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I am an elementary school teacher and what you are saying is very true. I have been teaching for 5 years now and although I have had some very bright students, the majority of them are not motivated to learn and want everything handed to them. It is like pulling teeth to get them to write spelling sentences or a paragraph. Of course, I am now at an inner city school where the population is 100% black and 99.9% free lunch. These children have other issues besides what to watch on television, even though I believe that this can be one factor of their attitudes. Since the shows are not available, they do not have anything to let them know why it is important and fun to learn, except me of course. They are more interested in learning how to draw Yugi-O, mimicing the latest WWF moves, and what rated R movie they were allowed to watch. Unfortunately, they are not interested in the mystery of 3-2-1 Contact and what zany thing Bill Nye will do today.
I often had the same thoughts comparing this generation to my own. However, I am not sure how valid that thought is. I am not going to walk around calling my generation lazy, stupid people. However, the generation of teachers who were teaching us could have easily been having this same conversation about us. I have always wanted to talk to my old elementary school teachers and see if they had similar issues to what I am facing.
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