Final thoughts on The Dumbest Generation

After reading this book I am very intrigued. I didn't think that it could have had such an impact on me. I thought it was just interesting to see how the fact that I grew up on computers and video game could be harmful to our society. However, I found a lot of points that made me want to show Mark Bauerlein that he is wrong. Other points made me embarrassed to be part of this so called "Dumbest Generation". There were a lot of great points raised that I hadn't even thought of though. The fact that we spend so much time in front of TV screens and computers is amazing to me when I look back and think about it. Even more amazing is that fact that it's not just one or the other. Most of the time I am in front of the computer and watching TV and listening to my iTunes or iPod and texting. The fact that I can multi task so well without getting confused and keeping it all on track is crazy. I'm happy I can multi task though. This will definitely help me in the future. I think the reason Bauerlein is so upset about the way that my generation is so technological is because he can't keep up with us. Since we were raised on computers we don't know what it's like to spend hours in the library trying to search through the dewy decimal system and a large set of encyclopedias just to find one piece of information. I just go to Google, type in the topic I'm looking for and there it is instantly at my fingertips. This book brought up a good point about how our social skills may be hurt because of our dependence on Instant and Text Messaging. We spend so much time in front of screens that when it comes time to get face to face with people we are sometimes at a loss. Overall, I think this was a good book and I'm glad I chose to read this instead of a story about Meth or Abortion that probably wouldn't have meant as much to me because it wasn't as personal.

Dumbest Generation Cinco (That's Spanish for Five)

"Undergraduates do all sorts of things at universities. They play compuer games, they eat pizza, they go to parties, they have sex, they work out, and they amuse each other by their ppretensions. What most fiction has ignored is that a lot of them also spend vast amounts of time alone, attacking the kinds of intellectual problems that can easily swallow lifetimes. In the perilous months of their last years at good colleges and universities, seniors parachute into mathematical puzzles, sociological aporiae, and historical mysteries that have baffled professionals. With the help - and sometimes the hindrance - of their teachers, but chiefly relying on their own wits and those of their close friends, they attack Big Questions, Big Books, and Big Problems." This quote talks a lot about what people don't give people my age enough credit for. Mark Bauerlein can go about a write an entire book about how my generation is going to be the end of us all because we rely on the internet instead of reading books like our parents. But when you really look at it, we do plenty to push our society along. If it weren't for our ever changing views on the way we see the world as young adults or how we deal with the mistakes our parents and generations before us have made then things wouldn't change. For instance, because of the way our country has become so dependant on oil from the Middle East, I want to grow up and solve this problem. I plan and creating homes that don't need to use any kind of outside energy because they will be able to create everything they need on their own. Other people my age look at the computers we have now and the way that people use their cell phones and change them. Computer operating systems are now changing every year and once you get used to one and learn how to use it, a new one is made to make your computer using experience even easier. Just because we keep changing the way we use all our technology doesn't mean that we are incompitent in keeping our lives and the course of future on track. The fact that we look at these big questions and big problems and then go our and try to fix them makes us even better than the generation before us. Instead of sitting around and complaining about it we are actually going out and doing something about it.

The Dumbest Generation Episode IV: A New Hope

"We had a four year pilot laptop computer program which investigated the benefits of a laptop computer environment from both practical and pedagogical points of view. The results are clear, our laptop students are completely convinced this is the only way to go!" Since this is what we grew up with, it only makes sense that computers would make it easier for college students to success in the highest level of education. I know that next year when I am in college I will get a laptop for myself. I'll be able to research for my classes, write my papers, stay connected with what's going on around campus, and even keep in touch with my family and friends from home. I found it interesting that even though we are supposedly the "Dumbest Generation", colleges are looking at their students for feedback about how to use technology in their classrooms. They are supposed to know more than we do, that's why they are teaching us, but they are allowing us to form the classroom environment and dictate how classes are taught. I think it's great that more college are using the internet and other forms of technology to help teach. For me personally I know it will make things easier. I am so used to the internet and interacting with my lessons online that it will make what I learn more meaningful if I can manipulate it. This sort of thing is already done in my Psychology class. We run through Psych Simulations in class as a way to get a hands on feel with the material that we are learning. This makes it very easy to understand and even fun to learn about. Our generation is very visual because we spend so much time around the TV and computer that when we have the opportunity to learn by seeing how things are played out such as neurons firing in our brain, or even watching the steps a computer would take in order to solve a math problem, it helps more than people above the age of thirty would believe. I understand that they are concerned for their future since in a few years we will be old enough to vote and take control of major corporations, but they need to learn to trust us. Just because we grew up on Facebook and our high school projects were posted in blogs open for everyone in the world to see doesn't mean we didn't also learn the lessons they taught us. If people have faith in the Dumbest Generation, I'm sure we will turn out just fine.

The Dumbest Generation Three Peat

"Born between roughly 1980 and 1994, the Millennials have already ben pegged and defined by academics, trend spotters, and futurist: They are smart but impatient. They expect results immediately. They carry an arsenal of electronic devices - the more portable the better. Raised amid a barrage of information, they are able to juggle a conversation on Instant Messenger, a Web-surfing session, and an iTunes playlist while reading Twelfth Night for homework." This quote came from the third chapter entitled "Screen Time". This statement amazes me because it is entirely true. The way we were raised, we have everything we need within seconds. If we need an answer Google will give it to us within one second of hitting search. Now they even give it to you before you even finish spelling out the word in the search box. This extremely short wait time has made us very impatient though. For example, if my computer takes more than five seconds to load a page or an email I go nuts and can't belive the internet is acting up so bad. Then I sit back and think about how regular mail takes about three days to get to you and how my parents had to either pick up a landline or wait till the next day at school to talk with their friends. I am currently listening to my iTunes, browsing Facebook, and writing this blog post. All of this is going on with the TV on behind me. Not until I started reading this book did I realize how much technology is in my life, and not only that, but how much I've mastered it. It has been a joke in my house that I have been the family IT guy since third grade, but it's true. Since then I was able to take apart our computer, figure out what was wrong, and fix it. All this was done without any training or experience at all. Since I grew up with all this around it was all natural. All I have to do is press a bunch of buttons in the right order or plug one thing in and everything works exactly how I want it to. Me being able to do this just makes me think of people younger than me. I didn't have a computer until about first or second grade. I have three little cousins who are two years old and another who is six. Even now they are playing on computers and with gameboys. In a few years they will probably know more about computers and technology than I do. The pace at which we are moving is crazy and I havn't even thought about it until now.

Dumbest Generation Part Two

"Book reading doesn't seem to improve young people's money and prospects, so why do it?"(67) This is the basic message that Mark Bauerlein is spreading in the second chapter of this book called "The New Bibliophobes". At first I had no idea what a bibliophobe was. So naturally as part of the Dumbest Generation, I googled it. I came to learn that a bibliophobe was someone who hates reading.

This seems to match perfectly with people our age. As a high school senior I am proud to say that I did end up reading all the books assigned in my English classes throughout my four years in high school. However, plenty of my friends made it by without even purchasing the book at all. To be honest, instead of using the three and a half months to read this book and get these blogs done, I waited until the very last possible second. So to be a bibliophobe is dead on. But like Bauerlein points out, reading isn't really helping me progress in life and because of that I don't spend too much time with it. I want to go to college and study to be an architect so I can design homes and communities that create their own energy. When will knowing Hamlet's second soliloquy help me do this? In order to get ahead in the business world that I will be entering in about five or six years I will need to be able to communicate with others quickly and be able to get ideas across a firm of other architects so we can decide on how to go about our next project. Even the classes I have already taken in high school have been solely on the computer. We spend about four weeks learning the computer program and after that short period of time we are so familiar with it and pick it up so quickly that we can whip together an entire floor plan and three dimensional model right on the computer in about two weeks. This is the skill that will help me get ahead in my chosen career path, not reading books by dead authors. This area of bibliophobia is indeed one area that I am proud to call myself a member of the Dumbest Generation. My technological skills will be able to get me ahead of the pack even though right now plenty of older people don't see that.

Dumbest Generation Numero Uno

Chapter one of The Dumbest Generation is called Knowledge Deficits. It talks about how our generation is increasingly growing dumber and dumber. Seeing as I am a part of this so called "Dumbest Generation", I am initially offended by this statement. However, after reading this chapter I am somewhat ashamed of myself. This chapter talked about many tests that current high school seniors were given and how they scored compared to seniors in the past. When seeing the scores at first I figured that I was going to be an exception to this statement because I come from such a great school system with very qualified teachers. Then I read some of the questions. At that point my self confidence was shattered. At first I was laughing at some of the questions that kids were getting wrong. Students were naming Japan, Germany, and Italy as our allies in World War II instead of the Soviet Union. Others couldn't explain why some doorways were marked COLORED ENTRANCE. I thought those kids had to be entirely uneducated to not be able to answer such simple questions. Then came this fact: "only one-third recognized the American general at Yorktown, and less than one-fourth identified James Madison as the 'father of the Constitution'". My laughter was gone. Who is the general at Yorktown and wasn't Thomas Jefferson the guy who created the Constitution? From that point on I fully took responsibility for being part of this Dumbest Generation. Mark Bauerlein, the author, explains our stupidity as coming from "their games, their socializing, and their spending." Our dependency on the Internet and on our cell phones and iPods and other technologies has kept us entertained enough to not worry about things that our parents may have thought as important when they were in high school.