Comments on: Don't Know Much About History…

Kids These Days — Are 17-Year-Olds Losing Touch With Cultural References?

[erasmus6]

"A new survey of 17-year-olds found that when asked which year Columbus sailed the ocean blue, 26 percent did not say 1492."

Who cares? What''s a measley DATE, when a lot can''t even find their own country on a freakin'' map! They know nothing about their own country, and nothing about any other country.

And it ain''t just about THIS generation, it is all generations.

"Closing that gap between teens and their parents may be the real test."

Well, where I live, the gap between teens and their parents is getting closer together as time goes by. The gap between my kids and myself is a lot closer than it was between me and my parents or between my parents and their parents.

[ianlou]

In the history of the United States of America there have only been three presidents who have hit a Presidential Triple Play being that they got elected, reelected and kept their party in the Whitehouse with the next presidential election. They are George Washington, Franklin D. Roosevelt, and Ronald Reagan.
Posted by ianlou

Opps, FDR died in office, Only Washington and Reagan are on this very exclusive list!

[gunownerdan]

Dirty Democrats and Rotten Republicans are DUMBING-DOWN AMERICA.
Politicians can control you much easier if you don''t know or care about history.

[runningralph]

Charlotte76,
You are correct, of course. Men are required. What has changed is the indiscriminate part. Women used to be more careful with whom they bred. I know women who have taken up with men they met online- with bad results as you might expect. I know a pretty 20 year old who took up with a man with a sixth grade education and 3 *** children he made no effort to support. So she gave him one more and went back to work in the fast food restaurant. Welfare is survival of the unfittest.

[ianlou]

Here''s some history for the young voter:
In the history of the United States of America there have only been three presidents who have hit a Presidential Triple Play being that they got elected, reelected and kept their party in the Whitehouse with the next presidential election. They are George Washington, Franklin D. Roosevelt, and Ronald Reagan.
George Bush Junior does not belong nor deserve to be part of this exclusive list.
Send this failed president a clear message, Vote Democrat in this election.

[briannorwood]

You know, I get a kick out of older folks bemoaning how the younger kids have not sense of history.

They forget that the reason they know alot of history is that they lived through alot of it!

I''m sure this complaint is as old as dirt too!

[Razzl]

It is now and always has been bogus to expect teenagers in that age bracket to have a wealth of historical or literary cultural references on the tip of their tongues. The knowledge they have of computers and technology is deep and real, but the kinds of people who do the "cultural reference" tests probably don''t even have the basic knowledge to ask them the right questions about those fields. And if you ask them questions about current film stars or musicians, they would probably embarass you as an out-of-touch fogey who doesn''t know a fraction of what they do.

This old accusation about cultural illiteracy is a red-herring issue that''s been going on since the ''50''s when the first generation of pre-war parents who learned the old way, from rote, felt resentment toward a world that didn''t do that kind of education any more. Of course, references to educational history are something the surveyors themselves might not do so well with...

[charlotte76-2009]

Your history may be great, Ralph, but your biology sucks. Last I checked, it''s not just women who engage in propogation. There has to be a man involved in there somewhere.

[skyk-2009]

That will do some good, however, until the curriculum changes and truth is put BACK in education, no hope of success.
Looking at public school textbooks today, they are nothing like those I used in the 60s-70s.



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Posted by Klingon69 at 09:56 AM : Feb 27, 2008
+ report abuse

LOL I sure hope not!! When you look at all the changes that have come about since then IF the books contained the same or simular we''d be in even more trouble. Nancy is right. I teach at a Community College and even there we have lost several of our best and brightest because they could not afford to teach anymore. Text''s are only guides and the secret to a good teacher is the ability to challenge students to think for themselves. To take what is in their text an apply it to life and the world around them. That takes SKILL and that Skill is NOT being rewarded.

[klingon69]

And so it is that we pay teachers a barely liveable wage... Ya want smart children? Pay teachers $120K/year and reduce the wages to Gov''''t contracted security firms.

Regards,
Posted by Nancy_Naive at 09:51 AM : Feb 27, 2008
That will do some good, however, until the curriculum changes and truth is put BACK in education, no hope of success.
Looking at public school textbooks today, they are nothing like those I used in the 60s-70s.