Posted on 11/13/2008 9:44:50 AM PST by Sopater
Today's American high school students are far likelier than those in the 1970s to believe they'll make outstanding spouses, parents and workers, new research shows.
They're also much more likely to claim they are "A" students with high IQs -- even though other research shows that today's students do less homework than their counterparts did in the 1970s.
The findings, published in the November issue of Psychological Science, support the idea that the "self-esteem" movement popular among today's parents and teachers may have gone too far, the study's co-author said.
"What this shows is that confidence has crossed over into overconfidence," said Jean Twenge, an associate professor of psychology at San Diego State University.
She believes that decades of relentless, uncritical boosterism by parents and school systems may be producing a generation of kids with expectations that are out of sync with the challenges of the real world.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
Whereas I was a “C” student, at best, with an IQ that is two standard deviations above normal.
IQ is meaningless without effort.
I couldn't have achieved it without your support.
No, THEY are so screwed. Once we are into full depression, Their self esteem will really come tumbling down while they are picking weeds out of vegetable fields.
my generation needs a great depression, or a world war to wake up to reality. It may be too late for them, but thats fine with me. More opportunities for someone like me who knows the importance of hard work.
The natural result of parental discipline being discouraged in our culture, the ‘consume at all costs today and don’t worry about paying for it tomorrow’ ethos of our society, and everything but academics being the focus of public education.
It’s not about what’s right. It’s about how you feel. Add to it the natural jealousy/envy/rivalry of adolescence and you have the makings of a perfect storm. American youth suffer from a bad case of entitlementialism. Unfortunately, their parents do as well.
We as a nation cannot have an economic downturn, though that is an inevitable part of a market economy. We operate as though things must always be better, no matter the cost. It’s why our government is leveraged to the hilt and why many households are so too.
The American Dream is now an entitlement. And that is why our economy and government are thrashing about.
Nobody in this country has the courage to say “no” to the demands of anyone else.
How does a civilization in which everyone believes they are above average survive?
They voted themselves Obama because they were afraid of war. Not realizing that if we let countries push us around, their economic well being is going to be gone. That’s how dumb these kiddies are.
To quote the rock band Cracker “I hate my generation”.
They know very little and have no skills (not all of course) but they are very proud of it. My wife and I in our 60s find ourselves having mini-courses on customer relations with teen clerks and cashiers. Dumb as fence posts, the cell phone generation that walks around staring at their cell phones. Amazing.
Then there’s the refreshing exception that has taken the effort to learn his products, meets people well and has manners, obviously headed for success and raised RIGHT. We do compliment those kids and try to make an effort to advise their bosses/business owner.
Here’s hoping the clueless catch on quickly because life will certainly catch up with them fast and not nearly so kindly.
and few of them were issued thinking caps.............
Having seen up close the competition and discipline in schools in China and India, and the excellent students they produce (at least at the middle and top) I fear that the next generation of American kids are going to be serving coffee to their Indian and Chinese masters in 25 years....
Probably many of them truly are “A” students, since the bar has been lowered so much. Today’s “A” students were 1960s “C” students.
The natural result of parental discipline being discouraged in our culture
beginning with delaying toilet training until pre-school. after all, we don’t want to traumatize them for life.
You suck for having posted this drivel. You have done nothing worthy of being called an accomplishment on this forum. You will never amount to anything on FreeRepublic or anywhere else in life. Go away and take your precious self-esteem with you, loser! :-)
My kids feel better about themselves then I did, and I’m happy about that.
My parents have never encouraged me or told me that I was doing anything well. It made me very distant fromt them, even to this day.
I congratulate my kids for things they do well - being nice, good maners, good grades, working hard, etc.
My 14 year old son is much smarter than I was at his age. He is taking much harder courses than I ever did. He is in Honors Alg 2 in 9th grade, and will finish 2 years of college math before he graduates.
He’s in honors biology in 9th grade, and I never even took biology.
He’s read more books than I ever did growing up, and he reads them quickly and comprehends them.
I don’t know what my IQ is, but his is over 130. Mine is not that high.
That's not what leads to the problems with too much self-esteem. Of course you're supposed to compliment kids for the things they do right. On the other hand, when they do something bad, you're supposed to discourage such behavior.
Many parents, unfortunately, are unwilling to do the second part. So, you have kids who are raised with the illusion that they can't do any wrong.
“You deserve a trophy for this post.
And you should get a participation ribbon for your post.”
Everybody wins! ;)
So we’ll have a bunch of fast food employees who feel good about themselves.
How many parents lack the will to stop supporting these children and force them to provide for themselves once they finish high school?
What if they attend college and are ultimately forced to face the fact that their ‘A’ grades in high school and stratospheric IQ isn’t enough to pass?
My wife’s brother fits this profile. He got a full ride to a very good private university. I think it took him about 3 semesters to piss it all away. Finally he was forced to make it on his own and he started at the bottom in retail. Now he’s running his own store and making good money for someone his age w/o a college degree.
Reality (ie taking care of yourself) is what will turn many of these kids into useful members of society. Unfortunately, the current dominant political view is that reality is not something the populace should be forced to deal with.
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