's not,that's not okay. And I was, can
you please tell me the law thattells me that's not okay? That's
a good question, Johnny, or, youknow, Martin, and they would
give me the status the statute.
(15:52):
So guess my mother did. That'sthe type of Mother I had. My
mother. My mother was, she wasan excellent mother. Human being
was another question, butexcellent mother, right? I mean,
excellent provider. We'll say,okay, so she did. She's super
petty. So she said, Okay, I willwrite to the to all, to the
(16:16):
capital, the state capital ofNew Jersey. I figured it's
Trenton. I think it's written.
I'm used to New York, so it'sAlbany in New York. But anyway,
she wrote the state capitol toassembly, the assembly, our
local assembly person that soit's like we had the Senate and
Assembly. Somebody's like theHouse of Representative from New
Jersey, and he was a black guy,and she wrote to his office and
says, Can I get a deferment toteach my child at home? They
(16:38):
said, yes, if you give us yourcurriculum. So she never had
been to college. Created aneducational curriculum that
became the standard for NewJersey for homeschooling.
TD Flenaugh (16:56):
Heritage, this genius, okay,
Unknown (17:01):
I then got my father on my side, because my father grew
up in the streets. He was hethey got married after he got
out of juvenile they call itjuvenile hall and stuff like
that, dude without detention.
But he felt that thesocialization he didn't want me
to be a wimp. They didn't saynerd back then. They said wimp.
(17:25):
And he was like, you know, nochild of his is going to not be
street smart. And the only way Iwas going to get street smart
because of their lifestylewasn't going to be because I
hung around them. I had to getin the hood and be of the hood,
to know how to you know, to knowhow to survive as a black male,
TD Flenaugh (17:45):
okay, hold that thought, we gotta go to
commercial. Okay, hold thatthought. We're gonna hear more
about how you got street smartafter these and messages, okay,
the rewrite method and therewrite method workbook are your
go to resource for helping kidsto learn to fall in love with
(18:12):
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(18:41):
Okay, I'm back with DoctorPratt, just telling us how he
got his dad on his side becausehis mom was homeschooling him.
And he was young, but he wasvery knowledgeable, and he was
trying to so how did you getwhat was the street like? Let us
know what happens now.
Unknown (19:01):
So again, just to recap, in case you just joined
so I shared our live out to twodifferent communities. And in
case anybody's just come in, Ieventually got skipped in
school. So they would test youin New Jersey before you got
into school, and they wouldplace you in the right grade,
okay if you were in thedistrict. So in my district, you
(19:22):
were standardized tested at fiveand six years old to get placed
into the right school, rightright classroom. And I got
placed into gifted talent giftin the town. So they called it
back then, and so I had a highstandardized test. I always
could take tests. I didn't evenknow what a test was, but I knew
that I knew the answers andstuff, and because I could read,
(19:47):
you could guess the right answerback in the 70s based on the
tone of the question. So youknow, you think if Johnny would
want apples, okay, one apple?
Apples. He has five. If Susiedoesn't want apples, how many is
he going to have five becauseSusie don't want them? You know,
it's like and I would, I would,I would, actually, this is my
(20:09):
thing. Not now, not not do, Idon't do this. Y'all now, but
back then, I over wrote things,meaning that I gave answers
above and beyond what wasrequired. Okay? So that would
give the person a snapshot intomy thinking. Mm, hmm. And that
did two things that got them onmy side and that impressed them.
(20:31):
So I would always in pencilright in a little bit more. Cuz,
remember, I'm homeschooled. Ihad the whole chalk at three. I
had to learn how to write on ablackboard. We had a black let
me tell you how my mother did.
She put that damn Blackboard onmy on my door. I had a when you
(20:54):
open my my bedroom door, therewas a blackboard that would so
like, is, this is, you know, somy, my perception of my
childhood before I got before Igot my 406 was I was in prison
in an educational institutioncalled home. Definitely
(21:17):
remember. My father went tojuvenile detention. He was he
grew up on a street calledPrince Street in in New Jersey
in Newark. Prince, Prince. Sowhen you look at the gangsters,
the gangsters of New Jersey, theBlack Mafia family that we had a
black mafia family in the 70s,all the gangsters came from his
(21:39):
block.
TD Flenaugh (21:39):
I watched that show. BMF,
Unknown (21:43):
well, that that's a different BMF, that's the that's
the 90s. Yeah, original. BMF, ogBMF was from Newark New Jersey,
because New Jersey also wherethe sopranos came. The Sopranos
were based on a family calledthe imperiality family. So the
Tony Soprano was, is actually areal person, and that person
lived in Newark, New Jersey, ona different side of town. So we
(22:03):
had the black sopranos, and wehad the and my father's one of
those, you know, one of theStreet guys for the black crime
families. And so he was notabout letting his child, you
know, not, not get indoctrinatedinto the world, and it reminded
(22:24):
my my institution, my my motherteaching the album school
reminded of how he wasinstitutionalized. I see, I see.
And so he was not, you know,happy about that, but check this
out. My dad loved my mother somuch because she taught him how
to read. So it was a very uniquechildhood to say to me,
TD Flenaugh (22:47):
do it make them feel indebted to someone?
Unknown (22:50):
Yep, wow, yep. He respected and my dad started
flipping real estate. He taughther how to flip real estate. So,
so what? They were a goodcouple. I didn't like that they
were a good couple because Icouldn't, I couldn't really play
TD Flenaugh (23:04):
them against each other in between them. Yeah,
yeah. And
Unknown (23:07):
so I same thing my daughter now, as a three year
old, she tries to play this andlike she bounces from you on the
other and what she my daughter'snot home right now. My wife and
my daughter are in at the bayou,but I'm in Louisiana. They're in
a different town totally, butit's really close to the water,
and her uncle just called me andsaid he's acting worse than she
(23:28):
is. And she keeps running backto my her mother because she's,
she's a she's a toddler, and shelikes to try to play you. She's
very smart three year old, uh,she thinks she get away with
murder, and he's acting like atwo year old to her, she keeps
going, No, I can't deal withthis. He's crazy. He's like, I
like, Listen, do what you gottado, you know? So we gotta keep
(23:49):
this kid in line. Because she's,he's out of control when it
comes to her thought process.
I'm seeing myself and her tosome degree, but even worse,
like it's scary, because it's Iwould never give
TD Flenaugh (24:01):
us, give us a situation. Like, let's hear it.
She goes
Unknown (24:06):
into the refrigerator because she's, she's 61 pounds
and she is 50 inches tall, soshe's three. She's like a mini,
a mini athlete, like a miniversion Amazon. And so she her,
her arm strength is incredible.
She can push a weight of 225,pounds, so and see. And the
thing is that she, she doesn't,she throws around her weight.
(24:30):
But you know how somebody knowsthey can do X, Y and Z, they
don't even, they don't eventhink, like, that's not even
question. So the other day, shewe have an ottoman, and she
wanted the Ottoman across thewhat? She just started pushing
and moving the Ottoman likethat. Not, not Oh, you know,
she's never done it before. Shejust like, Oh, I'm pushing to
move it. You're like, what the,you know? And then she gets,
stops it, and then jumps on topof the Ottoman, anyway, um, she
(24:52):
grabs my wife's phone. My wifephone has the Roku, uh. Remote
Control on it. Okay, so we tookit off of the device that she
has so she can stop messing upthe TV. She grabs my wife's
phone, and we hid the we hit theapp, okay, so it's not, it's not
on that homepage. And so shegrabbed my wife's finger like
(25:15):
this. So he's like, she's like,she's like, What are you doing?
What do you what's wrong? What'sgoing on? You got, you have your
device, you know, you can see,you can see YouTube kids and
whatever. She love. She bingewatches Sesame Street in japan,
Japanese or whatever. And she'svery much like an anime kid to
some degree, like at three. Shesays, you know, loves other
(25:35):
languages, loves watching thosevideos with a cap the bottle and
a cap meet, and they make theclicking sound, so it's almost
ASMR, but also the same time iscolors, and it's just so so
anyway, she tries to manipulateus. My point was that she tries
to manipulate and I'm seeingmyself in small dosages of what
(25:57):
happened later on in my life,through that now she my mother
was, I told his type of Mother Ihad her great, her, her
grandfather, her mother's fatherwas, is like my he's still
alive. Was, was like she he islike my mother. So she has two
DNA sets of these strong minded,educationally focused
(26:23):
grandparents, energy in her.
Okay, so it's difficult to notchallenge her. You can't just
say no. Her name is Zora, no.
Zora, I actually have this oh sogood example. Even better, three
days, I have two, not twofingers up, three days, twice a
day, she stopped breathing whenshe was three months old. Three
(26:50):
Three days old. I'm sorry. Andthe reason why she stopped
breathing was because thedoctors would just come by and
touch her. They would juststart, you know, examining her.
So they call me frantic, sayingshe stopped breathing for like,
10 seconds or five seconds, andshe's like, and she's like, we
think she's holding her breath.
(27:12):
So I said she has thesegrandparents that were stubborn
and stern, and they don't, theydidn't take any mess. So you
need to identify yourself as towho you are and what you're
going to do. And it should beokay. You're like, what they
call me back. Yo, it works.
Yeah, I know. So we had awebsite up. We took the site
(27:38):
down, but it was called for Zorabecause she stayed in the
hospital 80 days, and she shewas born not breathing again for
11 minutes. So the nurses tookturns and did the breath of the
blowing in the breath andpumping our heart until they got
(27:59):
adrenaline. Once they gave heradrenaline, she took off. Now
then she was in a tube for, Ithink, two days to make sure
that her brain swelling when,you know, whatever. So they she
had, at one point in her life,she had 16 doctors that was in
charge of her. So at the end ofthat time period, at six months
old, they were like, you know,she's going to be deficient.
(28:21):
Learning Disabilities. Is goingto be all these problems. She
had no problem, no visionproblem, no lung problem, no
brain problem. In fact, the lastdoctor's appointment we had with
the Children's Hospital, the theneurologist was showing me her
scans and was talking to me.
Zora is six months old. She'ssitting on my lap, just me and
(28:43):
Zora in the doctor's office, andshe's looking at me like, does
this? Does this be know that I'mhere? So the doctor figured that
out she was a foreign person.
And she said, Is she looking atyou with a disdain on her face?
I say, yes, you're notaddressing her. She said, oh,
oh, my God. You know, you knowforeign people, people who are
not an American. They're alittle bit like, whoa, black
(29:05):
kid, Hex technology stuff,right? So she's like, Okay,
fine. It's Dora, you and so, soZora goes at six months. She's
her. She's right, I know. She'slike, so anyway, the doctor's
saying, I don't see anythingwrong with her brain. And she's
like, this is the example why Ibelieve she's fine. So that's
Zora, and I'm living in thisconversation. I'm reliving my
(29:30):
life, and like you said, myeducational journey, yeah, and
how I have to, I literally, Icannot drive by a parent this
child, there's no, there's nomoment that I can't teach her
something. It's unfortunate. Iwish I could. I cannot, not take
a break in and then at the sametime, challenge, did you get it?
(29:55):
Did you get she's like, youknow, she'll, she'll come by
and. And she'll tap my hand, andI'm like, What? What did I do
wrong? And she'll smirk at me. Isaid, Oh, I didn't say, I love
you. And she'll, you know,whatever. And then she'll walk
away. And then I have to, I haveto leapfrog. I what I try to do
with my child is I try to getahead of her. And I'll say, but
(30:17):
make sure you go do that to yourmother too, because your mother
loves you too. And so she's, Oh,right. She does my mother, okay?
And she runs to her mother. Andso every time I end I engage
with her, I'm ahead of her. Ihave to, if I, if I allow her to
lead the energy that day in thehouse, it's a wrap. I can have a
(30:39):
appointment set with TD, and shewill have a tantrum for
something else because shewasn't engaged enough early in
the day. Okay,
TD Flenaugh (30:53):
yeah, you gotta be smarter than your kids. You
gotta be smarter at
Unknown (30:57):
three like this, and I'm watching Tiktok, and I'm
watching Instagram, and I knowI'm not the only parent, with
this, because it's there's a lotof different accounts that talk
about these three year olds orfour year olds or five year
olds. Do not give a about youryes, they're different. I call
them the returning generation.
We have had examples. There wasa three year old three years
(31:20):
ago, if you just Google, threeyear old, who sold lemonade,
three year old lemonade NorthCarolina and diapers. This girl
created a lemonade stand tosell, and she donated all the
money she created to thehomeless shelter to make sure
that babies had diapers. Andwhen you see the picture, she
(31:43):
has her Mary Jane shoes on,she's barely can carry this box
of diapers, and she looks likeshe's walking across the bridge
in Selma. Okay, this littlethree year old looks like she is
not. She won her local citycivic Person of the Year Award.
She was dedicated. We have a sixyear old in Georgia two years
ago, so she's now eight thatbecame the youngest certified
(32:06):
farmer in the state of Georgia,because she was trained by her
great grandmother at three tofarm. And I have two or three
more examples of this. It's aphenomenal
TD Flenaugh (32:18):
turning so they're, like, they're, we're raising
Unknown (32:22):
a I'm raising my great, great grandmother. That's what I
believe. Ooh, this is the 1940sgeneration in these little gen
ed kids. They here for yourfeelings. They're here to learn,
get impacted and move on. Theygot other stuff. That's how my
daughter, like, I'm like, youwake up. She wakes up. Like,
Okay, where is the lesson from?
What's the lady? Miss Rachel.
(32:47):
Where's Miss Rachel? At, I'mlike, you just woke up. She
don't want milk. She don't wantthe hug. Miss Rachel. Okay. And
then then she relaxes and goes,Okay, hi. How you doing? But
Miss Rachel's in the background,teaching it up. She is and you
are not. You don't have a break.
Like my wife doesn't get it. Iactually have a schedule for my
(33:12):
daughter. I have a schedule Iknow I can tell you exactly what
she's going to do every hourthat she's up. I heard that
when, when we follow theschedule, I don't have a
problem, but let that scheduleget messed up, that child goes
and it is crazy in the house,and it's only for three of us.
(33:33):
Okay, yeah, it's a lot. It's notand I see other parents who are
exhausted and who are, like, Yo,these kids? I'm like, yeah,
yeah. And people say they havefour I'm like, crazy.
TD Flenaugh (33:46):
So can you tell me?
Tell me what happened to youreducation, going back to your
education, yes, age, where yougot into public school. You got
out of the prison? No, I got
Unknown (33:57):
out of homeschooling in the prison. At my mother, my
idea of homeschooling was a wasa prison. But when I got to
school, I could read, I couldwrite. I knew my ABCs. Actually
knew how to add the additiontable. So back then, it was
really simple, not like today,it was really simple. You learn
to read, you learn to write, youlearn I didn't learn cursive. I
(34:21):
learned my addition tables andmy multiplication tables. Okay,
well, because I could read andwrite together, meaning I just
didn't reach I didn't just knowA, B, C. I actually knew words.
I knew how to put the wordtogether. So I was way ahead. I
was considered super advancedfor my age group. I was in my
(34:43):
third grade level reading as afirst grader. Okay, um, what?
What happened was, this is afunny story, and I haven't told
her on the internet yet. So youexclusively got my funny story.
I told it, but not, not to youknow, this will be it forever.
On internet, I watched roots. Iwas a generation that watched
(35:04):
roots. I went to my first gradeteacher's classroom, and I told
her, I am not Kuta kente. I amMartin Pratt now my teacher,
Miss sika, was like, What areyou talking about? She told me,
Go, sit down.
TD Flenaugh (35:21):
Wait, did you have a black teacher? No, ma'am.
Unknown (35:24):
And so Miss Seko is Italian. I grew up in orange New
Jersey. It was very Italianplace. And my block was
integrated, but the orange atthat time was more, you know,
Italian than
TD Flenaugh (35:35):
it was. Go, sit down. And then what? Yes, and
Unknown (35:39):
I refuse to sit down, because I was like this, okay,
so because I read, I was reallyimpacted by stories to the
extent where I refuse to watchdifferent movies. Because even
though I was young, I wanted towatch this movie, but I knew I
was going to have to deal withthe emotions of it, and I didn't
know, I didn't know how toprocess and shake off the
emotions, okay, so I would stopmyself from watching movies that
(36:02):
seemed like it had a hit, acliffhanger ending, or it wasn't
a happy ending. I only wanted towatch sappy movies because I
knew what the ending was goingto be. Because I read so many
books, I knew I could tell bythe character development what
was going to happen. So I wouldscare you like a bond James Bond
movie, because, it's like JohnJames not gonna die, it would
freak me out. So I walkedthrough and I told this woman, I
(36:26):
am not killed. To kente, shetold me to sit down. And I said,
Hell. I didn't say, hell no, butI said, Whatever I said. And so
and then she came to what Isaid, Yes. She came towards me,
and I kicked her in the shin.
Goodness, I'm in advanced class.
(36:47):
I'm not with the hood negros. Iwant the nerd black slash
Italian class, Spanish kidsright now, everybody's facing
the class like and I was therelike this. I am Martin Pratt.
I'm not cool to Katie, because Ithought slavery was real. I
(37:08):
thought we were in a slaveenvironment. To this that that
point, the roots really affectedme. So, Mr. Bikino, I remember
all these teachers name becauseit was very impactful situation.
Mr. Bikino wanted to kick me outof the district. The principal,
yes, that was Matthew, but youknow, he wanted to kick me out
of the district, not just out ofthe school. Be like I would have
(37:29):
basically, he was trying to putme in Newark. He was trying to,
like, go. So my mom said, well,because she had her her
curriculum, remember hercurriculum, homeschool.
Curriculum, accepted. Okay. Somy mother knew the boards of
regents. My mother knew thesuperintendent. My mother knew
all the people she had to gothrough.
TD Flenaugh (37:47):
Connected. Okay, what happened? So
Unknown (37:50):
when that happened, she said he watched fruits, and
they're like they also they knowthat at that point, society was
not like it is today. Whitepeople did not know black stuff.
You know all that we did, a lotof problems with giving them
access to our content. I'm justtelling y'all so they didn't
know about roots. Roots was onnational television, and white
people never watched roots. Inthe 70s, we were the only ones
(38:12):
interested, because it was blackcontent. You didn't see black
faces all night for four nightsor five nights. That was, that
was incredible. So every blackperson was glued to TV. Every
white person's like, hey,baseball, Hey, John, what's
going on? But they didn't care.
They didn't know. Oh, mistermaquino said, What's roots? And
she explained to him. She said,he's like, Oh, my God. He
watched that. He says it's on ateight o'clock at night on
(38:35):
national television. Yes, hewatched it. This is his history.
Yeah. So he's like, Oh. He said,Well, he Okay. Well, he
suspended my mother. Was like,for what? He said, We're kicking
his teacher. He said, why? Whatdo you mean? He said, she told
him, go sit down. No. He said,I'm not cool to kente. She
didn't engage with him. Shedidn't ask, who's the Kente, and
(38:58):
why are you not going to begintoday? So miss the Pina was
like, I'm in the chair, I'm inthe I'm in the office while it's
happening. So my mother'smanipulating him. And he's like,
Well, what are you suggesting?
He said, If he wasn't a blackteacher, she would know. And so
he's like, Oh, yes, give him theblacks to give know what his
punishment is. Put him in theblack class. You know what the
(39:20):
black class was? Missus Francis.
You know what Miss Francis did?
She invited us every summer toour house. You know Miss Francis
did? She taught us all blackhistory. You know what Francis
did? She really educated me.
Missus Francis was one of thebest teachers in that damn
school. So my mother was nothappy that I was in missika
class to begin with. I didn'tknow that at the time, so this
(39:41):
all worked itself out. But thatwas my that was my first seeing
how my content consumption ofoutside you know, education
affected my education. So Ilearned. An important lesson. I
love Battlestar Galactica. Ilove Star Trek. I never, ever
(40:02):
took those stories of school,never because, because that one
experience with teaching, takingroots to school totally, you
know, messed up. So I learned toleave outside content. I had a
hard time in high school becausethe stuff that was happening in
society, crack and all the USand hip hop and rap and
(40:23):
everything, I grew up in EastOrange, in high school and
middle school, and I went toschool with Dana Owens. I went
to school with Queen Latifah. Soa lot of the stuff that happened
in run, DMC, and all the hip hopstuff, I was at the beginning
stages of that stuff, and Icouldn't bridge the gap, because
I had such a bad situation backin the day that to say I did
(40:44):
wear Adidas, I did watch out toto tone the what do we call
them? Double fat laces. I had,you know, we did a lot of stuff.
We I don't know if you rememberthe probably too young to
remember devils jeans. There wasjeans before Lee. Lee had color
jeans for hip hop. These jeansare Devil's jeans. And I begged
my mother, my father to give mea one pair. It was a devil. It
(41:06):
was a hip hop devil like this onthe back of the jean. So you
were really cool. We need morethe devil. But thank
TD Flenaugh (41:14):
you. Anyway, I don't know anything about it.
Unknown (41:18):
Yes. So hip hop growing up through the hip hop
generation, another funny story,real quick about education. I
went to a a technical VocationalHigh School, okay, but how I got
into technology was because thathigh school was the best high
school in the east, thenortheast of New Jersey, okay,
(41:41):
because they had a computerteacher named Mr. Bishnu who
taught us programming on IBM, x,t and at computers. So I learned
cobalt and Fortran High School.
TD Flenaugh (41:53):
But no one Fortran.
Unknown (41:56):
So those are, like, unique, all the stuff that Elon
Musk is shutting down now he'sgonna, the government's gonna be
really effed up, because a lotof those programmers, they are
old language programmers thatyou can't find today. So the new
programs today, they're gonnahave to learn this old language,
and they're gonna become really,it's gonna become hard to get
(42:17):
some of those, those, if he andI think it's gonna be stopped.
But my point is that thislanguage that we deal with today
is based on Unix and based oncobalt Fortran. I learned that
at 14, but I went to avocational high school, not a
cool High School where Dana,when Latifah went to, or even
Whitney, Whitney. What'sWhitney? Whitney? Singer, Kenny.
(42:41):
Your last name? Well, yeah,Whitney Houston. So Whitney
Houston was lived in the EastOrange, uh, she went to high
East Orange high school. I wentto this Newark high school
called vocational Essex Countyvocational technical career
center. And it was like, There'sonly 400 kids in high school. It
wasn't a cool High School. Weactually got, I didn't get beat
up, but the high school gotjumped on a daily basis. Like
(43:04):
the Newark high school wouldcome by and beat up the nerd
kids, so to speak.
TD Flenaugh (43:09):
Okay, so how did this affect, like, your like
going to college or after highschool? How did that affect?
Unknown (43:16):
So, because I went to a vocational high school, I got to
work at sophomore my sophomoreyear, I decided I didn't want to
go to college. I worked for thetop company in New Jersey called
Port Authority of New York, NewJersey, and I worked at World
Trade Center. I worked at NewarkAirport, JFK, Teterboro, La
Guardia. I was the firsttechnology person for a unit
(43:42):
called financial services. Theywere the they were in charge of
the gate all the fees that thePort Authority collects from all
these companies that do businesswith them. That unit was there
for reporting to the board aboutwhat today's money came in. Okay
and they were still doing thingsby hand. So what I learned in
(44:05):
high school with the IBM x t,when the IBM at the first, the
first computer where hard drivecame out, I learned how to
program. And it was simple, justinstalling a program, but I
learned to program somethingcalled Super Calc. Super calc
was the presence of the lotus,123, and then Excel super cap,
D, base plus, and a wordprocessing program called Word
(44:29):
star 2000 this was in 1988 oh,that's graduating. It was 1986
so I, I installed these programsfor what was called financial
analysts to use. And they wereall white men who were using
this scientific calculator, theHP calculator. And these, these
(44:53):
books with green paper in it.
There was a there was a printercalled the okie data dot matrix
printer. This is. I had toinstall those things in each of
the units and then teach them,yes, wow. So I had a carver
service and picking up highschool and take me because I had
security clearance to get on atarmac. So the financial service
(45:16):
units for back then, they werein the the traffic control
building. They were behind thegates and all that stuff. So the
guy, the guy, the security guys,it wasn't a, you know, like a
nice car service or anythinglike that. It was a car that had
the word Port Authority in NewJersey on it. And they would,
they would, it was quicker forthem. If I took the bus and came
(45:38):
to the airport, or I not WorldTrade Center, the world trade
you get on the PATH train, butall the airports, they have
service roads to get to, to getto where I had to go to. So it's
quicker if they're picking upfrom school. And took me
straight there, then for me togo take the bus and do that
stuff. So anyway, so that mademe realize I didn't want to go
to college. I was in a a, whatdo you call it? I was in a
(46:03):
advanced class to get intoRutgers and also to get into
there was a two year collegecalled Essex County, Essex
County, Essex County College, soI could gotta, I could have an
associate degree when Igraduated. I have an associate
degree when I graduated at 12thgrade. But then the program was
you graduate at 12 and go rightto Rutgers. So you could go to
(46:26):
Rutgers and get out of Rutgersby two in two years instead of
four years.
TD Flenaugh (46:34):
But you decided not to do that. Yeah,
Unknown (46:36):
I was I was done with school. I wasn't. Hold
TD Flenaugh (46:39):
on. We have to say this, because I am calling you,
Dr Pratt, tell us about how yougot Dr Pratt, right,
Unknown (46:46):
yes. So I have a, I have an honorary PhD. So it's
not a, it's not, I haven'tpeople, some people feel like
you have an earned PhD. Then yougo to a PhD program. What's my
honorary degree in? It's inphilosophy of pop culture. So we
need another show just toexplain why I have that. But
real quick, what I will say is Iwas one of the first people on
(47:06):
Twitter. Not one of I was thefirst person on Twitter with the
word black in their Twittername. So because of that, my
Twitter name was, I love blackwomen, and because of that, I
was invited from a a a blackmedia company to help them cover
celebrity events. And also, atthe same time, my aunt opened
(47:30):
the first black bookstore inWashington, Heights in New York,
and I worked in the bookstorealso, so in 2003 this is before
the Twitter I'm talking about. Iwas running the bookstore, and I
had a radio show called Tech, nocolor radio show. I was the only
technology talk show on FM radioin New York, on WCR. I was on
(47:52):
for 13 years from 2003 2016 wewere the only technology talk
show every Monday night. So thetalk show, the bookstore, and
then being, being one of thefounders of Black Twitter. When
I learned about the honorarydegree program, I was like, I
need that, because I have donepop culture for so from 2003 let
(48:19):
me, let me give my backs are alittle bit too so I started
working on something calledBlack Planet. Before was Black
Planet, it was at the time Iworked on it. It was called New
York online. Black Planet wasthe first black website that
monetized monthly fees foraccess to member profiles. Okay,
(48:40):
so I know the founder that Omar,he was in my neighborhood. We
actually were neighbors. Hestarted in Fort Greene,
Brooklyn, um, I also was the theinternet cafe administrator for
a cafe that Spike Lee owned.
Dana. Dana and her mom wereinvestors, Queen Latifah, Tracy
Chapman and Alice Walker'sdaughter, Rebecca Walker, the
(49:00):
cafe was called cocovar, andthat was in fourth grade in 96
so disappoint.
TD Flenaugh (49:09):
Dr. Pat Lo,
Unknown (49:12):
well, you know, so I feel like you know, I deserve my
my honorary degree, because Ihave been around pop culture and
black pop culture in asignificant, unique way, like I
remember Erica Baidu. I metErica Badu when she was she used
to walk barefoot in Fort Greenein the poetry era when Saul
Williams and Jessica K more.
Jessica K more is a poet thatwas on what's the name God,
(49:35):
what's the in Harlem the I can'tWhy am I blanking on Harlem's,
Harlem's amateur night? WhatApollo, Apollo am tonight? So
when that was when Black poetrywas taken off like this. Erica
Badu was in the ourneighborhood, walking around,
(49:56):
barefoot, okay? Living Single.
Was developed in that sameneighborhood. So one of the
writers, not the person who wasgiven credit for Living Single,
but her co writer who's nevergiven credit, she based the
brownstone their life again,Queen Latifah figures in my life
a lot, not because I, you know,we physically are friends or
(50:20):
anything. But just, we justended up being in the same space
a lot of times. And then I'mthinking of Black Girls Rock. I
met DJ Beverly bond before shesold it to b t so I covered
Black Girls Rock when it wasowned by her, and she held it in
New York Times, The New YorkTimes building, the brand. They
(50:40):
had a brand new building, andshe held it in your in their
theater. And so I wore a t shirtthat says, I love black women
with a black woman's face on a tshirt that was my brand. And so
because all those things kind ofconverge at the same time, okay,
I think it was, I've only had tohonor a degree for a year. So
(51:02):
when I learned about theprogram, I was like, yes, and so
I'll just tell your audience,there's there's levels to
honorary degrees, just just likethere's levels to their
presidential lifetime award.
There's a Presidential Medalthat has Biden's face, Obama's
face, and now Trump's face onit, or Trump's face again. And
those, those Presidential Awardsare just like TEDx talks. So
(51:24):
because you get it doesn't meanthat you know the President
knows you, but it's a brandthat's licensed, and you get an
award. And so somebody wants togive you the Presidential Award,
they have to pay a licensing feeto use that award to give that
to you. The same thing withhonorary degrees. It's some, of
them, the school gives it to youbecause you gave them to the
school. Some of them, you canfind out about a program. You
(51:44):
can take the program and you payyour fee and you get your
degree. Okay, yeah, but you needto, I feel like I everywhere I
am. I tell people, you know, Ihave the H O N, so everybody
knows. It's not a a, we'll callit an earn, unearned PhD. It's
an honorary degree. I mean, Ijust, you know, but I've gone
(52:05):
totally told a lot of differenteducators that are upset that
regular folks can get anhonorary degree, so
TD Flenaugh (52:15):
your resume does not disappoint. Yeah, I would
say, and I agree with no. Letthem know where they can find
you if they want to work withyou, because you know so much
about social media. You very youknow he's a genius. So like
Unknown (52:31):
I do my best, I would say the best place to interact
with me is LinkedIn. And so I'mMartin Pratt, dr, Martin Pratt
on LinkedIn, but other placeshere, on YouTube, I'm asked Dr
Pratt on Tiktok. I'm asked DrPratt on Instagram, on my
initials, which is lmJ Pratt,and Twitter, I'm also lmJ Pratt,
TD Flenaugh (52:56):
Facebook, are you on Facebook? Because it's also
on Facebook. Yeah, it's not onFacebook
Unknown (52:59):
as Dr Martin Pratt, too. Yeah, as Facebook, I don't
really interact a lot, but I'mthere. I check it every day. I
check it every 15 minutes. Soevery platform I check, any
connection I'm proud of. I'mproud to say that on all the
platforms I know, I would say90% of my followers, I actually
(53:20):
know them, like I actually knowtheir story. I know where their
kids went to school at or Iknow, you know. So I got in
social media so early I got tolearn people. And if I you
followed me, and you stand out,I want to know more about you
because I want to help you, notbecause I want to make money
from you, but it's got. I wantyou to be able to stand on the
(53:41):
shoulders, like I stood on a lotof people's shoulders. I stand
on a lot of people's shoulders.
Unfortunately, most of thepeople I should as I stand on
are no longer on this planet.
But a lot of those black folksthat that helped me out, you
know, and so I learned early togive, give Black Okay, so,
alright,
TD Flenaugh (54:00):
well, last words you want to say to for
parenting?
Unknown (54:05):
I would just say, Yes, parents, I would just say,
you're not alone. Please createyour tribe. Please create people
that you can talk to so you'reyou don't feel like you're the
only parent going through thisbecause you're not, I guarantee
you whatever your child isputting you through, or whatever
your grandchild is goingthrough, I swear to God, I'm so
(54:27):
happy to be alive this at thismoment in history, because I'm
learning so much about theshared experience that we all
have, but we don't talk about,you know, and it's like it is
one of the, one of the things Ilike to leave people with. And
real quick, Google is your brainor your heart stronger
(54:54):
electricity wise. So just Googleis my heart stronger than my
brain. And let. Electricity. Andso your heart, okay, it it is
more electrical currents runningthrough our hearts than our
brain. What does that mean forcentering our life? What's in
your heart, not what in yourhead? So when you're struggling
(55:14):
and facing issues, go to yourheart. Protect your heart,
because your heart is beatingand is the strongest current we
have in our body. That meansthat your love you have for your
child is going to help youdeliver that child to their
adult passion purpose, no matterwhat the f your brain is telling
(55:36):
you. But if you don't know that,you will stay in our head going,
oh my god, what the hell's gonnaWhat's this child gonna grow up?
And then people around life arelike, Oh my god, your child
doesn't sit down. Oh my yourchild's not talking fast enough.
What's in your heart? So, andthat's a great way to stop
people from saying stuff to you.
You say, I get it. Tell them thefact about the heart and ask
them. Excuse me, Auntie, what doyou what's your heart desire for
(56:00):
her? Oh, I want her to Okay,great, stay there. Why does it?
Because your brain has lesselectricity. It's not as
important what was in yourheart. And usually, hopefully,
everybody in your life, theirheart is in the right place. And
there's all these sayings thatwe people say, that makes a lot
of sense now, but it makes senseto on this planet 53 years. For
(56:22):
53 years, I'm thinking thebrain. What's In My Head is the
most important place. It's not
TD Flenaugh (56:31):
okay. He left us with a word right now, make sure
you go and follow Doctor Prattget in contact with him if you
want to work with him on socialmedia, because he has so much
insight, and make sure that youparents and educators out there
do something today that givesyour kids a competitive
(56:52):
advantage. Thanks again forjoining us. Thanks again for
supporting the falling forlearning podcast, new episodes
go live every Saturday at 5pmyou can watch us on youtube.com,
at falling for learning, orlisten on all major podcast
(57:12):
platforms such as Apple, Google,Audible, Spotify and much More
for more resources, visitfalling in love with
learning.com we reallyappreciate you. Have a wonderful
week. You.
Welcome now. Do you have young kids? Have you
thought about homeschoolingthem? Are you teaching them at
home? What are you teaching themat home? We're going to get into
this very important topic withour guest today, Doctor Pratt.
You don't want to everybody. Youdon't want to miss this because
he has insights. Okay. Hi, thankyou so much for joining the
(00:29):
falling for learning podcast. Iam TD linaugh. We have this
podcast to help parents andcaregivers with having the
resources, strategies and toolsneeded to make sure that their
children are on track forlearning and to stay on track
for success.
(00:52):
Okay, here we are. We are readyto begin. This is Dr Pratt. He
is a social media strategistextraordinaire, and he actually
happens to do some Homeschoolingwith his daughter. And we're
going to hear about all hisinsights. We're going to give
you information about how youcould work with him. Doctor,
(01:13):
proud, welcome. Thank
Unknown (01:16):
you. Thank you for having me. I do want to
hopefully let the audience knowthat I want to learn as much as
as they learn. So love to havefeedback after the the watch to
in the comment section to let meknow that I'm not the only
person on the planet dealingwith a hype rack to toddler, and
(01:37):
I think that's one of thebiggest issues, is that we're
parenting kind of in thisconcept that it's just us, like,
really only one everybody else'skid seems totally cool, and
they're learning at the rightrate, and they're meeting all
their metrics, and just our kidthat is complete, a complete
fool, like it's just ours, it'snot the rest of the world. So I
(02:00):
just don't believe that. I don'tbelieve it, but I think as a
community of parents who havehyperactive children, we're
we're doing a bad job ofsupporting each other and
letting each other know it'sokay, you're not alone.
TD Flenaugh (02:19):
Okay? So this is some some good insight. So he,
you know, is wanting somefeedback, please, some put some
comments in the chat, like, letus know if you're having some of
the same issues. Now we, I knowDoctor Pratt, because he is part
of a community that I and he'shis own community even. But
again, like I said, he does alot of social media work, and he
(02:43):
helps me with some of my work,of course. And we wanted to
always find out from our guestwhat made them fall in love with
learning. So tell us about youryourself. Oh,
Unknown (02:58):
wow, I wasn't expecting that as a good question. My
mother was a strong believer inhomeschooling in the 70s, so and
also was raised in a religioushousehold, so I'd learned to
read a Bible at an early age,and I learned early on that I
(03:20):
could get admiration oracknowledgement or even praise
if I read with emphasis, if Iread with a tone and or
aliveness. Am I reading theBible? People would clap and I
would Oh, so as I don't knowwhy, but as a child, that made
(03:43):
me smirk and smile. So I readthe Scriptures with you know,
different voices at four orfive. So back to your question,
though, what I guess made mefall in love with learning was
the power that I could have toinfluence adults by them
(04:07):
discovering that, oh, Martinknows how to read, and not just
that he can read the big words,and not just that I had this is,
this is going back to the I wasborn in the 70s. So there was a
a famous kid in the 70s had a TVshow and he looked like me with
chocolate like me and a big, bigcheeks like me. So people
(04:27):
thought I was him. Sometimes Ihad a big afro, as you imagined.
Okay,
TD Flenaugh (04:32):
71 Wait a minute.
So tell me who this child actoris, that they was Rodney l
Unknown (04:37):
Ripley or something rotten. I can't remember his
name. He had the, I have to dothe research, because I didn't.
The big, closest thing I can sayto him is like he looked like
Gary Coleman. He was the 70sversion of this
TD Flenaugh (04:52):
early celebrity.
Okay, so you were doing it,right? So back in the, you know,
we know people use that for thegram now, right? You were, you
were exactly. It is that you'redoing it for that audience,
getting that little lift up
Unknown (05:03):
for you in the real world, in front of the
librarian. So I would always goto the library books, and they
would be, oh, you can't take outMoby Dick or whatever book I
want. It was like a Christie orsomething. I was some adult
book, right? You can't take thatout. I'm saying, Can I read? If
I can read for you, can I takeit out? It's Oh sure,
TD Flenaugh (05:23):
negotiation, okay.
Unknown (05:25):
And I read, he like, and I just didn't read, you
know? I read she was worried,chocolate with big cheeks, big
afro, and just, you know, so, soit's very much for me when I saw
Hollywood, understand thatlittle chocolate, black boy on
these shows, back then, it wasthe TV shows, comedy shows. I
(05:49):
was living that life, in reallife, in getting things I wanted
because I could, I couldn't justit wasn't because I was a
problem child or acting outchild. I was actually doing with
society. I was exceeding thelevel of expectation society had
for me. Because again, this isthe 70s, after the riots. Burned
(06:10):
out hood in Newark, New Jersey,you know the empty apartment
buildings. And I would go toplaces that were learning
institutions, or learningplaces, or courthouse or
whatever, and they would besurprised that this child, who
the community looked like thenews would say, you know, it was
(06:31):
just we were dilapidated. Wewere we were depleted. We had
lived in the
TD Flenaugh (06:35):
60s. So you keep Oh, so this okay. So tell us
about like you said, theneighborhoods were burned in
the,
Unknown (06:42):
yeah, the Newark, New Jersey, back then. This was
after the riots, which the riotsof, I think it's 69 or six. So I
was born in 71 so I when I cameto the planet, it was hell,
hell. It just happened. So, so Igrew up thinking that abandoned
apartment buildings andmattresses outside and broken
(07:06):
glass was normal. That's what Ithought. So when I went into
those institutions that werethere to serve the community,
they were shocked that we couldbe educated. So that's when I
fell in love with learning,because I realized I could go
further in my child mind, that Icould normally if I showed up as
(07:28):
a learned student or a learned,learned person. And that that
power I at some point later onin my life, but not now. I
relish that power. At somepoint, I discovered that it was
all power and good power. Butfor, I would say, 10 years of my
(07:48):
life, I realized I could getanything I wanted on the planet
by being educated.
TD Flenaugh (07:56):
Wow, this is such a different answer.
Unknown (08:01):
You didn't expect to meet loose the the black Lex
Luthor,
TD Flenaugh (08:09):
this is a spin on this, you know, like most people
talk about, you know, a parentreally getting them into it,
yeah, like that was amazingthinking about where they can
get you the power, like you'redefying odds, or, you know,
what's expected of you. Saythat, again, defining odds,
defying odds, yeah, no, yeah. Imean, that's like, that's,
(08:31):
that's a great idea, like,right? Because sometimes, you
know, kids don't get that fromlearning. And I talk a lot, and,
then, you know, I talk about inmy book too, like, we really
have to be careful about themessages we send to kids,
because sometimes we're sendingthe message that reading,
writing, things like that areboring, are a punishment, and
(08:52):
you were learning how to getpower from it. Now you did tell
us that you learn how to youwere reading at four and five.
Like, now, how is that possible?
Are you just a genius? Or whatdo you remember about that
process, about learning to read?
Unknown (09:05):
You know, I never questioned it. I grew up with
two parents who read, you know,who are readers? We had a
library in the house. Ourapartment. First apartment we
had was, it was a apartment. Butback then, our apartment was, I
would say it was, it was twobedroom. Well, no, it was
(09:26):
probably like a three bedroom,but we had two other room, the
father's office, and so it waslike a four bedroom with two
bathrooms, okay? And it was in ahouse in New Jersey, so it
wasn't the square apartment. Itwas like a house, second floor
of a house. So we had extrarooms, a living room, a dining
room, you know, we have a space,and in those spaces my parents,
one of the biggest thingsbesides plants, was books. Okay?
(09:48):
We had subscription toeverything, you know, life time,
Ebony, essence, jet. So Iinformation was. Was available
to me, in a way. And like everySaturday night, my father would
take me to the to to a newspaperstore. Back then they had
(10:10):
stores, yeah, that was allmagazines and newspapers. So he
would get the New Jersey starledger Saturday night, okay, so
he could have access to theSunday News. Mm, Saturday night.
So you know, in thisconversation, you're asking
questions. I'm thinking thinkingabout things that I haven't
really thought about for awhile. And I'm realizing
(10:32):
patterns my desire to haveaccess to information started,
you know, was I was inheritedbecause I was around two people
who didn't have college degreesbut had a higher level of
success because they understoodhow to read the tea leaves, so
to speak. So my dad had New YorkTimes Wall Street Journal and
(10:56):
the Sunday star Ledger in NewJersey, and he didn't get the
times. He only got times onSunday, he brought both
together. He bought the New YorkTimes and star ledger Saturday
night, it was available to youand the the Wall Street Journal
he borrowed from a local officethat would throw you out every
night. He would literally go tothe garbage and get the Wall
(11:19):
Street Journal every night to beable to read what happened on
the wall on the street the day.
So he was getting old, he wasthere Right. And then when he
got financially secure, he gotwe Wall Street Journal was a
regular thing. So actually, mynickname in high school is the
Wall Street Journal. Oh my
TD Flenaugh (11:36):
goodness. So that's, yeah, interesting. Like,
I
Unknown (11:38):
was a nerd. I was a complete nerd that that was
blessed to have older friendswho protected me, okay, but, but
getting to your question, Idon't remember why I learned to
read, other than the biggestdesire I had was to keep getting
(11:59):
the accolades so I keptperfecting my learning.
Wonderful.
TD Flenaugh (12:04):
So this is also something I talk about, is like
having that positive feedback,because sometimes we give kids a
lot of negative feedback, like,you know, like, you did this,
yes, that wrong, but we givethat positive feedback like,
that is something that's reallygreat. Great. I don't know. I
hear an echo. I don't know ifyou hear echo, but I do.
Unknown (12:26):
No, I don't. I just I you're lower. Now, now,
unfortunately, all of a sudden,my neighbors are outside my
window.
TD Flenaugh (12:33):
I can't hear anybody. I just hear that
there's kind of an echo. Sosorry about that with the sound.
So one thing that stood out tome is you also were saying that
your parents didn't have collegeeducation. And, you know,
sometimes people areintimidated, like they're like,
I don't know about that muchabout reading. I don't know
(12:54):
about reading or whatever, but,you know, just having your kid
around reading and talking aboutwhat they're doing. And some of
it's kids books, but some of itis, like, adult stuff, because
kids are interested in stuff.
And a lot of times we're like,mind your business, or you don't
have to worry about that. Thekids are very interested. And we
need to, you know, feed thatembrace in ways. Yeah, embrace
(13:15):
the curiosity. So can you tellus a little bit about your
educational journey. You knowthroughout your life,
Unknown (13:25):
yeah, so two quick stories, or maybe three. In New
Jersey, they tested you. So Iwas homeschooled. My My mother
really believed inhomeschooling. She did not
believe in the education system.
She was an ex Black Panther, soshe really was, like, not about
(13:48):
this life of giving. I want tomake sure my mic. I just
realized, maybe you're here toecho, because my mic is so far
down. I just realized. So but mymother really believed in
educating the community from thecommunity, not allowing the
school system to educate you. Ihowever, you know, wanting the
(14:12):
accolades, need to go to school,so we battle like battle. When I
say battle like a lot of this isreminding my three year old now
we battled in a sense of Iwanted to go to school, and I
would find reasons, legalreasons that like neglect. I
(14:32):
accuse my mother love educationat at five, I said, the state of
New Jersey says, If this childis not go to school at school
age, you are committingeducation to Google that you
know what she did, found that inthe reading yes in the library
back then. Think about thelibrary was Google back then. So
(14:54):
the librarians, they knew theanswer to everything. See. You
TD Flenaugh (15:00):
ask the library to tell us why you should go to
school, or how did that comeabout? That's crazy. Like, no,
Unknown (15:06):
let's see what I learned about adults. Here's the
thing I learned about adults,especially in the 70s, if a
black child, and I say thisbecause I don't even around
black people, so I don't knowabout Spanish, I don't know
about Italians white, but if ablack child went up to an older
black person and said, Excuseme, sir. It respects like, oh,
nice little respectful, sir.
Okay, yes. What can I do for youlittle child? And I would say,
(15:28):
is it okay if my parents keep mehome from school and don't let
me go? Oh, no, no, it's not,that's not okay. And I was, can
you please tell me the law thattells me that's not okay? That's
a good question, Johnny, or, youknow, Martin, and they would
give me the status the statute.
(15:52):
So guess my mother did. That'sthe type of Mother I had. My
mother. My mother was, she wasan excellent mother. Human being
was another question, butexcellent mother, right? I mean,
excellent provider. We'll say,okay, so she did. She's super
petty. So she said, Okay, I willwrite to the to all, to the
(16:16):
capital, the state capital ofNew Jersey. I figured it's
Trenton. I think it's written.
I'm used to New York, so it'sAlbany in New York. But anyway,
she wrote the state capitol toassembly, the assembly, our
local assembly person that soit's like we had the Senate and
Assembly. Somebody's like theHouse of Representative from New
Jersey, and he was a black guy,and she wrote to his office and
says, Can I get a deferment toteach my child at home? They
(16:38):
said, yes, if you give us yourcurriculum. So she never had
been to college. Created aneducational curriculum that
became the standard for NewJersey for homeschooling.
TD Flenaugh (16:56):
Heritage, this genius, okay,
Unknown (17:01):
I then got my father on my side, because my father grew
up in the streets. He was hethey got married after he got
out of juvenile they call itjuvenile hall and stuff like
that, dude without detention.
But he felt that thesocialization he didn't want me
to be a wimp. They didn't saynerd back then. They said wimp.
(17:25):
And he was like, you know, nochild of his is going to not be
street smart. And the only way Iwas going to get street smart
because of their lifestylewasn't going to be because I
hung around them. I had to getin the hood and be of the hood,
to know how to you know, to knowhow to survive as a black male,
TD Flenaugh (17:45):
okay, hold that thought, we gotta go to
commercial. Okay, hold thatthought. We're gonna hear more
about how you got street smartafter these and messages, okay,
the rewrite method and therewrite method workbook are your
go to resource for helping kidsto learn to fall in love with
(18:12):
writing. It has the tips, tools,resources, strategies and skill
building activities to help kidsfall out of writing and into
loving. To write, get your bookset today.
(18:41):
Okay, I'm back with DoctorPratt, just telling us how he
got his dad on his side becausehis mom was homeschooling him.
And he was young, but he wasvery knowledgeable, and he was
trying to so how did you getwhat was the street like? Let us
know what happens now.
Unknown (19:01):
So again, just to recap, in case you just joined
so I shared our live out to twodifferent communities. And in
case anybody's just come in, Ieventually got skipped in
school. So they would test youin New Jersey before you got
into school, and they wouldplace you in the right grade,
okay if you were in thedistrict. So in my district, you
(19:22):
were standardized tested at fiveand six years old to get placed
into the right school, rightright classroom. And I got
placed into gifted talent giftin the town. So they called it
back then, and so I had a highstandardized test. I always
could take tests. I didn't evenknow what a test was, but I knew
that I knew the answers andstuff, and because I could read,
(19:47):
you could guess the right answerback in the 70s based on the
tone of the question. So youknow, you think if Johnny would
want apples, okay, one apple?
Apples. He has five. If Susiedoesn't want apples, how many is
he going to have five becauseSusie don't want them? You know,
it's like and I would, I would,I would, actually, this is my
(20:09):
thing. Not now, not not do, Idon't do this. Y'all now, but
back then, I over wrote things,meaning that I gave answers
above and beyond what wasrequired. Okay? So that would
give the person a snapshot intomy thinking. Mm, hmm. And that
did two things that got them onmy side and that impressed them.
(20:31):
So I would always in pencilright in a little bit more. Cuz,
remember, I'm homeschooled. Ihad the whole chalk at three. I
had to learn how to write on ablackboard. We had a black let
me tell you how my mother did.
She put that damn Blackboard onmy on my door. I had a when you
(20:54):
open my my bedroom door, therewas a blackboard that would so
like, is, this is, you know, somy, my perception of my
childhood before I got before Igot my 406 was I was in prison
in an educational institutioncalled home. Definitely
(21:17):
remember. My father went tojuvenile detention. He was he
grew up on a street calledPrince Street in in New Jersey
in Newark. Prince, Prince. Sowhen you look at the gangsters,
the gangsters of New Jersey, theBlack Mafia family that we had a
black mafia family in the 70s,all the gangsters came from his
(21:39):
block.
TD Flenaugh (21:39):
I watched that show. BMF,
Unknown (21:43):
well, that that's a different BMF, that's the that's
the 90s. Yeah, original. BMF, ogBMF was from Newark New Jersey,
because New Jersey also wherethe sopranos came. The Sopranos
were based on a family calledthe imperiality family. So the
Tony Soprano was, is actually areal person, and that person
lived in Newark, New Jersey, ona different side of town. So we
(22:03):
had the black sopranos, and wehad the and my father's one of
those, you know, one of theStreet guys for the black crime
families. And so he was notabout letting his child, you
know, not, not get indoctrinatedinto the world, and it reminded
(22:24):
my my institution, my my motherteaching the album school
reminded of how he wasinstitutionalized. I see, I see.
And so he was not, you know,happy about that, but check this
out. My dad loved my mother somuch because she taught him how
to read. So it was a very uniquechildhood to say to me,
TD Flenaugh (22:47):
do it make them feel indebted to someone?
Unknown (22:50):
Yep, wow, yep. He respected and my dad started
flipping real estate. He taughther how to flip real estate. So,
so what? They were a goodcouple. I didn't like that they
were a good couple because Icouldn't, I couldn't really play
TD Flenaugh (23:04):
them against each other in between them. Yeah,
yeah. And
Unknown (23:07):
so I same thing my daughter now, as a three year
old, she tries to play this andlike she bounces from you on the
other and what she my daughter'snot home right now. My wife and
my daughter are in at the bayou,but I'm in Louisiana. They're in
a different town totally, butit's really close to the water,
and her uncle just called me andsaid he's acting worse than she
(23:28):
is. And she keeps running backto my her mother because she's,
she's a she's a toddler, and shelikes to try to play you. She's
very smart three year old, uh,she thinks she get away with
murder, and he's acting like atwo year old to her, she keeps
going, No, I can't deal withthis. He's crazy. He's like, I
like, Listen, do what you gottado, you know? So we gotta keep
(23:49):
this kid in line. Because she's,he's out of control when it
comes to her thought process.
I'm seeing myself and her tosome degree, but even worse,
like it's scary, because it's Iwould never give
TD Flenaugh (24:01):
us, give us a situation. Like, let's hear it.
She goes
Unknown (24:06):
into the refrigerator because she's, she's 61 pounds
and she is 50 inches tall, soshe's three. She's like a mini,
a mini athlete, like a miniversion Amazon. And so she her,
her arm strength is incredible.
She can push a weight of 225,pounds, so and see. And the
thing is that she, she doesn't,she throws around her weight.
(24:30):
But you know how somebody knowsthey can do X, Y and Z, they
don't even, they don't eventhink, like, that's not even
question. So the other day, shewe have an ottoman, and she
wanted the Ottoman across thewhat? She just started pushing
and moving the Ottoman likethat. Not, not Oh, you know,
she's never done it before. Shejust like, Oh, I'm pushing to
move it. You're like, what the,you know? And then she gets,
stops it, and then jumps on topof the Ottoman, anyway, um, she
(24:52):
grabs my wife's phone. My wifephone has the Roku, uh. Remote
Control on it. Okay, so we tookit off of the device that she
has so she can stop messing upthe TV. She grabs my wife's
phone, and we hid the we hit theapp, okay, so it's not, it's not
on that homepage. And so shegrabbed my wife's finger like
(25:15):
this. So he's like, she's like,she's like, What are you doing?
What do you what's wrong? What'sgoing on? You got, you have your
device, you know, you can see,you can see YouTube kids and
whatever. She love. She bingewatches Sesame Street in japan,
Japanese or whatever. And she'svery much like an anime kid to
some degree, like at three. Shesays, you know, loves other
(25:35):
languages, loves watching thosevideos with a cap the bottle and
a cap meet, and they make theclicking sound, so it's almost
ASMR, but also the same time iscolors, and it's just so so
anyway, she tries to manipulateus. My point was that she tries
to manipulate and I'm seeingmyself in small dosages of what
(25:57):
happened later on in my life,through that now she my mother
was, I told his type of Mother Ihad her great, her, her
grandfather, her mother's fatherwas, is like my he's still
alive. Was, was like she he islike my mother. So she has two
DNA sets of these strong minded,educationally focused
(26:23):
grandparents, energy in her.
Okay, so it's difficult to notchallenge her. You can't just
say no. Her name is Zora, no.
Zora, I actually have this oh sogood example. Even better, three
days, I have two, not twofingers up, three days, twice a
day, she stopped breathing whenshe was three months old. Three
(26:50):
Three days old. I'm sorry. Andthe reason why she stopped
breathing was because thedoctors would just come by and
touch her. They would juststart, you know, examining her.
So they call me frantic, sayingshe stopped breathing for like,
10 seconds or five seconds, andshe's like, and she's like, we
think she's holding her breath.
(27:12):
So I said she has thesegrandparents that were stubborn
and stern, and they don't, theydidn't take any mess. So you
need to identify yourself as towho you are and what you're
going to do. And it should beokay. You're like, what they
call me back. Yo, it works.
Yeah, I know. So we had awebsite up. We took the site
(27:38):
down, but it was called for Zorabecause she stayed in the
hospital 80 days, and she shewas born not breathing again for
11 minutes. So the nurses tookturns and did the breath of the
blowing in the breath andpumping our heart until they got
(27:59):
adrenaline. Once they gave heradrenaline, she took off. Now
then she was in a tube for, Ithink, two days to make sure
that her brain swelling when,you know, whatever. So they she
had, at one point in her life,she had 16 doctors that was in
charge of her. So at the end ofthat time period, at six months
old, they were like, you know,she's going to be deficient.
(28:21):
Learning Disabilities. Is goingto be all these problems. She
had no problem, no visionproblem, no lung problem, no
brain problem. In fact, the lastdoctor's appointment we had with
the Children's Hospital, the theneurologist was showing me her
scans and was talking to me.
Zora is six months old. She'ssitting on my lap, just me and
(28:43):
Zora in the doctor's office, andshe's looking at me like, does
this? Does this be know that I'mhere? So the doctor figured that
out she was a foreign person.
And she said, Is she looking atyou with a disdain on her face?
I say, yes, you're notaddressing her. She said, oh,
oh, my God. You know, you knowforeign people, people who are
not an American. They're alittle bit like, whoa, black
(29:05):
kid, Hex technology stuff,right? So she's like, Okay,
fine. It's Dora, you and so, soZora goes at six months. She's
her. She's right, I know. She'slike, so anyway, the doctor's
saying, I don't see anythingwrong with her brain. And she's
like, this is the example why Ibelieve she's fine. So that's
Zora, and I'm living in thisconversation. I'm reliving my
(29:30):
life, and like you said, myeducational journey, yeah, and
how I have to, I literally, Icannot drive by a parent this
child, there's no, there's nomoment that I can't teach her
something. It's unfortunate. Iwish I could. I cannot, not take
a break in and then at the sametime, challenge, did you get it?
(29:55):
Did you get she's like, youknow, she'll, she'll come by
and. And she'll tap my hand, andI'm like, What? What did I do
wrong? And she'll smirk at me. Isaid, Oh, I didn't say, I love
you. And she'll, you know,whatever. And then she'll walk
away. And then I have to, I haveto leapfrog. I what I try to do
with my child is I try to getahead of her. And I'll say, but
(30:17):
make sure you go do that to yourmother too, because your mother
loves you too. And so she's, Oh,right. She does my mother, okay?
And she runs to her mother. Andso every time I end I engage
with her, I'm ahead of her. Ihave to, if I, if I allow her to
lead the energy that day in thehouse, it's a wrap. I can have a
(30:39):
appointment set with TD, and shewill have a tantrum for
something else because shewasn't engaged enough early in
the day. Okay,
TD Flenaugh (30:53):
yeah, you gotta be smarter than your kids. You
gotta be smarter at
Unknown (30:57):
three like this, and I'm watching Tiktok, and I'm
watching Instagram, and I knowI'm not the only parent, with
this, because it's there's a lotof different accounts that talk
about these three year olds orfour year olds or five year
olds. Do not give a about youryes, they're different. I call
them the returning generation.
We have had examples. There wasa three year old three years
(31:20):
ago, if you just Google, threeyear old, who sold lemonade,
three year old lemonade NorthCarolina and diapers. This girl
created a lemonade stand tosell, and she donated all the
money she created to thehomeless shelter to make sure
that babies had diapers. Andwhen you see the picture, she
(31:43):
has her Mary Jane shoes on,she's barely can carry this box
of diapers, and she looks likeshe's walking across the bridge
in Selma. Okay, this littlethree year old looks like she is
not. She won her local citycivic Person of the Year Award.
She was dedicated. We have a sixyear old in Georgia two years
ago, so she's now eight thatbecame the youngest certified
(32:06):
farmer in the state of Georgia,because she was trained by her
great grandmother at three tofarm. And I have two or three
more examples of this. It's aphenomenal
TD Flenaugh (32:18):
turning so they're, like, they're, we're raising
Unknown (32:22):
a I'm raising my great, great grandmother. That's what I
believe. Ooh, this is the 1940sgeneration in these little gen
ed kids. They here for yourfeelings. They're here to learn,
get impacted and move on. Theygot other stuff. That's how my
daughter, like, I'm like, youwake up. She wakes up. Like,
Okay, where is the lesson from?
What's the lady? Miss Rachel.
(32:47):
Where's Miss Rachel? At, I'mlike, you just woke up. She
don't want milk. She don't wantthe hug. Miss Rachel. Okay. And
then then she relaxes and goes,Okay, hi. How you doing? But
Miss Rachel's in the background,teaching it up. She is and you
are not. You don't have a break.
Like my wife doesn't get it. Iactually have a schedule for my
(33:12):
daughter. I have a schedule Iknow I can tell you exactly what
she's going to do every hourthat she's up. I heard that
when, when we follow theschedule, I don't have a
problem, but let that scheduleget messed up, that child goes
and it is crazy in the house,and it's only for three of us.
(33:33):
Okay, yeah, it's a lot. It's notand I see other parents who are
exhausted and who are, like, Yo,these kids? I'm like, yeah,
yeah. And people say they havefour I'm like, crazy.
TD Flenaugh (33:46):
So can you tell me?
Tell me what happened to youreducation, going back to your
education, yes, age, where yougot into public school. You got
out of the prison? No, I got
Unknown (33:57):
out of homeschooling in the prison. At my mother, my
idea of homeschooling was a wasa prison. But when I got to
school, I could read, I couldwrite. I knew my ABCs. Actually
knew how to add the additiontable. So back then, it was
really simple, not like today,it was really simple. You learn
to read, you learn to write, youlearn I didn't learn cursive. I
(34:21):
learned my addition tables andmy multiplication tables. Okay,
well, because I could read andwrite together, meaning I just
didn't reach I didn't just knowA, B, C. I actually knew words.
I knew how to put the wordtogether. So I was way ahead. I
was considered super advancedfor my age group. I was in my
(34:43):
third grade level reading as afirst grader. Okay, um, what?
What happened was, this is afunny story, and I haven't told
her on the internet yet. So youexclusively got my funny story.
I told it, but not, not to youknow, this will be it forever.
On internet, I watched roots. Iwas a generation that watched
(35:04):
roots. I went to my first gradeteacher's classroom, and I told
her, I am not Kuta kente. I amMartin Pratt now my teacher,
Miss sika, was like, What areyou talking about? She told me,
Go, sit down.
TD Flenaugh (35:21):
Wait, did you have a black teacher? No, ma'am.
Unknown (35:24):
And so Miss Seko is Italian. I grew up in orange New
Jersey. It was very Italianplace. And my block was
integrated, but the orange atthat time was more, you know,
Italian than
TD Flenaugh (35:35):
it was. Go, sit down. And then what? Yes, and
Unknown (35:39):
I refuse to sit down, because I was like this, okay,
so because I read, I was reallyimpacted by stories to the
extent where I refuse to watchdifferent movies. Because even
though I was young, I wanted towatch this movie, but I knew I
was going to have to deal withthe emotions of it, and I didn't
know, I didn't know how toprocess and shake off the
emotions, okay, so I would stopmyself from watching movies that
(36:02):
seemed like it had a hit, acliffhanger ending, or it wasn't
a happy ending. I only wanted towatch sappy movies because I
knew what the ending was goingto be. Because I read so many
books, I knew I could tell bythe character development what
was going to happen. So I wouldscare you like a bond James Bond
movie, because, it's like JohnJames not gonna die, it would
freak me out. So I walkedthrough and I told this woman, I
(36:26):
am not killed. To kente, shetold me to sit down. And I said,
Hell. I didn't say, hell no, butI said, Whatever I said. And so
and then she came to what Isaid, Yes. She came towards me,
and I kicked her in the shin.
Goodness, I'm in advanced class.
(36:47):
I'm not with the hood negros. Iwant the nerd black slash
Italian class, Spanish kidsright now, everybody's facing
the class like and I was therelike this. I am Martin Pratt.
I'm not cool to Katie, because Ithought slavery was real. I
(37:08):
thought we were in a slaveenvironment. To this that that
point, the roots really affectedme. So, Mr. Bikino, I remember
all these teachers name becauseit was very impactful situation.
Mr. Bikino wanted to kick me outof the district. The principal,
yes, that was Matthew, but youknow, he wanted to kick me out
of the district, not just out ofthe school. Be like I would have
(37:29):
basically, he was trying to putme in Newark. He was trying to,
like, go. So my mom said, well,because she had her her
curriculum, remember hercurriculum, homeschool.
Curriculum, accepted. Okay. Somy mother knew the boards of
regents. My mother knew thesuperintendent. My mother knew
all the people she had to gothrough.
TD Flenaugh (37:47):
Connected. Okay, what happened? So
Unknown (37:50):
when that happened, she said he watched fruits, and
they're like they also they knowthat at that point, society was
not like it is today. Whitepeople did not know black stuff.
You know all that we did, a lotof problems with giving them
access to our content. I'm justtelling y'all so they didn't
know about roots. Roots was onnational television, and white
people never watched roots. Inthe 70s, we were the only ones
(38:12):
interested, because it was blackcontent. You didn't see black
faces all night for four nightsor five nights. That was, that
was incredible. So every blackperson was glued to TV. Every
white person's like, hey,baseball, Hey, John, what's
going on? But they didn't care.
They didn't know. Oh, mistermaquino said, What's roots? And
she explained to him. She said,he's like, Oh, my God. He
watched that. He says it's on ateight o'clock at night on
(38:35):
national television. Yes, hewatched it. This is his history.
Yeah. So he's like, Oh. He said,Well, he Okay. Well, he
suspended my mother. Was like,for what? He said, We're kicking
his teacher. He said, why? Whatdo you mean? He said, she told
him, go sit down. No. He said,I'm not cool to kente. She
didn't engage with him. Shedidn't ask, who's the Kente, and
(38:58):
why are you not going to begintoday? So miss the Pina was
like, I'm in the chair, I'm inthe I'm in the office while it's
happening. So my mother'smanipulating him. And he's like,
Well, what are you suggesting?
He said, If he wasn't a blackteacher, she would know. And so
he's like, Oh, yes, give him theblacks to give know what his
punishment is. Put him in theblack class. You know what the
(39:20):
black class was? Missus Francis.
You know what Miss Francis did?
She invited us every summer toour house. You know Miss Francis
did? She taught us all blackhistory. You know what Francis
did? She really educated me.
Missus Francis was one of thebest teachers in that damn
school. So my mother was nothappy that I was in missika
class to begin with. I didn'tknow that at the time, so this
(39:41):
all worked itself out. But thatwas my that was my first seeing
how my content consumption ofoutside you know, education
affected my education. So Ilearned. An important lesson. I
love Battlestar Galactica. Ilove Star Trek. I never, ever
(40:02):
took those stories of school,never because, because that one
experience with teaching, takingroots to school totally, you
know, messed up. So I learned toleave outside content. I had a
hard time in high school becausethe stuff that was happening in
society, crack and all the USand hip hop and rap and
(40:23):
everything, I grew up in EastOrange, in high school and
middle school, and I went toschool with Dana Owens. I went
to school with Queen Latifah. Soa lot of the stuff that happened
in run, DMC, and all the hip hopstuff, I was at the beginning
stages of that stuff, and Icouldn't bridge the gap, because
I had such a bad situation backin the day that to say I did
(40:44):
wear Adidas, I did watch out toto tone the what do we call
them? Double fat laces. I had,you know, we did a lot of stuff.
We I don't know if you rememberthe probably too young to
remember devils jeans. There wasjeans before Lee. Lee had color
jeans for hip hop. These jeansare Devil's jeans. And I begged
my mother, my father to give mea one pair. It was a devil. It
(41:06):
was a hip hop devil like this onthe back of the jean. So you
were really cool. We need morethe devil. But thank
TD Flenaugh (41:14):
you. Anyway, I don't know anything about it.
Unknown (41:18):
Yes. So hip hop growing up through the hip hop
generation, another funny story,real quick about education. I
went to a a technical VocationalHigh School, okay, but how I got
into technology was because thathigh school was the best high
school in the east, thenortheast of New Jersey, okay,
(41:41):
because they had a computerteacher named Mr. Bishnu who
taught us programming on IBM, x,t and at computers. So I learned
cobalt and Fortran High School.
TD Flenaugh (41:53):
But no one Fortran.
Unknown (41:56):
So those are, like, unique, all the stuff that Elon
Musk is shutting down now he'sgonna, the government's gonna be
really effed up, because a lotof those programmers, they are
old language programmers thatyou can't find today. So the new
programs today, they're gonnahave to learn this old language,
and they're gonna become really,it's gonna become hard to get
(42:17):
some of those, those, if he andI think it's gonna be stopped.
But my point is that thislanguage that we deal with today
is based on Unix and based oncobalt Fortran. I learned that
at 14, but I went to avocational high school, not a
cool High School where Dana,when Latifah went to, or even
Whitney, Whitney. What'sWhitney? Whitney? Singer, Kenny.
(42:41):
Your last name? Well, yeah,Whitney Houston. So Whitney
Houston was lived in the EastOrange, uh, she went to high
East Orange high school. I wentto this Newark high school
called vocational Essex Countyvocational technical career
center. And it was like, There'sonly 400 kids in high school. It
wasn't a cool High School. Weactually got, I didn't get beat
up, but the high school gotjumped on a daily basis. Like
(43:04):
the Newark high school wouldcome by and beat up the nerd
kids, so to speak.
TD Flenaugh (43:09):
Okay, so how did this affect, like, your like
going to college or after highschool? How did that affect?
Unknown (43:16):
So, because I went to a vocational high school, I got to
work at sophomore my sophomoreyear, I decided I didn't want to
go to college. I worked for thetop company in New Jersey called
Port Authority of New York, NewJersey, and I worked at World
Trade Center. I worked at NewarkAirport, JFK, Teterboro, La
Guardia. I was the firsttechnology person for a unit
(43:42):
called financial services. Theywere the they were in charge of
the gate all the fees that thePort Authority collects from all
these companies that do businesswith them. That unit was there
for reporting to the board aboutwhat today's money came in. Okay
and they were still doing thingsby hand. So what I learned in
(44:05):
high school with the IBM x t,when the IBM at the first, the
first computer where hard drivecame out, I learned how to
program. And it was simple, justinstalling a program, but I
learned to program somethingcalled Super Calc. Super calc
was the presence of the lotus,123, and then Excel super cap,
D, base plus, and a wordprocessing program called Word
(44:29):
star 2000 this was in 1988 oh,that's graduating. It was 1986
so I, I installed these programsfor what was called financial
analysts to use. And they wereall white men who were using
this scientific calculator, theHP calculator. And these, these
(44:53):
books with green paper in it.
There was a there was a printercalled the okie data dot matrix
printer. This is. I had toinstall those things in each of
the units and then teach them,yes, wow. So I had a carver
service and picking up highschool and take me because I had
security clearance to get on atarmac. So the financial service
(45:16):
units for back then, they werein the the traffic control
building. They were behind thegates and all that stuff. So the
guy, the guy, the security guys,it wasn't a, you know, like a
nice car service or anythinglike that. It was a car that had
the word Port Authority in NewJersey on it. And they would,
they would, it was quicker forthem. If I took the bus and came
(45:38):
to the airport, or I not WorldTrade Center, the world trade
you get on the PATH train, butall the airports, they have
service roads to get to, to getto where I had to go to. So it's
quicker if they're picking upfrom school. And took me
straight there, then for me togo take the bus and do that
stuff. So anyway, so that mademe realize I didn't want to go
to college. I was in a a, whatdo you call it? I was in a
(46:03):
advanced class to get intoRutgers and also to get into
there was a two year collegecalled Essex County, Essex
County, Essex County College, soI could gotta, I could have an
associate degree when Igraduated. I have an associate
degree when I graduated at 12thgrade. But then the program was
you graduate at 12 and go rightto Rutgers. So you could go to
(46:26):
Rutgers and get out of Rutgersby two in two years instead of
four years.
TD Flenaugh (46:34):
But you decided not to do that. Yeah,
Unknown (46:36):
I was I was done with school. I wasn't. Hold
TD Flenaugh (46:39):
on. We have to say this, because I am calling you,
Dr Pratt, tell us about how yougot Dr Pratt, right,
Unknown (46:46):
yes. So I have a, I have an honorary PhD. So it's
not a, it's not, I haven'tpeople, some people feel like
you have an earned PhD. Then yougo to a PhD program. What's my
honorary degree in? It's inphilosophy of pop culture. So we
need another show just toexplain why I have that. But
real quick, what I will say is Iwas one of the first people on
(47:06):
Twitter. Not one of I was thefirst person on Twitter with the
word black in their Twittername. So because of that, my
Twitter name was, I love blackwomen, and because of that, I
was invited from a a a blackmedia company to help them cover
celebrity events. And also, atthe same time, my aunt opened
(47:30):
the first black bookstore inWashington, Heights in New York,
and I worked in the bookstorealso, so in 2003 this is before
the Twitter I'm talking about. Iwas running the bookstore, and I
had a radio show called Tech, nocolor radio show. I was the only
technology talk show on FM radioin New York, on WCR. I was on
(47:52):
for 13 years from 2003 2016 wewere the only technology talk
show every Monday night. So thetalk show, the bookstore, and
then being, being one of thefounders of Black Twitter. When
I learned about the honorarydegree program, I was like, I
need that, because I have donepop culture for so from 2003 let
(48:19):
me, let me give my backs are alittle bit too so I started
working on something calledBlack Planet. Before was Black
Planet, it was at the time Iworked on it. It was called New
York online. Black Planet wasthe first black website that
monetized monthly fees foraccess to member profiles. Okay,
(48:40):
so I know the founder that Omar,he was in my neighborhood. We
actually were neighbors. Hestarted in Fort Greene,
Brooklyn, um, I also was the theinternet cafe administrator for
a cafe that Spike Lee owned.
Dana. Dana and her mom wereinvestors, Queen Latifah, Tracy
Chapman and Alice Walker'sdaughter, Rebecca Walker, the
(49:00):
cafe was called cocovar, andthat was in fourth grade in 96
so disappoint.
TD Flenaugh (49:09):
Dr. Pat Lo,
Unknown (49:12):
well, you know, so I feel like you know, I deserve my
my honorary degree, because Ihave been around pop culture and
black pop culture in asignificant, unique way, like I
remember Erica Baidu. I metErica Badu when she was she used
to walk barefoot in Fort Greenein the poetry era when Saul
Williams and Jessica K more.
Jessica K more is a poet thatwas on what's the name God,
(49:35):
what's the in Harlem the I can'tWhy am I blanking on Harlem's,
Harlem's amateur night? WhatApollo, Apollo am tonight? So
when that was when Black poetrywas taken off like this. Erica
Badu was in the ourneighborhood, walking around,
(49:56):
barefoot, okay? Living Single.
Was developed in that sameneighborhood. So one of the
writers, not the person who wasgiven credit for Living Single,
but her co writer who's nevergiven credit, she based the
brownstone their life again,Queen Latifah figures in my life
a lot, not because I, you know,we physically are friends or
(50:20):
anything. But just, we justended up being in the same space
a lot of times. And then I'mthinking of Black Girls Rock. I
met DJ Beverly bond before shesold it to b t so I covered
Black Girls Rock when it wasowned by her, and she held it in
New York Times, The New YorkTimes building, the brand. They
(50:40):
had a brand new building, andshe held it in your in their
theater. And so I wore a t shirtthat says, I love black women
with a black woman's face on a tshirt that was my brand. And so
because all those things kind ofconverge at the same time, okay,
I think it was, I've only had tohonor a degree for a year. So
(51:02):
when I learned about theprogram, I was like, yes, and so
I'll just tell your audience,there's there's levels to
honorary degrees, just just likethere's levels to their
presidential lifetime award.
There's a Presidential Medalthat has Biden's face, Obama's
face, and now Trump's face onit, or Trump's face again. And
those, those Presidential Awardsare just like TEDx talks. So
(51:24):
because you get it doesn't meanthat you know the President
knows you, but it's a brandthat's licensed, and you get an
award. And so somebody wants togive you the Presidential Award,
they have to pay a licensing feeto use that award to give that
to you. The same thing withhonorary degrees. It's some, of
them, the school gives it to youbecause you gave them to the
school. Some of them, you canfind out about a program. You
(51:44):
can take the program and you payyour fee and you get your
degree. Okay, yeah, but you needto, I feel like I everywhere I
am. I tell people, you know, Ihave the H O N, so everybody
knows. It's not a a, we'll callit an earn, unearned PhD. It's
an honorary degree. I mean, Ijust, you know, but I've gone
(52:05):
totally told a lot of differenteducators that are upset that
regular folks can get anhonorary degree, so
TD Flenaugh (52:15):
your resume does not disappoint. Yeah, I would
say, and I agree with no. Letthem know where they can find
you if they want to work withyou, because you know so much
about social media. You very youknow he's a genius. So like
Unknown (52:31):
I do my best, I would say the best place to interact
with me is LinkedIn. And so I'mMartin Pratt, dr, Martin Pratt
on LinkedIn, but other placeshere, on YouTube, I'm asked Dr
Pratt on Tiktok. I'm asked DrPratt on Instagram, on my
initials, which is lmJ Pratt,and Twitter, I'm also lmJ Pratt,
TD Flenaugh (52:56):
Facebook, are you on Facebook? Because it's also
on Facebook. Yeah, it's not onFacebook
Unknown (52:59):
as Dr Martin Pratt, too. Yeah, as Facebook, I don't
really interact a lot, but I'mthere. I check it every day. I
check it every 15 minutes. Soevery platform I check, any
connection I'm proud of. I'mproud to say that on all the
platforms I know, I would say90% of my followers, I actually
(53:20):
know them, like I actually knowtheir story. I know where their
kids went to school at or Iknow, you know. So I got in
social media so early I got tolearn people. And if I you
followed me, and you stand out,I want to know more about you
because I want to help you, notbecause I want to make money
from you, but it's got. I wantyou to be able to stand on the
(53:41):
shoulders, like I stood on a lotof people's shoulders. I stand
on a lot of people's shoulders.
Unfortunately, most of thepeople I should as I stand on
are no longer on this planet.
But a lot of those black folksthat that helped me out, you
know, and so I learned early togive, give Black Okay, so,
alright,
TD Flenaugh (54:00):
well, last words you want to say to for
parenting?
Unknown (54:05):
I would just say, Yes, parents, I would just say,
you're not alone. Please createyour tribe. Please create people
that you can talk to so you'reyou don't feel like you're the
only parent going through thisbecause you're not, I guarantee
you whatever your child isputting you through, or whatever
your grandchild is goingthrough, I swear to God, I'm so
(54:27):
happy to be alive this at thismoment in history, because I'm
learning so much about theshared experience that we all
have, but we don't talk about,you know, and it's like it is
one of the, one of the things Ilike to leave people with. And
real quick, Google is your brainor your heart stronger
(54:54):
electricity wise. So just Googleis my heart stronger than my
brain. And let. Electricity. Andso your heart, okay, it it is
more electrical currents runningthrough our hearts than our
brain. What does that mean forcentering our life? What's in
your heart, not what in yourhead? So when you're struggling
(55:14):
and facing issues, go to yourheart. Protect your heart,
because your heart is beatingand is the strongest current we
have in our body. That meansthat your love you have for your
child is going to help youdeliver that child to their
adult passion purpose, no matterwhat the f your brain is telling
(55:36):
you. But if you don't know that,you will stay in our head going,
oh my god, what the hell's gonnaWhat's this child gonna grow up?
And then people around life arelike, Oh my god, your child
doesn't sit down. Oh my yourchild's not talking fast enough.
What's in your heart? So, andthat's a great way to stop
people from saying stuff to you.
You say, I get it. Tell them thefact about the heart and ask
them. Excuse me, Auntie, what doyou what's your heart desire for
(56:00):
her? Oh, I want her to Okay,great, stay there. Why does it?
Because your brain has lesselectricity. It's not as
important what was in yourheart. And usually, hopefully,
everybody in your life, theirheart is in the right place. And
there's all these sayings thatwe people say, that makes a lot
of sense now, but it makes senseto on this planet 53 years. For
(56:22):
53 years, I'm thinking thebrain. What's In My Head is the
most important place. It's not
TD Flenaugh (56:31):
okay. He left us with a word right now, make sure
you go and follow Doctor Prattget in contact with him if you
want to work with him on socialmedia, because he has so much
insight, and make sure that youparents and educators out there
do something today that givesyour kids a competitive
(56:52):
advantage. Thanks again forjoining us. Thanks again for
supporting the falling forlearning podcast, new episodes
go live every Saturday at 5pmyou can watch us on youtube.com,
at falling for learning, orlisten on all major podcast
(57:12):
platforms such as Apple, Google,Audible, Spotify and much More
for more resources, visitfalling in love with
learning.com we reallyappreciate you. Have a wonderful
week. You.
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