Teens: Are they worse, or am I old? (1 Viewer)

[Goldminer1]

I have been a high school teacher for the past decade-plus. I teach kids that range from having GPAs that start with 0, to kids that get full rides to Ivy League schools. I see it all. The school I teach at is large (over 2,500 students), in the suburbs, and in general is a "good" school, but we do have our share of behvaior issues. There are fights, kids smoke in the bathrooms, they don't follow the dress code rules, they're late to class etc.

But, to be honest the thing I notice the most, is their lack of desire to do -ANYTHING- that they don't enjoy or that requires any level of effort, whatsoever.

This goes from my lowest achieving students, to my highest. The learned helplessness is just off-the-charts bad this year, and has been getting worse every year. I teach Juniors, their social/emotional characteristics feel much closer to what 6th or 7th graders were like 20 years ago.

I have to hand-hold and spoon-feed, EVERYTHING to these kids. It is insane.

I don't know if I should blame parenting, the pandemic, social media, the kids themselves, or myself or some other thing I haven't even considered.

Is anybody else that lives, works or interacts with teenagers seeing the same thing or am I just old (37) now?

Thanks.

 

[ChiefD]

Parents are worse. Kids learn all their moral codes at home. Parents want to be best friends and forget their real job is to be a parent.

 

[AAABatteries]

I agree parenting is probably somewhat worse today but I have a slightly different take. Kids today (and pretty much always has been this way) want to be challenged - we’ve made advancements in so many areas but in many situations our education system hasn’t changed with the times enough. We need a massive overhaul of how we go about teaching our kids. Having every kid sit through years and years of subjects they will never use isn’t helping anyone.

 

[Andy Dufresne]

Two words - social media

 

[Steeler]

I agree kids are generally worse.

But I'm posting to say you aren't old at 37

 

[D-Day]

The need for hand holding may be due to the fear of failure and the magnified consequences for even the slightest screw up. I think back to some of my screw ups, and a few people would know, give me a hard time, and then it would fade away. Today, if you are lucky it is not filmed, you may be doomed to the permanent echos of social media.

To quote Marla Daniels from the wire: "The game is rigged; you cannot lose if you don't play."

 

[Goldminer1]

The need for hand holding may be due to the fear of failure and the magnified consequences for even the slightest screw up. I think back to some of my screw ups, and a few people would know, give me a hard time, and then it would fade away. Today, if you are lucky it is not filmed, you may be doomed to the permanent echos of social media.

To quote Marla Daniels from the wire: "The game is rigged; you cannot lose if you don't play."

I do notice this quite a bit. They are absolutely terrified of doing something wrong, so they ask a lot of "dumb" questions. As a teacher, it is absolutely exhausting. Especially when I (we) try to limit those questions with written instructions, visual aides etc, and then we still get the question that we just answered in multiple different ways.

It is harder than ever to come in to school and feel like I'm not wasting my own time/life by being here. I honestly don't hate teaching or have a million bad things to say about it (I realize this thread may make you think differently), but at a certain point, I have to have respect for myself. As time goes on, I feel more like that meme from Joker ,where he's putting on the clown makeup in the mirror. Like, what am I doing here?

And I promise you, if you have kids, and they have good experienced teachers, those teachers are feeling the same things that I am, and many have already left the profession. We have a LOT of fresh-out-of-college teachers and then a large group of those that have been here for 20+ years. Those "mid-range" teachers of 8-15 years of experience are a dying breed, because everybody goes to a different industry, before they get "trapped" into the retirement benefits game.

It sucks. I want to stick it out and help these kids, but its tough.

 

[ghostguy123]

Internet has ruined parenting.
It is what it is.

 

[NutterButter]

I know personally, I just coasted through my teenage years academically and I turned out fine. My kids read more books in a year than I read before college. LOL.

 

[Goldminer1]

I know personally, I just coasted through my teenage years academically and I turned out fine. My kids read more books in a year than I read before college. LOL.

I'm not going to knock kids for reading books, but one of the other big issues I am seeing, is that kids don't go outside and interact with each other in person. No joke, I literally had a kid bring me blades of grass on Monday to prove that he had gone outside over the weekend.

They are able to communicate electronically 24/7 and so physically going to your friend's house to play video games, or to play wiffle ball, doesn't happen very much anymore. The social development of kids seems to have -really- suffered because of this. You may be familiar with studies on how beneficial "unsupervised play" is for young children, it is important for "older" kids too, but in today's world, they get very little of it, in person.

 

[massraider]

If you have been a high school teacher for ten years, I think you are better qualified to answer this than any of us.

 

[jobarules]

Yesterday, my 14 year old son texted me after school (I was at work) that he was going to the schoolyard to play football. Its the first time he's done that. I used to do my homework and be out of the house playing sports until dinnertime on school nights.

 

[Goldminer1]

Yesterday, my 14 year old son texted me after school (I was at work) that he was going to the schoolyard to play football. Its the first time he's done that. I used to do my homework and be out of the house playing sports until dinnertime on school nights.

That is awesome. More football, more band, and yes, more (in-person) video game time, I truly think they need it. Go interact with other kids.

Going back to a previous comment, I think part of the reason they are so scared of making a mistake, is that they don't ever see their peers making mistakes, and/or they haven't ever really made a mistake in-front of any of their peers before. They haven't thrown an interception during a backyard football game, or gotten a bloody lip running around in someone's backyard or not been able to beat a level on a video game in front of anybody.

It is like they have this idea that everybody else is perfect, except for themselves (thanks, social media!).

--

And oh yeah, another side-effect of this behavior, they are also - EXTREMELY - critical of each other. If anybody has a slight slip-up, like they have a misspelled word on a PowerPoint presenation, they are merciless about it. Over nothing. It's like - "oh my gosh, you weren't 'social media perfect' for 2 seconds - attack!!!" They do this to their teachers too.

It is a really difficult time to be a teenager, and sadly, because so much is so -easy- for them, nobody, including themselves, seem to recognize how dificult life for high school kids, is right now.

 

[Hoh]

I’m sure it doesn’t help this generation to see our generation at each other’s throat over every single topic under the sun. Every opinion, every stance is subject to ridicule and criticism. It’s not enough anymore to say “I disagree”, it’s “I disagree, you’re evil.” The only safe identity or stance is to have none at all. Who can blame them for avoidance?

 

[Goldminer1]

I agree parenting is probably somewhat worse today but I have a slightly different take. Kids today (and pretty much always has been this way) want to be challenged - we’ve made advancements in so many areas but in many situation our education system hasn’t changed with the time enough. We need a massive overhaul of how we go about teaching our kids. Having every kid sit through years and years of subjects they will never use isn’t helping anyone.

When people ask me the "what would you change?" question about education, I always hit them with some version of - "Start completely over. Eliminate everything we've ever known or done or thought about education. Get rid of any tradition or pre-concieved idea about what works and what doesn't. Erase the board and start over."

The educational part of this, won't be fixed by a stricter dress code, or more difficult homework assignments or restructuring of school or district administrators. We need an educational system for 2023 and beyond.

We just finished up the Gilded Age section in my U.S. History class. The similarities betwen 1900ish America and 2023 America are pretty crazy. Rampant wealth inequality, haves and have-nots, labor disputes, environmental concerns. And in 2023 how are our school days structured? Around bells, that might as well be the whistle at a factory in 1899 New York City. The educational system is stuck in the past. No doubt about it. It feels like we're preparing kids for a factory job with Carnegie Steel instead of a life and job in the new modern economy.

 

[NutterButter]

I know personally, I just coasted through my teenage years academically and I turned out fine. My kids read more books in a year than I read before college. LOL.

I'm not going to knock kids for reading books, but one of the other big issues I am seeing, is that kids don't go outside and interact with each other in person. No joke, I literally had a kid bring me blades of grass on Monday to prove that he had gone outside over the weekend.

They are able to communicate electronically 24/7 and so physically going to your friend's house to play video games, or to play wiffle ball, doesn't happen very much anymore. The social development of kids seems to have -really- suffered because of this. You may be familiar with studies on how beneficial "unsupervised play" is for young children, it is important for "older" kids too, but in today's world, they get very little of it, in person.

I think its just different. I thought this was a funny situation which made me look at things differently. My daughter liked to watch other people play minecraft (this is actually a thing on youtube) so I asked her wouldn't you rather just play it yourself. She then asked me why is that different than me watching other people play football all day. Obviously there's some nuisance to that, but I felt the analogy was valid. Kids these days spend their time differently than we did and I don't think there's anything inherently wrong with that. If my teenagers want to spend their free time on tiktok rather than spending it watching movies and sports like I did, that's their business.

 

[msudaisy26]

It is a combo, a better word is different. People think different is worse and are scared of change.

 

[Goldminer1]

I know personally, I just coasted through my teenage years academically and I turned out fine. My kids read more books in a year than I read before college. LOL.

I'm not going to knock kids for reading books, but one of the other big issues I am seeing, is that kids don't go outside and interact with each other in person. No joke, I literally had a kid bring me blades of grass on Monday to prove that he had gone outside over the weekend.

They are able to communicate electronically 24/7 and so physically going to your friend's house to play video games, or to play wiffle ball, doesn't happen very much anymore. The social development of kids seems to have -really- suffered because of this. You may be familiar with studies on how beneficial "unsupervised play" is for young children, it is important for "older" kids too, but in today's world, they get very little of it, in person.

I think its just different. I thought this was a funny situation which made me look at things differently. My daughter liked to watch other people play minecraft (this is actually a thing on youtube) so I asked her wouldn't you rather just play it yourself. She then asked me why is that different than me watching other people play football all day. Obviously there's some nuisance to that, but I felt the analogy was valid. Kids these days spend their time differently than we did and I don't think there's anything inherently wrong with that. If my teenagers want to spend their free time on tiktok rather than spending it watching movies and sports like I did, that's their business.

Thats a very fair point. I think that this is the part, that I need to get better at, is just accepting that these kids are of a different time and world than I grew up in. I'm right in the meaty part of the Millennial curve - born in 1986.

5 Years Old: Persian Gulf War
9 Years Old: OKC Bombing / OJ Trial
12 Years Old: Princess Diana dies / Seinfeld Ends / Google is Founded / Homerun Chase / Clinton Impeached
13 Years Old: Columbine
14 Years Old: Y2K
15 Years Old: 9/11& War on Terror
16 Years Old: Iraq War
17 Years Old: Facebook Launches
19 Years Old: Hurricane Katrina
21 Years Old: Housing Crisis
22 Years Old: Obama sworn-in (Historic)

Kids that are in high school today, remember, none of those events. But, they were all a big part of my youth and development in terms of the culture and world I was a part of.

If you're 17 years old today, you were 9/10 years old when the election cycle of 2016 started. So essentially, your entire life since you've been a "big kid" has been an insane time politically and a global pandemic. Not great, and also, not their fault.

 

[tuffnutt]

I have been a high school teacher for the past decade-plus. I teach kids that range from having GPAs that start with 0, to kids that get full rides to Ivy League schools. I see it all. The school I teach at is large (over 2,500 students), in the suburbs, and in general is a "good" school, but we do have our share of behvaior issues. There are fights, kids smoke in the bathrooms, they don't follow the dress code rules, they're late to class etc.

But, to be honest the thing I notice the most, is their lack of desire to do -ANYTHING- that they don't enjoy or that requires any level of effort, whatsoever.

This goes from my lowest achieving students, to my highest. The learned helplessness is just off-the-charts bad this year, and has been getting worse every year. I teach Juniors, their social/emotional characteristics feel much closer to what 6th or 7th graders were like 20 years ago.

I have to hand-hold and spoon-feed, EVERYTHING to these kids. It is insane.

I don't know if I should blame parenting, the pandemic, social media, the kids themselves, or myself or some other thing I haven't even considered.

Is anybody else that lives, works or interacts with teenagers seeing the same thing or am I just old (37) now?

Thanks.

I have been a high school teacher for 24 years now... and I can say, unequivocally, kids are worse today than when I started. Complete lack of drive to want to learn ANYTHING. I was actually just talking with some other teachers in our district about this earlier this week. I work in a small district (only about 230 kids in High School) so I'm sure our problems pale in comparison to larger urban districts. But I've never seen it so bad.

I'm sure there is enough blame to go around, parents, social media, lockdown during pandemic... but the biggest change I've seen is from administration side. They let the inmates run the asylum. They are so fearful of litigious parents that we no longer discipline our students. Our big push right now is incentives. We offer all these different incentive programs to motivate kids... but as I brought up in our faculty meeting last week... we have all these carrots but zero sticks. We allow our kids to have there phones with them all day long so its a constant battle to get them to put it away and pay attention to lectures or do assignments.

I've tried to get our admin to start a ZAP program (Zeros aren't permitted) that would take kids out of activities (practices, games, field trips, dances) until there zeros are taken care of... that went nowhere. So as a teacher I am stuck in the middle of kids who don't want to learn and admin who don't want to upset the apple cart. I have 8 years till retirement and honestly don't think I will make it. My youngest is a freshman right now so I will stick it out till she graduates... but after that I don't know.

 

[tuffnutt]

The need for hand holding may be due to the fear of failure and the magnified consequences for even the slightest screw up. I think back to some of my screw ups, and a few people would know, give me a hard time, and then it would fade away. Today, if you are lucky it is not filmed, you may be doomed to the permanent echos of social media.

To quote Marla Daniels from the wire: "The game is rigged; you cannot lose if you don't play."

I do notice this quite a bit. They are absolutely terrified of doing something wrong, so they ask a lot of "dumb" questions. As a teacher, it is absolutely exhausting. Especially when I (we) try to limit those questions with written instructions, visual aides etc, and then we still get the question that we just answered in multiple different ways.

It is harder than ever to come in to school and feel like I'm not wasting my own time/life by being here. I honestly don't hate teaching or have a million bad things to say about it (I realize this thread may make you think differently), but at a certain point, I have to have respect for myself. As time goes on, I feel more like that meme from Joker ,where he's putting on the clown makeup in the mirror. Like, what am I doing here?

And I promise you, if you have kids, and they have good experienced teachers, those teachers are feeling the same things that I am, and many have already left the profession. We have a LOT of fresh-out-of-college teachers and then a large group of those that have been here for 20+ years. Those "mid-range" teachers of 8-15 years of experience are a dying breed, because everybody goes to a different industry, before they get "trapped" into the retirement benefits game.

It sucks. I want to stick it out and help these kids, but its tough.

OMG that is EXACTLY how I feel!

 

[Goldminer1]

I have been a high school teacher for the past decade-plus. I teach kids that range from having GPAs that start with 0, to kids that get full rides to Ivy League schools. I see it all. The school I teach at is large (over 2,500 students), in the suburbs, and in general is a "good" school, but we do have our share of behvaior issues. There are fights, kids smoke in the bathrooms, they don't follow the dress code rules, they're late to class etc.

But, to be honest the thing I notice the most, is their lack of desire to do -ANYTHING- that they don't enjoy or that requires any level of effort, whatsoever.

This goes from my lowest achieving students, to my highest. The learned helplessness is just off-the-charts bad this year, and has been getting worse every year. I teach Juniors, their social/emotional characteristics feel much closer to what 6th or 7th graders were like 20 years ago.

I have to hand-hold and spoon-feed, EVERYTHING to these kids. It is insane.

I don't know if I should blame parenting, the pandemic, social media, the kids themselves, or myself or some other thing I haven't even considered.

Is anybody else that lives, works or interacts with teenagers seeing the same thing or am I just old (37) now?

Thanks.

I have been a high school teacher for 24 years now... and I can say, unequivocally, kids are worse today than when I started. Complete lack of drive to want to learn ANYTHING. I was actually just talking with some other teachers in our district about this earlier this week. I work in a small district (only about 230 kids in High School) so I'm sure our problems pale in comparison to larger urban districts. But I've never seen it so bad.

I'm sure there is enough blame to go around, parents, social media, lockdown during pandemic... but the biggest change I've seen is from administration side. They let the inmates run the asylum. They are so fearful of litigious parents that we no longer discipline our students. Our big push right now is incentives. We offer all these different incentive programs to motivate kids... but as I brought up in our faculty meeting last week... we have all these carrots but zero sticks. We allow our kids to have there phones with them all day long so its a constant battle to get them to put it away and pay attention to lectures or do assignments.

I've tried to get our admin to start a ZAP program (Zeros aren't permitted) that would take kids out of activities (practices, games, field trips, dances) until there zeros are taken care of... that went nowhere. So as a teacher I am stuck in the middle of kids who don't want to learn and admin who don't want to upset the apple cart. I have 8 years till retirement and honestly don't think I will make it. My youngest is a freshman right now so I will stick it out till she graduates... but after that I don't know.

I'm with you. I'm sure we've all seen the "teacher shortage!" stories on the nightly news, that pop-up right around Labor Day every year, about how few people are applying to become classroom teachers.

The -real- problem is that all the good teachers have either left, or want to leave, because of the failing system. The "crisis" isn't that we can't hire anybody. It is the fact that so many job openings exist in the first place.

We get 8 weeks off in the Summer. 2 weeks off at Christmas time. A week off for Thanksgiving and Spring Break, and you still have people jumping off the ship en masse, with almost nobody willing to jump back-on the ship, to replace them. If that doesn't tell you what state the teaching profession is in, nothing does. I'm not shy about enjoying my time off and my schedule. But every single year, working 50 weeks a year, instead of being a teacher with all of this time off, seems like less and less of a bad trade-off.

 

[dgreen]

I know personally, I just coasted through my teenage years academically and I turned out fine. My kids read more books in a year than I read before college. LOL.

I'm not going to knock kids for reading books, but one of the other big issues I am seeing, is that kids don't go outside and interact with each other in person. No joke, I literally had a kid bring me blades of grass on Monday to prove that he had gone outside over the weekend.

They are able to communicate electronically 24/7 and so physically going to your friend's house to play video games, or to play wiffle ball, doesn't happen very much anymore. The social development of kids seems to have -really- suffered because of this. You may be familiar with studies on how beneficial "unsupervised play" is for young children, it is important for "older" kids too, but in today's world, they get very little of it, in person.

I think its just different. I thought this was a funny situation which made me look at things differently. My daughter liked to watch other people play minecraft (this is actually a thing on youtube) so I asked her wouldn't you rather just play it yourself. She then asked me why is that different than me watching other people play football all day. Obviously there's some nuisance to that, but I felt the analogy was valid. Kids these days spend their time differently than we did and I don't think there's anything inherently wrong with that. If my teenagers want to spend their free time on tiktok rather than spending it watching movies and sports like I did, that's their business.

Thats a very fair point. I think that this is the part, that I need to get better at, is just accepting that these kids are of a different time and world than I grew up in. I'm right in the meaty part of the Millennial curve - born in 1986.

5 Years Old: Persian Gulf War
9 Years Old: OKC Bombing / OJ Trial
12 Years Old: Princess Diana dies / Seinfeld Ends / Google is Founded / Homerun Chase / Clinton Impeached
13 Years Old: Columbine
14 Years Old: Y2K
15 Years Old: 9/11& War on Terror
16 Years Old: Iraq War
17 Years Old: Facebook Launches
19 Years Old: Hurricane Katrina
21 Years Old: Housing Crisis
22 Years Old: Obama sworn-in (Historic)

Kids that are in high school today, remember, none of those events. But, they were all a big part of my youth and development in terms of the culture and world I was a part of.

If you're 17 years old today, you were 9/10 years old when the election cycle of 2016 started. So essentially, your entire life since you've been a "big kid" has been an insane time politically and a global pandemic. Not great, and also, not their fault.

Yep, generations are shaped by the influential events of their formative years.

I think this could be an interesting conversation to have with your students. Obviously change some wording and don't ask them if they are "worse", but it could be interesting to hear why they think they are the way that they are, why they think your generation is the way you are, etc.

 

[Uruk-Hai]

I remember all of the handwringing over kids playing video games and how it made them less social. Those kids are now the parents of this thread's subject.

 

[Charlie Steiner]

Every generation blames the one before.

 

[msudaisy26]

The fighting, smoking etc. That has happened since the beginning of time in schools. I went to a very high end highschool and it was a weekly occurrence. There were a few times a year where kids got caught doing some type of sexual activity on the campus. (bathroom, parking lot, locker room, empty auditorium.)

 

[Long Ball Larry]

But, to be honest the thing I notice the most, is their lack of desire to do -ANYTHING- that they don't enjoy or that requires any level of effort, whatsoever.

This goes from my lowest achieving students, to my highest. The learned helplessness is just off-the-charts bad this year, and has been getting worse every year. I teach Juniors, their social/emotional characteristics feel much closer to what 6th or 7th graders were like 20 years ago.

I just want to highlight this point which seems like one of the main cruxes of the OP, as I think that there are a lot of posts just trying to generalize whether things are worse or better.

While everything is relative and I T is reasonable to say that on the whole, things may not really be better or worse, I do agree with this point and motivation and learned helplessness. I have gone through this with my own daughter and observed it in many others. Obviously it is not true if every single person, but I do suspect that it is a more pervasive issue than it used to be.

 

[CletiusMaximus]

I have two teenagers. One thing I've noticed is it seems much harder to be a "strict" parent than it was in my youth. We have to constantly affirm our unconditional love, acceptance and support of everything they do or their social media will tell them we are abusive parents. It's almost forbidden to punish your kids for lazy or disrespectful behavior. My wife and I seem to be by far the strictest parents among our kids' friend circles and it causes resentment in our household. Some of the most basic common-sense rules we established around media and chores in the household make us an extreme outlier in our circles. It's unbelievable participating in youth sports these days and other extracurriculars, where parents are shadowing every practice and constantly advocating for their kids in these activities and their schooling. Having the attitude that we're going to throw our kid out there and let him fail and learn from it is now seen as bad parenting rather than being the norm as it once was.

 

[Long Ball Larry]

My understanding is that studies generally say that paying teachers more doesn’t linearly correlate with academic results of students, and that the best teachers tend to be motivated by other factors (though I certainly have nothing against paying teachers more). I would suspect that one of the motivating factors for teachers is seeing kids learn and grow and outgrow the need for the teacher and take with them whatever the teacher has imparted. Accordingly, I suspect it would be really demotivating If kids today seem to be less willing to actualize themselves and generally require more handholding just to get through the school day/year, and if you are are less frequently getting the feeling of seeing kids growing and enhancing their self-determination .

 

[Goldminer1]

My understanding is that studies generally say that paying teachers more doesn’t linearly correlate with academic results of students, and that the best teachers tend to be motivated by other factors (though I certainly have nothing against paying teachers more). I would suspect that one of the motivating factors for teachers is seeing kids learn and grow and outgrow the need for the teacher and take with them whatever the teacher has imparted. Accordingly, I suspect it would be really demotivating If kids today seem to be less willing to actualize themselves and generally require more handholding just to get through the school day/year, and if you are are less frequently getting the feeling of seeing kids growing and enhancing their self-determination .

That is some really good insight. Would I like to be paid more? Of course, but that isn't why I teach, or why I am frustrated with it.. I do "fine" financially and feel like I'm comfortable in my life, but the rewards of being a teacher seem to make less of an impact on me as the years go by, and you just articulated it better than I have been able to.

I feel like I spend more time hand-holding simple things with students, and enforcing largely unimportant rules (what color polo shirt they have on) than actually teaching and seeing the fruits of that labor.

 

[Scoresman]

I have a niece who is pretty much a straight A student. She is very open about being constantly burned out because of the amount of homework they are given. I asked her what she typically gets for homework and it really is insane, borderlining on ridiculous.

I asked some other friends with kids who go to different high schools and they say the same thing. Their kids are sent home with way too much homework.

Are you seeing the same thing in terms of workload, and if so, why has it gotten so insane? Could burnout be a thing with the kids?

 

[Goldminer1]

I have a niece who is pretty much a straight A student. She is very open about being constantly burned out because of the amount of homework they are given. I asked her what she typically gets for homework and it really is insane, borderlining on ridiculous.

I asked some other friends with kids who go to different high schools and they say the same thing. Their kids are sent home with way too much homework.

Are you seeing the same thing in terms of workload, and if so, why has it gotten so insane? Could burnout be a thing with the kids?

I would say yes and no.

I doubt this is your niece, but to some kids, 10 minutes of homework is too much, and will cause them to complain and feel "burned out." Like I posted originally, the ability to just sit down and do something you don't necessarily want to be doing (homework) has gotten comically weak.

Now, are there teachers that are trying to make-up for this fact, by throwing pointless amounts of work at them? Yes. It is a legitimate issue, and I typically see/hear about this type of practice with the kids who are already high achievers academically. I think in some weird way, when teachers see high level kids, they think they can almost "save" them by giving them a ton of work, so that they "stay on track" when in reality, they are actually causing some kids to just give up entirely.

Now, is the problem of too much work, rampant? I would say no. Does it exist? Yes.

 

[Oracle]

The need for hand holding may be due to the fear of failure and the magnified consequences for even the slightest screw up. I think back to some of my screw ups, and a few people would know, give me a hard time, and then it would fade away. Today, if you are lucky it is not filmed, you may be doomed to the permanent echos of social media.

To quote Marla Daniels from the wire: "The game is rigged; you cannot lose if you don't play."

I do notice this quite a bit. They are absolutely terrified of doing something wrong, so they ask a lot of "dumb" questions. As a teacher, it is absolutely exhausting. Especially when I (we) try to limit those questions with written instructions, visual aides etc, and then we still get the question that we just answered in multiple different ways.

It is harder than ever to come in to school and feel like I'm not wasting my own time/life by being here. I honestly don't hate teaching or have a million bad things to say about it (I realize this thread may make you think differently), but at a certain point, I have to have respect for myself. As time goes on, I feel more like that meme from Joker ,where he's putting on the clown makeup in the mirror. Like, what am I doing here?

And I promise you, if you have kids, and they have good experienced teachers, those teachers are feeling the same things that I am, and many have already left the profession. We have a LOT of fresh-out-of-college teachers and then a large group of those that have been here for 20+ years. Those "mid-range" teachers of 8-15 years of experience are a dying breed, because everybody goes to a different industry, before they get "trapped" into the retirement benefits game.

If kids are asking questions (dumb or not) that tells me they are at least putting in effort. I like that the kids are trying to be engaged.

Both of my kids went in early/ stayed late to work with a teacher (multi variable calc )when I was unable to help

 

[tuffnutt]

I have a niece who is pretty much a straight A student. She is very open about being constantly burned out because of the amount of homework they are given. I asked her what she typically gets for homework and it really is insane, borderlining on ridiculous.

I asked some other friends with kids who go to different high schools and they say the same thing. Their kids are sent home with way too much homework.

Are you seeing the same thing in terms of workload, and if so, why has it gotten so insane? Could burnout be a thing with the kids?

I would say in my experience is the opposite... in fact I rarely assign homework and if there is... it is just a continuation of classwork. Over the years it has become less and less. Now there are factors for this... 1) I no longer have the top academic students in my classes as we offer a college credit American History class so many take that and 2) because of that... the kids that I do have in class... simply wont do it.... so that leaves me as a teacher in position of answering to admin why kids are failing and how I need to fix it...so the fix is less outside class work and as has been stated up thread more hand holding.

 

[Goldminer1]

The need for hand holding may be due to the fear of failure and the magnified consequences for even the slightest screw up. I think back to some of my screw ups, and a few people would know, give me a hard time, and then it would fade away. Today, if you are lucky it is not filmed, you may be doomed to the permanent echos of social media.

To quote Marla Daniels from the wire: "The game is rigged; you cannot lose if you don't play."

I do notice this quite a bit. They are absolutely terrified of doing something wrong, so they ask a lot of "dumb" questions. As a teacher, it is absolutely exhausting. Especially when I (we) try to limit those questions with written instructions, visual aides etc, and then we still get the question that we just answered in multiple different ways.

It is harder than ever to come in to school and feel like I'm not wasting my own time/life by being here. I honestly don't hate teaching or have a million bad things to say about it (I realize this thread may make you think differently), but at a certain point, I have to have respect for myself. As time goes on, I feel more like that meme from Joker ,where he's putting on the clown makeup in the mirror. Like, what am I doing here?

And I promise you, if you have kids, and they have good experienced teachers, those teachers are feeling the same things that I am, and many have already left the profession. We have a LOT of fresh-out-of-college teachers and then a large group of those that have been here for 20+ years. Those "mid-range" teachers of 8-15 years of experience are a dying breed, because everybody goes to a different industry, before they get "trapped" into the retirement benefits game.

If kids are asking questions (dumb or not) that tells me they are at least putting in effort. I like that the kids are trying to be engaged.

I see what you're saying here, but I guess how I would describe it, goes like this:

You know that episode of Seinfeld, where Jerry decides to get his kitchen cabinets re-done and the guy he hires, can't do a single thing without asking Jerry about it? It's like that.

Now, if you want to ask me what color the cabinets should be when you're done? Fine.

But, asking me what color the handle of your screwdriver should be, is a waste of our time and prevents us from ever actually getting to build the cabinets in the first place.

It feels like a huge percentage of our time as teachers, is now spent re-assuring kids that having a red-handled screwdriver is fine, and we never actually get to build the cabinets.

 

[Jayrod]

I have two teens in school (M/17, F/13) and my wife is an elementary assistant principal who taught in the classroom for 16 years.

Elementary ed seems like a different animal in that they deal with parents a lot more and I understand the hand holding because they are actually immature children.

Our teens both play sports, so that instills a lot of what seems to be missing with some additional accountability and motivation to get their act together.

That said, the desire to just lay on their bed on their phones all day and night is maddening. I'm convinced that if they didn't have any scheduled activities and we didn't make them get up and do something, they never would. Even watching a game or movie must be done with phone in hand and constantly be checked.

At least it is an easy discipline tool. The mere threat of taking away the phone is met with weeping and gnashing of teeth...especially from the older one.

 

[Caveman33]

The need for hand holding may be due to the fear of failure and the magnified consequences for even the slightest screw up. I think back to some of my screw ups, and a few people would know, give me a hard time, and then it would fade away. Today, if you are lucky it is not filmed, you may be doomed to the permanent echos of social media.

To quote Marla Daniels from the wire: "The game is rigged; you cannot lose if you don't play."

I do notice this quite a bit. They are absolutely terrified of doing something wrong, so they ask a lot of "dumb" questions. As a teacher, it is absolutely exhausting. Especially when I (we) try to limit those questions with written instructions, visual aides etc, and then we still get the question that we just answered in multiple different ways.

It is harder than ever to come in to school and feel like I'm not wasting my own time/life by being here. I honestly don't hate teaching or have a million bad things to say about it (I realize this thread may make you think differently), but at a certain point, I have to have respect for myself. As time goes on, I feel more like that meme from Joker ,where he's putting on the clown makeup in the mirror. Like, what am I doing here?

And I promise you, if you have kids, and they have good experienced teachers, those teachers are feeling the same things that I am, and many have already left the profession. We have a LOT of fresh-out-of-college teachers and then a large group of those that have been here for 20+ years. Those "mid-range" teachers of 8-15 years of experience are a dying breed, because everybody goes to a different industry, before they get "trapped" into the retirement benefits game.

If kids are asking questions (dumb or not) that tells me they are at least putting in effort. I like that the kids are trying to be engaged.

I see what you're saying here, but I guess how I would describe it, goes like this:

You know that episode of Seinfeld, where Jerry decides to get his kitchen cabinets re-done and the guy he hires, can't do a single thing without asking Jerry about it? It's like that.

Now, if you want to ask me what color the cabinets should be when you're done? Fine.

But, asking me what color the handle of your screwdriver should be, is a waste of our time and prevents us from ever actually getting to build the cabinets in the first place.

It feels like a huge percentage of our time as teachers, is now spent re-assuring kids that having a red-handled screwdriver is fine, and we never actually get to build the cabinets.

Are you noticing more kids with ADHD or other mental issues? It seems to me like it has become common for young adults to be on medication for a mental issue. I'm not sure if this is genetic, environmental, or just a false perception of mine.

 

[Gally]

I know personally, I just coasted through my teenage years academically and I turned out fine. My kids read more books in a year than I read before college. LOL.

Take it to the "Do you read books" thread. No need to double up threads.

 

[NutterButter]

I know personally, I just coasted through my teenage years academically and I turned out fine. My kids read more books in a year than I read before college. LOL.

Take it to the "Do you read books" thread. No need to double up threads.

Coincidentally, i just voted "yes" to that poll since I do read a handful of books a year now, but I was a late bloomer.

 

[Goldminer1]

That said, the desire to just lay on their bed on their phones all day and night is maddening. I'm convinced that if they didn't have any scheduled activities and we didn't make them get up and do something, they never would. Even watching a game or movie must be done with phone in hand and constantly be checked.

At least it is an easy discipline tool. The mere threat of taking away the phone is met with weeping and gnashing of teeth...especially from the older one.

I think the biggest thing that is overlooked into the whole "phone addiction" issue (for everyone - not just teens) is that it robs you of your desire to do anything else. Your phone is "safe" and the outside world isn't. My phone agrees with my political views, and sense of humor and age group and culture. The outside world doesn't, so why not "live" in this safe little world that these apps create for us?

My phone doesn't make me take lecture notes or do a study guide or take a test. My phone is happy and safe and understands me. My parents don't. My teachers don't.

 

[CletiusMaximus]

I have a niece who is pretty much a straight A student. She is very open about being constantly burned out because of the amount of homework they are given. I asked her what she typically gets for homework and it really is insane, borderlining on ridiculous.

I asked some other friends with kids who go to different high schools and they say the same thing. Their kids are sent home with way too much homework.

Are you seeing the same thing in terms of workload, and if so, why has it gotten so insane? Could burnout be a thing with the kids?

My son did an incredible amount of homework in high school. He commonly worked at his laptop for 4-5 hours a night during the week. He spent more time on homework in high school than I spent in college and probably even law school. I have no explanation for it, but he still can't really write worth a damn. His spelling (in texts) is ridiculous. My wife had to totally hand-hold him through the college application and financial aid process as well as his job applications, and he's considered a smart kid! She still hounds him constantly on basic stuff like his schedule, budgeting, etc. - things my parents never discussed with me that I recall.

 

[Kanil]

I'm not a teacher but my wife was in the teaching realm for 16 years before deciding to get out of it last year. She did mostly intervention work. Started as a literacy interventionist and ended up running the overall intervention and gifted and talented programs at her school so her experiences were mostly with kids on the extreme ends of the achievement spectrum. She also saw kids of all ages (the school she worked at for her last 8 years was a K-12). I only say this because "normal" teachers probably have a completely different experience than she did but here are some of the things she's shared with me.

Admin:
The number one reason she quit was admin. They were inconsistent with student discipline depending on how annoying the student's parents were. Admin also played "favorites" with staff. While my wife was definitely part of the "in" group of teachers, she saw admin say teacher 1 couldn't do X only to let teacher 2 do X three months later.

Students:
Covid set students behind so far. It hurt everyone but especially hurt those that were in the K-3 grades while everyone was forced to do remote school. Older kids were somewhat able to attend and access curriculum remotely, but it was almost impossible to get a 1st grader to sit at their computer and pay attention for more than 10 minutes at a time. These kids are now in higher grades where they're expected to have certain foundational knowledge that they just don't have and it's causing them to be unable to access the curriculum. So now either the teachers have to teach things they should have learned a year or two ago in addition to what they're supposed to teach, or the kids get frustrated and just give up.

Part of Covid also made it ok to fail. EVERYONE was in a "do their best" mode and if your best wasn't good enough, well, you can just blame Covid. The "it's ok to fail" belief has stuck with these kids, teachers, and parents and it's hurting the kids in the long run. I whole heartedly believe the curriculum for these students needs to be re-evaluated and re-leveled to where they're at now, not where they would have been had the pandemic never happened.

Students are way more empathetic than they ever have been. Kids now are kinder and much more inclusive than they were when she started, much less when we were kids. There is almost an "anti-bullying" culture that's been built. That's not to say there are not issues with kids being mean, just that it happens less often and other students are less tolerant of that behavior within their peer groups.

Parents:
They suck. They've always sucked and not sure they suck more now or then. You'll have the great parents that are involved and partners with teachers, but the large majority are either completely uninvolved or a hindrance at best. Eff parents, especially the ones that wont allow their kids to get the intervention support they need because it hurst their own personal egos. Eff them hard.

 

[Goldminer1]

The need for hand holding may be due to the fear of failure and the magnified consequences for even the slightest screw up. I think back to some of my screw ups, and a few people would know, give me a hard time, and then it would fade away. Today, if you are lucky it is not filmed, you may be doomed to the permanent echos of social media.

To quote Marla Daniels from the wire: "The game is rigged; you cannot lose if you don't play."

I do notice this quite a bit. They are absolutely terrified of doing something wrong, so they ask a lot of "dumb" questions. As a teacher, it is absolutely exhausting. Especially when I (we) try to limit those questions with written instructions, visual aides etc, and then we still get the question that we just answered in multiple different ways.

It is harder than ever to come in to school and feel like I'm not wasting my own time/life by being here. I honestly don't hate teaching or have a million bad things to say about it (I realize this thread may make you think differently), but at a certain point, I have to have respect for myself. As time goes on, I feel more like that meme from Joker ,where he's putting on the clown makeup in the mirror. Like, what am I doing here?

And I promise you, if you have kids, and they have good experienced teachers, those teachers are feeling the same things that I am, and many have already left the profession. We have a LOT of fresh-out-of-college teachers and then a large group of those that have been here for 20+ years. Those "mid-range" teachers of 8-15 years of experience are a dying breed, because everybody goes to a different industry, before they get "trapped" into the retirement benefits game.

If kids are asking questions (dumb or not) that tells me they are at least putting in effort. I like that the kids are trying to be engaged.

I see what you're saying here, but I guess how I would describe it, goes like this:

You know that episode of Seinfeld, where Jerry decides to get his kitchen cabinets re-done and the guy he hires, can't do a single thing without asking Jerry about it? It's like that.

Now, if you want to ask me what color the cabinets should be when you're done? Fine.

But, asking me what color the handle of your screwdriver should be, is a waste of our time and prevents us from ever actually getting to build the cabinets in the first place.

It feels like a huge percentage of our time as teachers, is now spent re-assuring kids that having a red-handled screwdriver is fine, and we never actually get to build the cabinets.

Are you noticing more kids with ADHD or other mental issues? It seems to me like it has become common for young adults to be on medication for a mental issue. I'm not sure if this is genetic, environmental, or just a false perception of mine.

There are a -ton- of kids with extremely limited attention spans. There are also a ton of kids that have an extremely limited ability to do anything that is outside of their comfort zone and/or what they personally want to be doing at that moment (looking at their phone).

Many students that exhibit those behaviors often "self-diagnose" that they have ADHD or other issues, and sort of laught it off like "haha, I'm so ADHD" and almost wear it like a badge of honor.

The reality is when you encounter a kid that *actually* has *real* ADHD or some other issue like that, it is undeniable and a lot different than a kid who likes to look at their phone a lot.

For kids with medically diagnosed issues, it can truly be a struggle just to get through the day. They need and deserve help. And what makes it worse is that larger group that sort of "jokes" about having ADHD, end up minimizing it for the kids who truly struggle with it.

So, do I notice more kids with ADHD or other issues, I would say yes I do. Even considering just the ones that have -actual- diagnosed issues. When you lump in the group that essentially are just addicted to their phones and have "self-diagnosed" ADHD, the numbers are huge.

 

[massraider]

I think the biggest thing that is overlooked into the whole "phone addiction" issue (for everyone - not just teens) is that it robs you of your desire to do anything else. Your phone is "safe" and the outside world isn't. My phone agrees with my political views, and sense of humor and age group and culture. The outside world doesn't, so why not "live" in this safe little world that these apps create for us?

My phone doesn't make me take lecture notes or do a study guide or take a test. My phone is happy and safe and understands me. My parents don't. My teachers don't

The phone/computers/electronics addiction also keeps people isolated.

Tops on my list of '**** I should have been told in school' is that having a bigger network is important. Knowing a lot of people, having a lot of relationships. The more people you know, the more opportunities pop up. And people like to send work/jobs to people in their network.

I'll just also say that anyone in your profession has my thanks, and unfortunately my empathy. Thanks to all y'all, as long as you can hang in there.

 

[Gally]

I asked some other friends with kids who go to different high schools and they say the same thing. Their kids are sent home with way too much homework.

I think some of this is also on the kid themselves. As someone pointed out that kids having no motivation or being a self starter they drag their feet on work and it drags out. My kids were two completely different kids when it comes to school work. My daughter (older and now out of college) would spend all night doing her homework every day. From the minute she got home to the minute she went to bed she was at the table doing her homework. At first I thought it was teachers just giving too much work. But then I started to stick my nose into how much work she was actually doing. It turns out that she would waste most of her time trying to find music (I work better with music on) or looking across the room day dreaming or a multitude of other things. It would dive me nuts to the point I would get on her and take her phone away poke my head in every so often to keep her going etc. Eventually I figured that that if she had an hour to her work it would take her an hour. If she had 5 hours to do the same work it would take her 5 hours. I tried reasoning with her that rather than have me standing over her for 4 hours pushing her to get stuff done wouldn't it be better to just do it quickly then she could play on her phone, listen to music, whatever. Eventually I gave up and just let her waste time. She always got the work done and got good grades so there really wasn't an issue (other than the time).

My son on the other hand budgets his time and gets things done quickly. He knows how long the work takes and will either do it right away or wait until whatever time and then do it. I never have to bug him or get on him to do his work at all. At first when I would see him goofing off and not doing work I would get on him to do it right then because I had visions of my daughter. I soon realized he could budget his own time and was good at it. So where I would want to just get the stuff done right away and push him initially to do that it would end up being a fight. Since he has earned the trust of knowing how to budget and get his stuff done I leave him completely alone unless he has a question that he needs help on (which is very infrequent).

All that to say, some kids drag out work because they are unmotivated or lazy as some have said. It's not necessarily getting too much work but just a lack of drive to get it done quickly. Rather complain than just doing it.

 

[Goldminer1]

I asked some other friends with kids who go to different high schools and they say the same thing. Their kids are sent home with way too much homework.

I think some of this is also on the kid themselves. As someone pointed out that kids having no motivation or being a self starter they drag their feet on work and it drags out. My kids were two completely different kids when it comes to school work. My daughter (older and now out of college) would spend all night doing her homework every day. From the minute she got home to the minute she went to bed she was at the table doing her homework. At first I thought it was teachers just giving too much work. But then I started to stick my nose into how much work she was actually doing. It turns out that she would waste most of her time trying to find music (I work better with music on) or looking across the room day dreaming or a multitude of other things. It would dive me nuts to the point I would get on her and take her phone away poke my head in every so often to keep her going etc. Eventually I figured that that if she had an hour to her work it would take her an hour. If she had 5 hours to do the same work it would take her 5 hours. I tried reasoning with her that rather than have me standing over her for 4 hours pushing her to get stuff done wouldn't it be better to just do it quickly then she could play on her phone, listen to music, whatever. Eventually I gave up and just let her waste time. She always got the work done and got good grades so there really wasn't an issue (other than the time).

My son on the other hand budgets his time and gets things done quickly. He knows how long the work takes and will either do it right away or wait until whatever time and then do it. I never have to bug him or get on him to do his work at all. At first when I would see him goofing off and not doing work I would get on him to do it right then because I had visions of my daughter. I soon realized he could budget his own time and was good at it. So where I would want to just get the stuff done right away and push him initially to do that it would end up being a fight. Since he has earned the trust of knowing how to budget and get his stuff done I leave him completely alone unless he has a question that he needs help on (which is very infrequent).

All that to say, some kids drag out work because they are unmotivated or lazy as some have said. It's not necessarily getting too much work but just a lack of drive to get it done quickly. Rather complain than just doing it.

This is largely my experience. In my regular level classes, I -NEVER- just stand at the door as kids walk-out and say, "do this for homework." And, as far as I know, none of the other regular-level teachers ever do this either. When those kids get "homework" it is stuff that they get time in class to do, but instead, as you say here, some of them will literally sit and stare at the wall instead of doing the work. Then, when it comes time to turn in their assignments on Sunday night at 11:59pm, suddenly "they get too much homework." When, the reality for a lot of them, is that they were given literally 0 homework that week, they just chose not to do any of it when they were given the time to do it.

---
Just to clarify the "levels" that a lot of high schools operate their courses on:

"Regular"
Honors
AP/IB/Advanced

 

[Caveman33]

I asked some other friends with kids who go to different high schools and they say the same thing. Their kids are sent home with way too much homework.

I think some of this is also on the kid themselves. As someone pointed out that kids having no motivation or being a self starter they drag their feet on work and it drags out. My kids were two completely different kids when it comes to school work. My daughter (older and now out of college) would spend all night doing her homework every day. From the minute she got home to the minute she went to bed she was at the table doing her homework. At first I thought it was teachers just giving too much work. But then I started to stick my nose into how much work she was actually doing. It turns out that she would waste most of her time trying to find music (I work better with music on) or looking across the room day dreaming or a multitude of other things. It would dive me nuts to the point I would get on her and take her phone away poke my head in every so often to keep her going etc. Eventually I figured that that if she had an hour to her work it would take her an hour. If she had 5 hours to do the same work it would take her 5 hours. I tried reasoning with her that rather than have me standing over her for 4 hours pushing her to get stuff done wouldn't it be better to just do it quickly then she could play on her phone, listen to music, whatever. Eventually I gave up and just let her waste time. She always got the work done and got good grades so there really wasn't an issue (other than the time).

My son on the other hand budgets his time and gets things done quickly. He knows how long the work takes and will either do it right away or wait until whatever time and then do it. I never have to bug him or get on him to do his work at all. At first when I would see him goofing off and not doing work I would get on him to do it right then because I had visions of my daughter. I soon realized he could budget his own time and was good at it. So where I would want to just get the stuff done right away and push him initially to do that it would end up being a fight. Since he has earned the trust of knowing how to budget and get his stuff done I leave him completely alone unless he has a question that he needs help on (which is very infrequent).

All that to say, some kids drag out work because they are unmotivated or lazy as some have said. It's not necessarily getting too much work but just a lack of drive to get it done quickly. Rather complain than just doing it.

That sounds like how I remember high school. Even in all honors and AP classes, I think the homework was no more than 1-2 hours per day. If you used free periods effectively, you would have very little work to do at home. I was a terrible procrastinator. I would leave all big assignments until the very last minute and have to race the night before to complete. It was very stressful but all my own fault. More recently, I have taken college classes and they are much easier than my high school classes. The workload, grading..everything is a cake walk in the everyone gets As society of online college.

 

[cheese]

I have a niece who is pretty much a straight A student. She is very open about being constantly burned out because of the amount of homework they are given. I asked her what she typically gets for homework and it really is insane, borderlining on ridiculous.

I asked some other friends with kids who go to different high schools and they say the same thing. Their kids are sent home with way too much homework.

Are you seeing the same thing in terms of workload, and if so, why has it gotten so insane? Could burnout be a thing with the kids?

My son did an incredible amount of homework in high school. He commonly worked at his laptop for 4-5 hours a night during the week. He spent more time on homework in high school than I spent in college and probably even law school. I have no explanation for it, but he still can't really write worth a damn. His spelling (in texts) is ridiculous. My wife had to totally hand-hold him through the college application and financial aid process as well as his job applications, and he's considered a smart kid! She still hounds him constantly on basic stuff like his schedule, budgeting, etc. - things my parents never discussed with me that I recall.

I’m not a good person to ask whether this is the reason for teen problems, but I have the same experience about the amount of homework. Related, the number of extra curriculars is extreme. My kid is up at 530, on bus by 630, gets home at 3, has hours of HW to do before going to practice or (most days) multiple practices depending on the season. The second she gets home she goes to bed. Her grades are fine, but I have to assume she is a complete zombie at school and I can see why any kid would be a pain the next day (which is every day).

I take responsibility for some of it. We let her sign up for too much. But this is the norm for kids. Every coach thinks their sport is everything, every teacher thinks their subject is the one that matters, choir thinks they "only" have 3 mandatory concerts, etc etc. It just all adds up to the kids are buried and stressed. When adults get buried and stressed, they cope in various ways or just flat out shut down. Why should kids be different? That's why I find it hard to agree with posts above about kids not playing outside or doing certain things we used to do. When should they do it?

 

[Goldminer1]

I have a niece who is pretty much a straight A student. She is very open about being constantly burned out because of the amount of homework they are given. I asked her what she typically gets for homework and it really is insane, borderlining on ridiculous.

I asked some other friends with kids who go to different high schools and they say the same thing. Their kids are sent home with way too much homework.

Are you seeing the same thing in terms of workload, and if so, why has it gotten so insane? Could burnout be a thing with the kids?

My son did an incredible amount of homework in high school. He commonly worked at his laptop for 4-5 hours a night during the week. He spent more time on homework in high school than I spent in college and probably even law school. I have no explanation for it, but he still can't really write worth a damn. His spelling (in texts) is ridiculous. My wife had to totally hand-hold him through the college application and financial aid process as well as his job applications, and he's considered a smart kid! She still hounds him constantly on basic stuff like his schedule, budgeting, etc. - things my parents never discussed with me that I recall.

I’m not a good person to ask whether this is the reason for teen problems, but I have the same experience about the amount of homework. Related, the number of extra curriculars is extreme. My kid is up at 530, on bus by 630, gets home at 3, has hours of HW to do before going to practice or (most days) multiple practices depending on the season. The second she gets home she goes to bed. Her grades are fine, but I have to assume she is a complete zombie at school and I can see why any kid would be a pain the next day (which is every day).

I take responsibility for some of it. We let her sign up for too much. But this is the norm for kids. Every coach thinks their sport is everything, every teacher thinks their subject is the one that matters, choir thinks they "only" have 3 mandatory concerts, etc etc. It just all adds up to the kids are buried and stressed. When adults get buried and stressed, they cope in various ways or just flat out shut down. Why should kids be different? That's why I find it hard to agree with posts above about kids not playing outside or doing certain things we used to do. When should they do it?

Obviously, we don't know each other personally, so I'll sort of apply your situation to the wider "issue" at hand that I see with kids like yours:

Do some teachers think their class is God's gift to education? Yep. Do some youth coaches act like they're running a professional team? Yep.

I think what it comes down to, is that you simply have to cut things out. Easier said than done, I know.

Because there -are- so many kids that are just bumps on a log, kids that -aren't- are seen as these shining examples and pushed beyond their limits, because adults see them and think "Oh, a good one! Lets get the most out of them that we can!" And so those kids end up in Choir and Orchestra and Lacrosse and Golf and Student Council and National Honors Society and ..... because "they're one of the good ones" and so they are directed into an insane amount of activities.

I am far from an expert on college admissions, but I do teach in our I.B. program with some of the most gifted/driven/capable students in the entire region. The kids that we send to the very best schools, are not always the kids that are in 48 different clubs and have a 5.0 GPA and a 1600 SAT. Are they good students? Of course. Are they involved? Yes. But they don't drive themselves crazy with creating a list of accomplishments to put on a college application.

A lot of the prestigious schools today, want to know about the person themselves, not how many different things they got involved in, or if they ever have gotten a B+. The truth is, that there are a ton of kids with 5.0 GPA's and 15 different clubs and 4 varsity sports and hundreds of hours of community service. But, universities know, that a lot of times, this is done simply to impress some new admissions officer. From my experience, kids that have a high academic workload, but are well-rounded people are much more favorable to the prestigious schools than kids who pack their schedule from dawn to dusk with tasks that look good on a resume.

The college essay portion of the admissions process is now -massively- important. Whereas, back when Millennials or Gen-X were applying to college, those "college resumes" were essentially how you got to those big time schools. 5.0 GPA, 1600 SAT and every club and sport available to you on your high school campus is how you got to the Ivy League. In the past, it was rare for a 3.5 GPA kid that had some life experiences and wrote a good essay to get into a prestigious school. In today's landscape? That is absolutely possible.

Having a normal life, and experiences that aren't designed for the amusement of a college admissions office, are now often seen, as being an important piece of the admissions puzzle.

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You mentioned that your daughter immediately goes to sleep when she comes home. One of my personal crusades is the "bad sleep" epidemic that is going on with these kids. They are on their phones until 3am, or too stressed to sleep, or playing video games, or whatever, and they build up MASSIVE sleep "debt" during the week.

Wake up at 5:30. Go to school. Go to practice. Come home. Fall asleep at 5. Wake up at 8:30. Eat "dinner." Stay up until midnight doing homework. Then look at your phone for 3 hours. Sleep from 3am-5:30am. Repeat.

Then, when the weekend comes, they sleep for 12 hours on Saturday and miss out on time with their family. We as a whole society need to help kids with their sleeping schedules and habits, it is a disaster.

 

[Brunell4MVP]

Most kids are better. They are smarter. They are more careful with what they say and do. They work harder in school. They can learn more (good and bad) from the internet quicker than we did. They are more involved in team activities.

Now whether this is all good is a reasonable question. I think they get too smart too quick, and then either get 1) stressed or 2) bored. And I think that their social and academic calendar is very planned, which means they don't operate well for a while once they are on their own (like 1st year of college).

 

[massraider]

When adults get buried and stressed, they cope in various ways or just flat out shut down. Why should kids be different? That's why I find it hard to agree with posts above about kids not playing outside or doing certain things we used to do. When should they do it?

There's a bunch of kids out there doing absolutely nothing productive from after school till bed time.