What, Me Think? (was RE: clarification needed)

[Walter Crockett <walter -dot- crockett -at- informix -dot- com>]

Lisa Miller writes:

"Last September, I began teaching Freshman Composition.  I was somewhat
surprised
at the lack of concern given to punctuation by my students.  I was also
surprised at the lack of hard knowledge my students had about punctuation.
Most
seemed unwilling to correct their lack of knowledge through study.  

"While this can be attributed to just "being a freshman," I think it may
indicate
an overall sloppiness that seems to be creeping into our society.  For
instance,
these same students seemed to lack the ability to grasp critical thinking
(that
ability to systematically resolve a problem)  skills as well.  To generalize
boldly, I am coming to believe that we are becoming more sloppy in our
thinking
and this is evident in the degradation the standards that shape our
language.

"Thoughts?"

My father was a professor of social psychology at the University of Kansas
and several other colleges from the mid '50s to the late '80s. In the '80s
he stopped enjoying teaching, particularly teaching undergraduates. He felt,
and many of his colleagues agreed, that students in that decade no longer
enjoyed thinking. In fact, he said, many students became downright indignant
if an assignment required them to think, rather than to regurgitate the
facts he handed them. 

I don't believe the situation has improved since then. It sounds trite, but
I imagine television is much to blame: we no longer have to work to be
entertained. Young people don't read as much, and they certainly don't play
music as much as they did thirty years ago. Both activities are critical to
the ability to think. In addition, educated people neither converse nor
correspond as they did 50 years ago. In my parents' day, people used to have
parties and talk and argue. Today we have parties and blather. In my
parents' day, people used to write letters. Today they send emails, and
worse, instant messages. 

The real challenge for our country, or for our culture I should say, is to
move thinking, writing, conversing and the playing of music back into
something resembling the mainstream.    

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