'What They Remember' -- 18-yr-old Mindset

Parents Forum Parent Cafe
#1

<p>D and I were watching an old episode of Star Trek this w/end, and at one point Kirk and the crew left their communicators on a table (episode: 'Miri') and they got swiped.</p>

<p>So I said, "That was stupid, they forgot their cell phones."
And D said, "Yeah".</p>

<p>And I thought for a minute, and said "Nobody had cell phones in those days. Those aren't cell phones."
And she said "What do you mean?"</p>

<p>See where this is going? So I started to think of all the things our kids who are 17-18 and graduating from high school take for granted, because they don't remember NOT having them.</p>

<p>Every year Beloit College publishes the "College Mindset List", here's last year's:
Beloit</a> College Mindset List</p>

<p>That's good stuff, but some of it is written too "cute", and anyway, I'm interested things that our kids take for granted, that we might be surprised to have to explain. So how about we CC Parents start our own list (if it repeats stuff from the Beloit List, fine, it's individual to US and our kids). Let's go:</p>

<ol>
<li> They don't remember ever having a phone with a cord.</li>
<li> They don't remember any president before Bill Clinton.</li>
<li> There was always CNN and the Cartoon Network.</li>
<li> You could always play movies at home, when you wanted to, and TV shows were on once or twice (reruns), and you couldn't choose when to watch them.</li>
<li> The Pope was Polish.</li>
<li> They were in a car seat until kindergarten, and everybody wore seat belts, and you played Raffi in the car.</li>
<li> The Iron Curtain fell, the Berlin Wall fell, and walls between Israel-Palestine and US-Mexico rose.</li>
<li> You always got money out of the wall.</li>
<li> Everybody they know had a Little Tykes car.</li>
<li>For years, boys wore Power Rangers costumes on Halloween.</li>
<li>Computer games were Magic Tree House, Oregon Trail, and Myst.</li>
<li>Soccer was a basic sport for both boys and girls at every school.</li>
</ol>

#2

<p>About Star Trek: I'm a fan, D not so much. We were talking about the third season, when NBC moved it to Fridays at 10 and basically killed it, since its target audience wasn't home. D had a hard time wrapping her mind around the concept that you had to watch a show when it was on - there were no video recorders!</p>

#3

<p>I think that it can be quite difficult teaching history to children today because they are surrounded by technology. I recall going through a book on the history of war with my son and I had to explain why armies did what they did and the problems with overextending.</p>

<p>There was also the issue of communications as you had to physically send someone or something to communicate. It could be a runner, someone on a horse, a boat, etc. But you couldn't use a Satellite Phone or cell phone to request more troops, water, etc.</p>

#4

<p>never had: white out</p>

<p>my first thought was card catalogue but that was on the list already :)</p>

<p>always had: GAP, Abercrombie & finding your favorite store at any mall anywhere anytime IRL or online</p>

#5

<p>We were at my sisters last week and I noticed an IBM Selectric so we got to show them how it worked. My mother talked about her old Remington Rand (100% mechanical) typewriter. It was interesting talking about how we had to write papers in the old days. Yes, we talked about White-Out, Onion-Skin paper, etc.</p>

#6

<p>My d and her friends were here one day and spotted our turntable and some records. They thought it looked cool and wanted to try it out but none of them could figure out how to work it or else they were scared to try.</p>

#7

<p>^ lol well my kid remembers hearing disco played on a turntable in preschool. That will certainly date her!</p>

<p>Paying for gas at the pump - I carried DD to the payment booths until she was about 2.</p>

<p>And access to drive-throughs generally. Now we use a drive-through for prescription drugs (remember hauling the kid into the pharmacy?) and for fast food. I don't remember drive-throughs being so prevalant in the 80's.</p>

#8

<p>My husband & I had to explain to our daughters what 'ditto' sheets were. Remember the smelly, purple mimeographed worksheets in school before the Xerox days?</p>

<p>They just didn't get it.</p>

#9

<p>always had ritalin</p>

#10

<p>I remember holding the mimeographed paper up to my face when the teacher came in with a fresh pile of tests or worksheets. The smell was very interesting!</p>

<p>Remember when there were one or two kids in your high school who had the "technical" knowledge to run the movie projector. We call them the AV (audio/visual) kids and they were the geeks of the 60/70's. And I swear every movie started with a Mutual of Omaha segment.</p>

#11

<p>Here's a few:</p>

<ul>
<li><p>Taking pictures used to be a Big Deal -- cameras were expensive (not everyone had one), buying film was expensive, getting pictures developed was expensive. I remember that H and I budgeted for 2 rolls of film for our honeymoon -- that was all we could afford! Now, every kid has a camera on his or her cell phone, and snapping extra pictures has no incremental cost to it. Plus, you now see what you've taken, instantly, versus waiting til you got to the drugstore.</p></li>
<li><p>Making phone calls long-distance also used to be a Very Big Deal. You'd wait til after 11 pm when the rates went down. You didn't make a long-distance phone call to someone unless it was extremely important. Students contacted parents by putting in collect calls asking for themselves, the parents would refuse the charges and then call the student back. </p></li>
<li><p>Requests / dedications on the radio. Now, everyone listens to his or her own thing via iPod.</p></li>
<li><p>Bottled water -- remember when you just ate three meals a day, and if you were thirsty in between, you went to a water fountain? You didn't think of actually eating.</p></li>
<li><p>Pay phones.</p></li>
</ul>

#12

<p>
[quote]
Remember when there were one or two kids in your high school who had the "technical" knowledge to run the movie projector.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>Yes, I remember this, because in my sr. year of hs the teacher couldn't figure out how to run the thing, so when no one else did I got up to have a look, and he gave me (female) the dirtiest look.</p>

<p>So generally, I wonder if today's girls feel as much anti-girl scorn as we did? In grade school, in winter during recess, the boys would chant "no girls allowed" - they would hog all the good ice slides. Of course now they don't let kids play in the snow during recess (if they even have recess)...</p>

#13

<p>always had music videos and a flag with 50 stars</p>

#14

<p>Lol - someone may be dating themselves a bit here, as the flag has had 50 stars since 1960.</p>

#15

<p>
[quote]
And access to drive-throughs generally. Now we use a drive-through for prescription drugs (remember hauling the kid into the pharmacy?) and for fast food. I don't remember drive-throughs being so prevalant in the 80's.

[/quote]
No drive through fast food or banks when I was in high school, but our city had a drive through liquor store. Pretty sure those aren't around any more. </p>

<p>I don't think kids can remember not having instant access to the answer to any question. What did we do in high school when we wanted to know the capital of Turkey?</p>

#16

<p>I read about the teenage driver who didn't realize that the metal key on the end of the clicker could also open the car door in a pinch.</p>

#17

<p>I am sure they don't remember the concept of making a PRIVATE phone call. We had one wall phone in our house and it had the longest (and stretched out) cord. To talk on the phone in private, we would go in the closet and shut the door. Of course my dad limited our calls to 5 minutes and my siblings were always banging on the door.</p>

<p>They also don't remember not having air conditioning. We had ONE fan in our house and on hot nights, my mom would put it in the hallway (with all the bedroom doors open) and tried to convince us that if we laid real still the breeze from the fan would somehow reach us. She lied!</p>

<p>This one is embarrassing. About 5 years ago my S2 got a car ride from someone. He pointed to a knob inside the door and said "Mr. Cook, what is this for?" OMG - it was the knob to roll down the window - our cars had electric window buttons and the whole concept of doing it manually was beyond his 10 year old brain.</p>

#18

<p>always had microwaves, food processors</p>

<p>I remember getting a new flag with 50 stars and listening to John Glenn's orbit on the radio in my kindergarten classroom. My parents told me my life was going to be full of amazements. They were so right!</p>

#19

<p>I participated in a history project at my college sorority, and they were amazed at the concept that we had a "typing room" - it was a room on the first floor, away from everything else, soundproofed, and we'd take our Smith-Coronas there and type our term papers, etc. to keep the noise away from everyone else. Of course, with computers, there is minimal noise. They also laughed at the notion that we took turns answering the front door and answering the (pay) phones and we would announce over the intercom, "Mary Smith, you have a caller [if male] / visitor [if female] in the foyer," or "Mary Smith, you have a phone call on Line 3" and then Mary would pick up the pay phone extension on the third floor and talk to her parents / break up with her boyfriend / accept a job offer in full hearing of everyone else on the third floor :-).</p>

#20

<p>Anyone else remember when you didn't have to go through security to get to a gate in an airport? You could just walk up and meet your party?</p>