Why Today's Students Are "Dumbed Down"

My 10 years of substitute teaching experience, as well as 30 years as a full-time teacher in public schools, makes it easy for me to explain why students today are “dumbed down.”

Admittedly, my experience is from a comparison of only three districts; my career district,  a neighboring smaller, but more conservative community, as well as a private Christian district. Nevertheless, I believe it is simply a smaller representation of a nation-wide problem.

While there is an equitable mix of students, I believe the real reason which contributes to their "dumbing down" lies elsewhere.

Having substituted in many different classes over the years at all levels from K-12, the one glaring factor contributing to students learning being less rigorous today is not so much the curriculum content, but the social, and organizational/study skills, combined with the style of discipline enforced in schools; especially in the 3rd - 6th grades.

These formative years are critical to instilling in students that the skills they learn and develop during these years establish the foundation of their future learning experience into their upper grades, of either success or failure. 

While there are varying instructional strategies utilized by many in the profession, it's my experience that very few today demand and maintain expectations that empowers students while holding them accountable for their own learning and behavior.

A teacher who commands and enforces an expectation that a specific order and process of what is appropriate group behavior, such as using common social courtesy of being patient and waiting one's turn before disrupting everyone else in the group is missing.

This kind of dysfunctional environment in the private school doesn't exist for a couple of simple reasons. Parent expectations, home environments that are stable and loving, and social skills having been taught at home bring a functional dynamic to the classroom of the private school. As a result, the prevailing learning environment is one of a much higher quality when it comes to the teacher/student interaction during instruction or Q&A sessions at the same grades in private schools.

Skills taught in public school classes are lacking on how to focus, listen, or even carefully read the directions on the top of the worksheet provided and to think about directions read, or given. Instead, they just give up easily and resort to more disruptive activities.

In my opinion, this situation is occurring in too many classrooms I've substituted in. It exists because their regular instructors either do not consistently command and expect a high level of behavior, or lack those very skills themselves.

Bottom line, those students who want to learn are essentially being held back, or not being challenged. The current situation does not foster a quality experience. 

Here's a great article which points out how the "dumbed down" student then reaches college and becomes thoroughly indoctrinated by the college/university professors; 95% of which are socialists. 

Even MORE informative regarding how our nation's current situation has come to where we find ourselves today, we must go back to an interview in the '80s of a defected KGB agent from the Soviet Union who explains in detail what their plan was to win their long-range war of taking over the United States. THIS IS A MUST WATCH!