Wordle Today #418 Answer, Hint And Clues, Thursday August 11th Solution

Holy moly guacamole, the first day of school has come and gone and it went better than expected. My 15-year-old started a new high school in 10th grade this year which was pretty intimidating but I think she’ll do great.

I’m just enjoying the fact that I have some kid-free time to work in the day. Summer is great and all, but I’ve come to believe that year-round school is a better option for kids, teachers and parents. (Well, maybe not teachers who rely on summer jobs to make ends meet, but that’s a big picture conversation about teacher pay and education funding that we can have another time).

There are plenty of problems with summer break, and some distinct advantages to year-round schooling. Allow me to explain.

The Problems With Summer Break

It’s difficult for working parents who might not be able to stay home with their kids and end up spending a lot on summer camps, daycare and other expenses. In a system where school took more frequent breaks throughout the year rather than just one long one over summer, at least these costs would be more spread out.

Students, meanwhile, forget a lot of what they learned the previous year over such a long summer break. Studies have found that students can forget anywhere from 17% to 34% of what they learned the previous year over summer break, which is clearly not ideal for anyone involved.

Other studies have shown that summer break exacerbates income gaps and inequality, with lower income students falling further behind during the summer. It makes sense. Families with less money and financial resources will have a harder time getting their kids involved with camps or summer activities or travel. And having extra days in school can make a big difference for kids who get many of their meals there (and might not at home—a very real problem during the pandemic’s school shutdowns).

The Benefits To A ‘Balanced Calendar’

Meanwhile, there are advantages to spreading out breaks. It means that kids and teachers have more frequent pauses in the school year.

Here’s how Education Week describes this format:

“Instead of having one long summer break, year-round schools break the academic year up with several medium-sized (think two- or three-week) vacations. This is often referred to as a balanced calendar.

“The length of breaks and marking periods vary. Some schools have four 45-day sessions followed by 15-day breaks; others have three 60-day academic sessions followed by 20 days of break; and some have two 90-day sessions and two 30-day breaks.

“Other schools extend the school year as well as shifting the schedule, sometimes by adding an “intersession” period of a week or two, during which students take academic courses that are outside their normal course load. The Congressional Research Service found that the average year-round school is open 189 days per year—nine days longer than the standard 180-day year.”

Pretty interesting, right?

And that, dear readers, is all I will ramble on about that. Sorry, I used to write about education issues right here at Forbes many years ago. I still nerd out on it sometimes.

Let’s take a look at today’s Wordle!

Today’s Wordle #418 Hint & Answer

You must be careful now. Spoilers wait in the shadows up ahead, down yonder trail. Thou hast been warned!

The Hint: Gather, slowly.

The Clue: This word has two different vowels in it, and only two.

The Answer:

This was a fun one. I actually made an audible exclamation when I got it right, because I really wasn’t expecting to even though I was on my fourth guess already. I was just trying to rearrange the three letters I had to see if I could get any of them in green and then lo and behold, the correct answer appeared!

My opening word—audio—was very effective in ruling out most of the vowels. Unfortunately, the second vowel I needed was the one vowel not included in this guess. In fact, according to Wordle Bot, I still had a whopping 434 possible solutions remaining—the absolute unluckiest possible outcome for this word. Normally it cuts it down to 183. Ouch!

I tried to get the ‘A’ into green with my second guess, tanks, but it was still very yellow. Wordle Bot suggested crest as a better alternative, and it would have gotten me that green ‘E’ had I thought of it at the time. Oh well.

I decided to use crane for guess #3 which got me the ‘E’ in yellow and made me pretty sure that the word I was looking for would end in EAN. It just seemed more likely to end in ‘N’ than in ‘A’ given there was an ‘E’ involved that couldn’t be in the final spot. So I guessed glean to test my theory and emerged victorious.

Like a damn hero. That’s me. Your friendly neighborhood Wordle Hero. You’re welcome.