Covid really did a number on them.
Covid and technology. It’s pretty well documented what modern social media does to people’s attention spans. On top of it teachers weren’t even allowed to take a kids phone in class until recently.
Covid
really didis still doing a number on them.“Mild” COVID causes as much as a 3-point IQ loss and mental health disorders.
I’m not saying it’s the cause of everything — lax parenting, lack of firm authority figures, and digital attention monopolization are huge factors — but constantly exposing them to a mass-crippling virus sure doesn’t fuckin’ help.
I wonder if this is mostly a hangover from COVID. My parents are teachers, and they say after the 2 month summer break the kids backslide and most classes aren’t back to normal until almost Christmas. This survey is from 2022 when schools still weren’t even completely back to pre-COVID routines.
Bias: I’m coming up on forty, so my experience of being a kid in high school was twenty years ago. I work with a few “kids” in their early twenties, and have a few family members in their teens and twenties.
Parenting as in “process of raising and educating a child from birth until adulthood” and the use of phones/tablets as parenting tools are a HUGE factor.
When I was young, under 8-ish, my parents were very strict on following rules. My bother and I could watch TV, play video games, run around outside with impunity given that there were no other obligation but if we were told that the TV goes off at 6 for some reason and we resisted then the TV was unplugged for the next couple of days. Talking back would mean the rest of the night with no toys, single user devices like the family computer had a set time limit, going over the limit would have your next turn revoked. It was also instilled in us that the authority of parents extended to other family members and teachers.
By the time we were in our early teens my parents could go pretty much hands off. As long as all school obligations were completed we were free to come and go as we pleased, it was pretty awesome. I’m not sure it was the ideal approach to parenting but it made two teens who never had disciplinary issues in school and could be trusted not to go drunk driving or start smoking pot.
I’ve seen very little of that type of parenting in the past 20 years, particularly at a young age. Outbursts and insubordination are more likely to be met with a conversation or an argument and entertainment is rarely deprived as form of negative reinforcement. Phones/tablets are also used as a pacifier, which presents a big problem. The internet has been geared by businesses towards grabbing, and holding your attention by manipulating your emotions. This is not great for adults but I suspect this is pretty bad for kids who are still learning how to understand and deal with emotions in general.
And it’s not like parents want to raise kids who are pricks but there are WAY more pressures on parents now than there were 30 years ago, enforcing rules without resorting to violence is stressful and difficult. Plus there have been some pretty ridiculous financial stresses, employers want more time from employees, our health care system is a nightmare, no one can afford to be a stay-at-home but no one can afford childcare either. And you still have the 24/7 assault of businesses trying to manipulate your emotions and keep you permanently anxious.
All of this gets you an emotionally unstable kid who is used to getting what they want either immediately or after applying some pressure to an authority figure, and parents who are too burned out to and unsupported to do anything about it.
tl:dr: old man thinks things were easier 30 years ago, that is bad for kids now.
Two of my kids became teachers recently. They said a lot of the kids are completely disrespectful, some violent, and also can’t read or write the appropriate grade level because of the newer pass them through system (no kid left behind). Much of their day is behavior management and not teaching. My wife and I are surprised because an 8-12 year old will do things we can even imagine trying to get away with at that age.
I actually like that sometimes kids have outbursts and insubordination met with a conversation (but still keeping some form of punishment), because sometimes they’re having a bad day, sometimes they just got tempted and you can talk about it, and sometimes they just weren’t thinking because they’re kids.
Everything else I agree with, it’s hard for parents to stop their kids from being addicted to their phones when the parents are also addicted to their phones :/
Maybe I should have said ‘bargaining,’ in the form of ‘if you behave now you can have X later.’ It’s the way you deal with a rogue nuclear state, not a child who is learning social responsibility.
Oh yeah I get what you mean, and I’ve seen that happen a lot. I just meant along with that, it’s good people seem to talk more about why something is bad rather than “because I said so,” since it makes it a cooperation instead of a battle.
I appreciate the self awareness. If you actually read this, it’s talking about before and after the pandemic, not “these days”.
I teach university level (ages 17 and up).
Purely anecdotal, but I can confirm that I see instances of everything mentioned in this article on a weekly (sometimes daily) basis.
Students are more flippant and belligerent. They will go over your head and around your back to get excused for work. When they make a mistake, they find a way to blame it on the teacher.
I started teaching in 2006 and it was not like this. Blaming COVID and technology is easy. Blaming parents is easy. But, top-down decisions are another thing to look at. People who are no longer teaching are making teaching decisions in some instances, and disciplinary measures have been weakened. Students lawyer up in a heartbeat so we walk on eggshells.
Example: student cheats, uses ChatGPT or plagiarised something? I cannot say they cheated. That’s slander or libel. I have to get the documentalist to confirm and then the head of the programme will speak with the student. If the student admits, they get a mulligan, otherwise the student can appeal and that is a can if worms I don’t want to lear about.
Kids emulate adults…
Blaming them is pathetic lol
But calling out shiti parenting is no no spot within our society
With that said shiti parenting is largely result of poor social economic conditions. Even if you want to be a good parent it is very hard to do unless you got economic means AND time.
Kids emulate adults…
I would generalize that more to, “People operate and react to the system they’re in.” For kids, a huge part of that is their parents, but there are other factors involved like social media, and the wider society.
So many people want the simple answer, so they say it’s “personal responsibility” and nothing else. We need to create/adjust our systems to generate the outcomes we want. As you point out, socioeconomics play a huge part so we not only need to relieve those burdens, but also provide specific supports in schools and the wider communities.
Yeah, exactly. We’ve been running on “personal responsibility” as the core ethic of society for 50 years now, and, uh… I mean, it hasn’t worked out here, I’m not sure why anyone would believe that it’ll work for 10 year olds.
Sometimes the parents just don’t know because the kids act lije saints at home in a rule structure, but school has low authority to do anything now and students know this. Source, two of my kids entered the teaching profession recently.
parents just don’t know
hmm, i don’t buy this tbh. either way, it is their damn job eitherway
I don’t claim it is all, but kids are incredible manipulators. And then you get the parents that are oppositional to information that doesn’t fit their view of their child. The kids see that parent backs them up, no matter what and so next week is same behavior problems. And the one school administration did not want to report behaviours to parents. I assume it then has to be logged and scored somewhere against a rating.
But yes it is the parents job, I totally agree. My kids are doing behavior work /parenting work at school which kills teaching lessons
My kids are doing behavior work /parenting work at school which kills teaching lessons
And this is why teacher shortages will continue… no sane person would sign up for this imho
Yeah, another extended family member quit teaching after two weeks. The extra time and BS was not worth the money
With that said shiti parenting is largely result of poor social economic conditions. Even if you want to be a good parent it is very hard to do unless you got economic means AND time.
Have they tried NOT having kids then?
“they” are clearing “trying” hence why all of the “developed” economies expect Israel are entering a demographic transition, which is resulting in labour shortages.
hence why in migration post COVID 2-3x…
I mean, they’re steeping in environments online that aren’t really very age-controlled. Log into any free-to-play or public server game with voice chat and give it a listen. It’s just a bunch of literal small children screaming racial slurs. They might not all be in environments like that, but enough of them are that it’s definitely going to substantially alter their experience.
They have a level of practical autonomy that we couldn’t have dreamed of with little to no oversight that at this point is decades entrenched. Outside of adult-only spaces the Internet is basically Children of the Corn. Even the ones who aren’t wrapped up in that nonsense have to contend with the ones who are, and none of them are going to have the emotional maturity to really deal with it properly.
How could we not expect rude children who grow up to be callous protofascists and narcissists?
If you read the article, it’s just since the pandemic. We can’t blame new-fangled technology this time.
