One Thing I’m Desperately Trying for My Kids to Learn — Discover the Joy in Life’s Simple Pleasures
There are some things Gen Z may never get to experience
I’ve just realized that my ten-year-old son has no idea how to use a dictionary. For his homework, he had to find meanings of difficult words from a pocket dictionary and he had absolutely no idea how to do it.
“Why go through the hassle when you could easily ask Google and save time?” he said.
It made me wonder what else my kids are missing out on?
Generation Z has never known a world without the internet and cell phones. They’ve lived their entire lives with instant access to a plethora of data on anything that crosses their mind.
They expect wifi and 4G as a basic necessity, the same way older generations expected running water and electricity.
They can’t even imagine how tiresome and frustrating it could get when one had to sift through a hefty encyclopedia.
Or how you had to be content with the results of your photographs — even if they turned out awful because you didn’t have the liberty of choosing the best picture and discarding the rest.
With everything being easily accessible and instantly available to them, kids are now impatient and overstimulated. They look for ways to cope with boredom because they seem to lose interest easily.
Nothing’s able to hold their attention for too long.
A Glimpse of the Not-So-Distant Past
Thinking about my childhood brings back so many memories. The other day I was sharing some recollections of my past with my teenage daughter.
There were things she wouldn’t understand even if I explained in detail to give her a clear picture. She had a baffled look on her face as if I was speaking an alien language.
My kids act as though I belong from the stone age. Being a millennial, I’m also quite a tech-savvy person (I’d like to believe), but they think otherwise.
I mean, we were the ones to witness the introduction of the internet and social media platforms.
Our whole world turned upside down with the emergence of dial-up internet.
Who doesn’t remember the screams of the modem connecting? The strange, echoing sound followed by the ‘ding-dings’ that indicated you were connected to the internet.
One couldn’t use the telephone while using the internet. Remember shouting your lungs out to make sure your younger sibling didn’t pick up the phone receiver, otherwise, your internet would disconnect.
There was one landline known as the ‘home phone’ for everyone to use. The fun part was that there was no CLI (Caller Line Identification), which meant you had no idea who was calling.
The rotary-dial phone was fun dialing. Not so much if you were in a hurry; then it was just frustrating.
Once upon a time, everyone in the family did not have a personal laptop. The family computer was a clunky machine that operated on DOS (Disk Operating System).
Floppy disks were used for data storage. For kids today, the floppy disk is simply the ‘save’ sign on their screens.
VCRs were the ‘cool’ thing. You had to go to the movie store physically to buy or rent a movie. Not to mention the agony of rewinding the VHS tape if the store owner hadn’t done so.
Teens today will never know the art of rewinding or forwarding an audio cassette with a pencil.
Less Is More
In these modern times of technology, social media, and Netflix, kids are spending more and more time with gadgets. They are so consumed by these that they fail to appreciate the simple pleasures life has to offer.
They have so much at their disposal via iPads, smartphones, and screens. Prolonged usage of these gadgets leaves them agitated and exhausted. They cannot go about their normal day if they’ve to live without wifi or smartphones.
Generation Z is missing out on the joys of human interaction. They prefer texting instead of having an honest and raw conversation.
They fail to comprehend and experience the tangibility of things around them as they’ll prefer a virtual experience instead.
I remember my childhood as if it was yesterday. There was an abundance in time because you weren’t consumed by screens and gadgets.
In the afternoons, we’d play outside until evening. We’d climb trees and pick unripe mangoes, making sure our parents didn’t find out what we were up to.
E-books and kindle won’t give you the same experience as one where you get a book from the library or a bookstore.
For some, it is the future, but for old souls like me, nothing compares to reading from a good old-fashioned paper book.
Kids these days might never get to experience life as we did. But as parents, we could try to make sure they’re still in touch with the simple joys of life.
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Do you have any intergenerational thoughts on the topic of changing times? Check out our monthly prompt for January! We’d love to hear your story! Share your piece with us and tag “Monthly Writing Challenge”.
