The kids are alright
It's the grownups who are the problem
Everyone likes to talk about how messed up today’s kids are. They can’t read, even when they’re students at elite colleges. They have short attention spans and can’t focus on anything for more than a few minutes. They use AI to cheat.
This discourse drives me crazy, because no-one is willing to accept responsibility for this state of affairs: university professors blame the highschools; highschool teachers blame TikTok; parents blame peer pressure from other kids; it’s no-one’s fault, really. It’s always someone else.
No. Just stop it. Accept responsibility over children under your care! I hear parents whine that their kids can’t sit through a film, then see those same parents watch a film while also browsing instagram and doing online shopping. I see parents complain about kids’ mindless consumption of short-form content, then see kids being handed an iPad as soon as they board a plane; I’ve even see babies with screens attached on their pushchairs. People talk about how kids don’t read, and they themselves haven’t opened a book in months. Lecturers complain that their students are functionally illiterate, yet refuse to fail them.
Look, it’s not very hard. Role model the behaviours you want to see. You want your children to develop focus? Show focus yourself. You want them to do things other than look at a screen? Read to them, draw with them, play with them, take them to the park. You are in education and are disappointed in the quality of your students’ work? Set a higher bar. Fail students and stop awarding unmerited distinctions. You are upset that students use AI to write essays? Give them work that AI can’t do, or switch to exams. These problems are not intractable, nor are the solutions intellectually challenging. It just takes a bit of discipline — which is what you’re complaining children lack. No wonder: they don’t have anyone to show them what discipline looks like.