The things we do for our spawn...

[mrodgers]

I’m 41 and I had computer classes in elementary school. Frankly, my tech skills are abysmal and I wish I’d gotten a stronger foundation in learning those things when I was younger.

OT: At 49, we had our first computer in 3rd grade. 1 computer in the school district. Something like 12 elementary schools, Jr. High building in town, Intermediate building on this hill top and the Senior High over on that hill top. I don't think I saw another computer until 10th grade ('89) when we had new programming classes. I did BASIC, Pascal, and Fortran programming. I don't remember any of that.

Friends up the road in high school had a Commodore 64. We played games on it. It was amazing, LOL.

 

[monsterkitty]

I had swim practice at 4:30 every morning. We had to leave the house at 4:15. My older sister would get up early and practice the piano. When she learned "The Entertainer" we got to listen to that every morning for months.

 

[bethbuchall]

I remember once in my pre-child life, a co-worker was complaining that his vacuum cleaner wasn’t good because it didn’t pick up crayons. I told him that you’re supposed to pick up the crayons yourself instead of trying to vacuum them. I’ve thought of that conversation every time I stubbornly tried to vacuum up something instead of picking it up myself (though I’ve never tried to vacuum up crayons).

We also had conversations about how I’d NEVER allow eating in my car. Hahahaha!

 

[Lilsia]

FWIW in elementary school we did learn even back then computing. You learned typing lessons, you played computer games (where in the world is carmen sandiego and hello oregon trail (II for more my age group). I had a v-tech laptop when I was really young. There's no way any kid in the last 30 years starts computer stuff until middle or high school unless the school did not have funds for computers. I grew up in the 90s and early 2000s and we def. had computer stuff. Now I didn't have a personal computer at home til 5th or 6th grade but I was doing all these computer things at school. What generation are you talking about that didn't have computer classes in elementary school? Cuz it wasn't Millennials..we did.

What kids have nowadays is really just increased technology but it's not new. I do think you have a point about balance. Balance out the tablet and iPad with non-screen based learning. Balance out basic life skills with more high-tech ones.

(ETA: oh oh I remember encarta 95 OMG that thing I spent hours on. I liked it much better on my dad's DSL than my mom's dial up though )

Maybe that depends on where you were. For us(I am 48) that stuff wasn't until junior high. My children(20 &21) also did not get any of that in elementary school. Like I said, I know that computers are in every day life now. But my point was that even if a child does not have access to one at a young age, they are not going to be "behind" in life in any way. It's not like learning that stuff takes a lifetime. Some people are so afraid that if they don't give their preschooler a tablet, that they are somehow going to be disadvantaged in life and that is just not true.

 

[tvguy]

I’m 41 and I had computer classes in elementary school. Frankly, my tech skills are abysmal and I wish I’d gotten a stronger foundation in learning those things when I was younger.

Computer skills have been critical for Kindergarteners on up since the pandemic started and school shifted from the classroom to remote.
Actually, my former employer was shocked to learn when they shifted us to remote work almost two years ago at many employees had no computer or internet at home. Not sure about computer skills as these are people that used company computers and internet 40 hours a week without issue. They also apparently used the bosses computers and internet for all their online needs.

 

[tvguy]

Maybe that depends on where you were. For us(I am 48) that stuff wasn't until junior high. My children(20 &21) also did not get any of that in elementary school. Like I said, I know that computers are in every day life now. But my point was that even if a child does not have access to one at a young age, they are not going to be "behind" in life in any way. It's not like learning that stuff takes a lifetime. Some people are so afraid that if they don't give their preschooler a tablet, that they are somehow going to be disadvantaged in life and that is just not true.

Interesting. My kids are 36 and 31 and they had computers starting in preschool and every grade level on up. Only one per classroom but that was a part of their schooling.

 

[luvsvacation]

Before I had kids I knew exactly what kind of parent I was going to be. I even remember writing out my baby’s daily schedule before she was born. My mom laughed at me. I am one of the rare ones who did stick to exactly what I said I was going to do. I will say I worked in the infant room of a daycare for 2 years and was a nanny to 3 children, one of whom was a newborn, for another 2 years, so I did have a pretty good idea going in what I wanted to do. For those years when my kids were babies/toddlers/pre-schoolers/elementary school I was quite proud of myself. I had a plan, I stuck to it…and then they started growing up I realized I had never dealt with tweens or teens, I had no plan. Actually I did have somewhat of a plan, I was going to be pretty tough and strict and make them pay for everything themselves including college (like my husband and I did). Well DD is currently a sophomore in a college that we pay for She pays 300 a month towards it and we pay the rest (tuition & dorm). I actually ended up being the most laid back of all their friends parents! Totally did not see that coming! They are 18 & 19 now and I am back to parenting the way I thought I would. I always knew that when they got to be adults I would let them do their own thing and just be here as a friend who can give guidance when asked. So all in all I’d say I’ve stuck with my plan except those awkward years of 11-16ish when I felt like I had no clue what I was doing!!

 

[Cheburashka]

Our "spawn"? Lol. Am I the only one this reminds of V.C. Andrews novels?

 

[TCRAIG]

My husband and I agreed - First it was no car - then it was an old beater car - then returning home from a business trip for our daughter’s 15th birthday - there it was - a brand new car in the driveway - she and her dad just went to ‘look’ and bingo - he folded faster than Superman doing his laundry

 

[Mackenzie Click-Mickelson]

Some people are so afraid that if they don't give their preschooler a tablet, that they are somehow going to be disadvantaged in life and that is just not true.

I do think it's advanced to teach coding and robotics young (we did not have that at my schooling though the district my husband was in does have that in high school levels in special academies or a fancy way of saying programs-my husband did robotics in high school).

Part of why Millennials and younger generations do well with tech is because we were exposed to it. Middle Millennials (where I fall into as I'm not quite considered a Geriatric Millennial lol) remember dial up or not having personal computers at home but we were exposed to tech and just kept up with it adjusting over time. I remember a flip phone (I never had a pager but I knew friends that did) and T9 but easily moved into slider phones (that had the full QWERTY keyboard) and then into smart phones. My mom had computing (62) skills but struggles on laptops (especially touch screen ones) and smart phones but she can do accounting on the computer better than I can.

Maybe disadvantage is a strong description but unless a school lacks funding generally these kids have this stuff around them. If you aren't exposed to it at school and you don't have friends who have it and you don't have it at home you probably are going to be behind by the time you get to middle and most especially high school just because of a comfortability level in skill mastery. But that's probably rare that someone has zero exposure til late.

Kids also see their parents on their cell phones and have done a darn good job at mimicking what they do. Majority of people have smart phones and kids are likely to have watched their parent at some point. That's exposure right there. Kids see swiping, and buttons being pressed and associate icons, etc. And that is the relevant tech these days as opposed to old clunky computers of my elementary school days.

For us(I am 48) that stuff wasn't until junior high.

Another poster answered they were 41 and had it. I'm 33 we def. had that stuff. Personal computers weren't really a thing until 4th,5th, and 6th grade but by then we had already been learning on computers and using them fairly consistently. My husband (32) and I used to fondly talk about how we learned typing. My school did a piece of printer paper taped over the keyboard, his did like a cardboard box. Floppy discs? Gosh I remember those.

Age has something to do with what part of schooling you got exposed to it when we're talking about the past when we didn't have the same tech but you mentioned 20s and up. I could see hardcore typing lessons going by the waste side because traditional keyboards aren't as common but yeah. Even if you say your kids didn't exactly what we had they were exposed to what was the prevalent technology at that time in school. Stuff evolves. I don't expect them to teach WPM for typing but using apps (vs what we had which was computer programs often on cd-rom discs), good internet searching, etc is what is more relevant. Kids submit homework via tablets, they know this stuff. Not all parents have money for tablets or laptops for home usage (or choose to allow this) though for home usage.

You mentioned about young people making change, that is something that when I was in retail was an issue anyways for all ages and I've had my own fair share in the past with even cashiers not being able to do it.

I think now it's a problem just borne out of less dealings with cash in general. TBH maybe employers need to do refresher courses on this for all employees. I remember JCP way back in the day (when cash was much more common) part of our training was doing stuff like this. Not so much counting lessons but just giving different scenarios.

These days there really isn't plenty of time to get to technology when much of our world is technology. You can resist it or embrace it.

FTR I'm not advocating for giving your preschooler everything out there but I can't pretend that my young v-tech laptop loving self didn't have at least something at a young age.

This was my v-tech and boy do I miss it, the cartridges that you could insert to play games (numbers, patterns, etc)

 

[Mackenzie Click-Mickelson]

no computer or internet at home.

Didn't you say your coworkers when you were working were under 30s? Streaming is a way of life, unless they couldn't afford it they had wifi. They may not have had a laptop or home desktop but a desktop is rare these days and a laptop is not as common either. Many people just use their phones or have smart tvs or firestick, roku, etc. If I was expected to do work stuff at home long term the company should be providing me with a computer or paying for one. My husband has a work laptop, he doesn't do personal stuff on the work laptop and doesn't do work stuff on his personal laptop. When my mom went remote she brought home her work laptop (that they had only started switching to maybe a year prior to the pandemic).

 

[tvguy]

Didn't you say your coworkers when you were working were under 30s? Streaming is a way of life, unless they couldn't afford it they had wifi. They may not have had a laptop or home desktop but a desktop is rare these days and a laptop is not as common either. Many people just use their phones or have smart tvs or firestick, roku, etc. If I was expected to do work stuff at home long term the company should be providing me with a computer or paying for one. My husband has a work laptop, he doesn't do personal stuff on the work laptop and doesn't do work stuff on his personal laptop. When my mom went remote she brought home her work laptop (that they had only started switching to maybe a year prior to the pandemic).

Yes, most are under 30. And yes, I have seen them streaming programming on their work computer pre-pandemic after their work hours. Or doing online shopping on their lunch hour etc. My daughter works at the same place I did. She was allowed to work remotely 2 days a week, but required to work in the building 3 days a week. 2 of those in building days were Saturday and Sunday since they have to have at least one person in her job classification physically in the building, and she was the only one working weekends. She opted not to take home a company laptop. The computer she built is much faster. She used her computer for the newsroom software and to watch the newscast she was working on, her cell phone for Zoom which they used their entire shift, and purchased a Surface for the communication system they use during live newscasts. She could have used just one computer for all, except then you have audio conflicts with the three systems you are using and would constantly have to me switching between audio sources.

 

[Lilsia]

I do think it's advanced to teach coding and robotics young (we did not have that at my schooling though the district my husband was in does have that in high school levels in special academies or a fancy way of saying programs-my husband did robotics in high school).

Part of why Millennials and younger generations do well with tech is because we were exposed to it. Middle Millennials (where I fall into as I'm not quite considered a Geriatric Millennial lol) remember dial up or not having personal computers at home but we were exposed to tech and just kept up with it adjusting over time. I remember a flip phone (I never had a pager but I knew friends that did) and T9 but easily moved into slider phones (that had the full QWERTY keyboard) and then into smart phones. My mom had computing (62) skills but struggles on laptops (especially touch screen ones) and smart phones but she can do accounting on the computer better than I can.

Maybe disadvantage is a strong description but unless a school lacks funding generally these kids have this stuff around them. If you aren't exposed to it at school and you don't have friends who have it and you don't have it at home you probably are going to be behind by the time you get to middle and most especially high school just because of a comfortability level in skill mastery. But that's probably rare that someone has zero exposure til late.

Kids also see their parents on their cell phones and have done a darn good job at mimicking what they do. Majority of people have smart phones and kids are likely to have watched their parent at some point. That's exposure right there. Kids see swiping, and buttons being pressed and associate icons, etc. And that is the relevant tech these days as opposed to old clunky computers of my elementary school days.

Another poster answered they were 41 and had it. I'm 33 we def. had that stuff. Personal computers weren't really a thing until 4th,5th, and 6th grade but by then we had already been learning on computers and using them fairly consistently. My husband (32) and I used to fondly talk about how we learned typing. My school did a piece of printer paper taped over the keyboard, his did like a cardboard box. Floppy discs? Gosh I remember those.

Age has something to do with what part of schooling you got exposed to it when we're talking about the past when we didn't have the same tech but you mentioned 20s and up. I could see hardcore typing lessons going by the waste side because traditional keyboards aren't as common but yeah. Even if you say your kids didn't exactly what we had they were exposed to what was the prevalent technology at that time in school. Stuff evolves. I don't expect them to teach WPM for typing but using apps (vs what we had which was computer programs often on cd-rom discs), good internet searching, etc is what is more relevant. Kids submit homework via tablets, they know this stuff. Not all parents have money for tablets or laptops for home usage (or choose to allow this) though for home usage.

You mentioned about young people making change, that is something that when I was in retail was an issue anyways for all ages and I've had my own fair share in the past with even cashiers not being able to do it.

I think now it's a problem just borne out of less dealings with cash in general. TBH maybe employers need to do refresher courses on this for all employees. I remember JCP way back in the day (when cash was much more common) part of our training was doing stuff like this. Not so much counting lessons but just giving different scenarios.

These days there really isn't plenty of time to get to technology when much of our world is technology. You can resist it or embrace it.

FTR I'm not advocating for giving your preschooler everything out there but I can't pretend that my young v-tech laptop loving self didn't have at least something at a young age.

This was my v-tech and boy do I miss it, the cartridges that you could insert to play games (numbers, patterns, etc)
View attachment 642023

We are talking about the very young here. Do you truly believe that if someone under the age of 10 does not get computer training that they will forever be "behind" everyone else and be a total computer illiterate? That makes zero sense. Like I said, where we live, we did not get any computer training until junior high, and that was the most basic of basics for only a quarter of a semester, not even half of the school year. And there were no coding classes in our HS either. Guess what? My husband is a programmer and a damned good one that has been with his company for 26 years. He learned after HS. So it didn't hinder him in any way to not learn about computers until adulthood. There is zero evidence that supports giving children technology at such a young age makes any difference when they get older.

 

[prestoncaldwell]

We are talking about the very young here. Do you truly believe that if someone under the age of 10 does not get computer training that they will forever be "behind" everyone else and be a total computer illiterate? That makes zero sense. Like I said, where we live, we did not get any computer training until junior high, and that was the most basic of basics for only a quarter of a semester, not even half of the school year. And there were no coding classes in our HS either. Guess what? My husband is a programmer and a damned good one that has been with his company for 26 years. He learned after HS. So it didn't hinder him in any way to not learn about computers until adulthood. There is zero evidence that supports giving children technology at such a young age makes any difference when they get older.

I learned after high school, too. "Left behind" is a very strong (and loaded) term. I simply think exposure to tech will enhance her experience as she makes her way thriugh her education. You seem to be rabidly against young chikdren learning tech, to the point of suggesting that it will render her incapable of making change.

 

[Lilsia]

I learned after high school, too. "Left behind" is a very strong (and loaded) term. I simply think exposure to tech will enhance her experience as she makes her way thriugh her education. You seem to be rabidly against young chikdren learning tech, to the point of suggesting that it will render her incapable of making change.

I love how you guys like to twist whatever people say. Please try to comprehend what I am saying. I never said that I am not against it, I just don't see it as necessary at such a young age and it most definitely won't hinder them in life to not have access to a computer as a toddler, like some of you seem to think. That is all that I am saying, your child will not suffer any lasting ills if they do not have access to a computer at that age. And replacing life skills with computer classes in third grade, is not a good idea.

 

[SirDuff]

I learned after high school, too. "Left behind" is a very strong (and loaded) term. I simply think exposure to tech will enhance her experience as she makes her way thriugh her education. You seem to be rabidly against young chikdren learning tech, to the point of suggesting that it will render her incapable of making change.

As if, somehow, making change is some sort of important marker?

 

[sam_gordon]

I love how you guys like to twist whatever people say. Please try to comprehend what I am saying. I never said that I am not against it, I just don't see it as necessary at such a young age and it most definitely won't hinder them in life to not have access to a computer as a toddler, like some of you seem to think. That is all that I am saying, your child will not suffer any lasting ills if they do not have access to a computer at that age. And replacing life skills with computer classes in third grade, is not a good idea.

But the fact they've had access to a computer as a toddler has nothing to do with with people not being able to make change in their head. There's a lot of things getting "left out" of education... art, music, physical education, and yes, "life skills".

 

[Mackenzie Click-Mickelson]

Yes, most are under 30. And yes, I have seen them streaming programming on their work computer pre-pandemic after their work hours. Or doing online shopping on their lunch hour etc. My daughter works at the same place I did. She was allowed to work remotely 2 days a week, but required to work in the building 3 days a week. 2 of those in building days were Saturday and Sunday since they have to have at least one person in her job classification physically in the building, and she was the only one working weekends. She opted not to take home a company laptop. The computer she built is much faster. She used her computer for the newsroom software and to watch the newscast she was working on, her cell phone for Zoom which they used their entire shift, and purchased a Surface for the communication system they use during live newscasts. She could have used just one computer for all, except then you have audio conflicts with the three systems you are using and would constantly have to me switching between audio sources.

So they likely had wifi at home. You always describe your prior coworkers as some helpless babies, they probably were a lot more resourceful than many of the older workers. Maybe that is why most of the talk usually has a "get off my lawn" vibe. **Understand there will be less resourceful employees always no matter the time period we're talking about

 

[Mackenzie Click-Mickelson]

We are talking about the very young here. Do you truly believe that if someone under the age of 10 does not get computer training that they will forever be "behind" everyone else and be a total computer illiterate? That makes zero sense. Like I said, where we live, we did not get any computer training until junior high, and that was the most basic of basics for only a quarter of a semester, not even half of the school year. And there were no coding classes in our HS either. Guess what? My husband is a programmer and a damned good one that has been with his company for 26 years. He learned after HS. So it didn't hinder him in any way to not learn about computers until adulthood. There is zero evidence that supports giving children technology at such a young age makes any difference when they get older.

This is a bit like your conversation over on the all-inclusive thread in so much that what gets talks about changes. Don't take my conversation to be champion another poster, they raised their kid their way in what way they thought was best, but you came at them like because they introduced more advanced computer things their knowledge was being gapped elsewhere and they were going to be incompetent in counting change just because that's what you've experienced in your life.

And replacing life skills with computer classes in third grade, is not a good idea.

I think this is where you're not quite up and up. People aren't replacing life skills with computer classes that implies that schools have always taught a large bulk of life skills and we all know that ain't the truth. By in large in the U.S. there has always been some things that were considered parental responsibilities and educational by way of schooling responsibilities. Sure get annoyed that people have issues counting change (which has existed for like all time) but when I was in school I wished they had taught us how to fill out FAFSA (which was on the computer), how to do taxes (on the computer) and I wish they had done a lot more with excel (that somehow came up a lot over my work career) earlier on because the basic stuff wasn't cutting it. Some of the math stuff I've never used in my life.

Have you ever seen the memes where people say what they wished they had learned about? Or one that are things that they teach that have very few opportunities for even coming up in life? Take technology for the fact that understanding how to work it is a life skill and has been for several decades at this point. One that has changed over time (like my conversation about WPM and typing lessons swapping out for app usages and turning in homework) but the ability to use tablets, phones, computers, etc is the way of life these days and starting early is usually just by things that are occurring at the home and seems to allow the kids to be more natural about the current technology; how advanced you go is up to the parent. I'm not saying buy the latest tech for your toddler but the amount of paying attention they do to the people around them it's clear they pick up this stuff fast and no surprise they are young where that stuff can be picked up faster. It's basically their version of a foreign language lol.

I saw how my older employees struggled with navigation on the computers I was even paired up with one on trying to help her learn better on looking and looking quickly for the answers. These things came naturally to me because I had been working on computers since my elementary school days and just evolved over time with faster internet, with knowing how to google, etc. There will always be some people who pick things up quickly. Your husband's story does not mean it's the same for everyone.

 

[VandVsmama]

I think it's funny & ironic that in a thread titled "The things we do for our spawn," intended to poke fun at ourselves for all of the things we swore we wouldn't do when we had kids, some of y'all are arguing about the things done for kids.