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We have zero problem-solving skills. There might be a backpack lying in the path that someone has to go through, and instead of picking it up or going around it, they'll start whining about not knowing what to do. It's like their brains are shutting down . They literally can't think of anything to just get it out of the way. A lot of them spend an entire hour reading and don't read a single word. Greetings. Welcome to another episode of ColdFusion. There is something seriously wrong with Generation Alpha in today's classroom.
I'm not talking about arguing with a teacher over the phone or even using pepper spray. This is a deeper crisis in the modern education system. Of course, there are many smart children who are doing well, but unfortunately, the proportion of children who cannot read, cannot add or subtract, even when they are about to graduate from school, is increasing. I don't know if there's something wrong with my cerebellar cortex, but I can't Read, bro. Teenagers can't read. Not confidently, not freely, and in some cases-not at all The hippopotamus gutted its victim. If this trend continues, it is worth asking what will happen to the future of nations and the world as a whole. If we look deeper into the past, we will see a pattern that leads us to real answers
to difficult questions. What if it's not about the children? What if we are all, each in our own way, responsible for this But, of course, not everything is so bad. At the end of this episode, we'll look at places where this problem is actually being solved right now, today. no secret that education has been in decline for some time. But before we dive into the topic, let's assess the state of affairs today. And to do that, we need to go back. These are kids from the 1960s imagining what the future will be like. The topic of the video is not the main one. What is more important is how they speak and how they formulate their thoughts.
I don't think there will be a nuclear war, but I think there will be all this automation. A large number of people will be left without work. I think something needs to be done about this. Um, people will be perceived more as statistics than as real people. I don't think it will be that good. I mean, there will be some kind of cars everywhere. Everyone will do everything for you. You know, you're going to get so boring and I don't think it's going to be that good. If you look at the comments on this video, everyone is saying that children of the past sounded more eloquent than adults today. The English Instagram page Typical Movie
documents the decline of knowledge and education in real time. the capital of China? Oh my God. I'm thinking about all this. Bangladesh. Now a question for you, yes. What is another name for 1000 years? What is the past tense of the word deliver? How did you get to delivery? Because you take the word deliver and add a Y to the end. I don't know. Okay, no. It is delivered. And this is not just a specially selected group of people. There are hundreds of such videos.
Read the card. Animals Yes, bring it closer, I can't see. President, affection, reflected and deeply ungrateful development viral resilience. According to many sources, Generation Z is officially the first generation that is dumber than the previous one. Of course, this doesn't apply to everyone. There are many smart Gen Zers, but this is an average. So, if this is the state of young adults, what about children? Frankly speaking, not very much. Why? Well, there are many reasons, which we'll talk about later, but the obvious culprit is technology. So let's start with that and see how true it is.
Generation Alpha consists of those born between 2010 and 2024, the oldest of whom are currently 16-17 years old. For them, using a laptop in the classroom has become a prerequisite for learning, but science says it may not be the best idea . Let me explain. Have you ever noticed that when you write something down by hand, you remember the information better? Why is that? It's not that pen and paper are magical, but that the process of writing itself stimulates the brain differently than typing. When students write by hand, their entire brain is activated simultaneously. The areas responsible for memory, sensory
integration, and, most importantly, encoding new information, work together. And while typing, the brain is practically not stimulated. And if you compare those who learn on a computer and those who write by hand, the hand-writing group always wins by a wide margin. One of the leading studies on this topic was published in 2024. This was the result of 20 years of work by Norwegian neuroscientist Audrey van der Meer. Her work showed that handwriting is not a single movement, but a series of thousands of micromovements coordinated by the eyes in real time. During this process, your brain is actually doing some work and solving spatial problems.
You're using your fingers, your complex finger movements, to create shapes on the surface, whereas when you type, it's just simple finger movements that are actually the same for every letter you're trying to write. And that's why children who learned to read and write on a tablet have difficulty distinguishing letters that look similar but are mirror images of each other, for example. This is not just a theory, it has been proven in practice. And that involves limiting the use of computers and going back to the basics: pen and paper.
Why? Because test results are getting worse. The pendulum always swings. I think we've gone too far towards digital in education, and I really think it's now swinging backwards. At Barrenis School, 11th and 12th grade students have the option to use laptops, but most choose not to. Teachers are already seeing the difference. Oh, this is heaven and earth. We are seeing a significant improvement in understanding the material. There is much more work being done, much more dialogue being held, and of course critical thinking has also increased. So do you think devices are making kids dumber? No, I don't think they make kids dumber, because I actually think kids are a lot smarter than us. In my opinion, they prevent children from thinking independently.
Introducing generative AI into the educational process could make the situation even worse. Of course, it has its place, but there is a risk of overusing it. And as The Australian notes regarding Generation Z, alarming research suggests that AI may already have fatally undermined this generation's ability to think, and more importantly, to discern information. Unfortunately, it also turns out that some schools are simply being lazy about using generative AI to create their lessons. Does this card look right to you? If you look closely, Kentucky is "Weneki," Indiana is "Aino Lano," Louisiana is "Lukong," and South Carolina is " Quanto Variety." Well, this map was in the schedule that was given to students at the JCPS school district. The
strange errors don't end there. It appears that a significant portion of this schedule was generated using AI. Banning AI in classrooms entirely may seem like throwing the baby out with the bathwater, but there is a big risk: if AI is not properly integrated, it can be used to replace students' own thinking, which is the exact opposite of education. But let's leave AI aside. Putting that aside, things are bad for Generation Alpha. In 2024, a public school teacher in Maryland, USA, shared a strange experience he had working with his students over the past 10 years. They began to focus on their studies worse than ever and had
trouble with basic reading skills after third grade. He noticed that as the students grew older, these problems only worsened. Business Insider recounts his story, quote: " McGowan, who has a doctorate in education, gives children who have difficulty reading a book upside down and upside down." "They should be able to turn the book over correctly and open it to the first page," he says. " Today, some students can't do that." End of quote. For most adults, this is probably an unthinkable scenario, but the fact is that new devices are changing the brains of adults, and they are causing unknown changes in those now called "iPad kids." They didn't know a world without smartphones, social media, and iPads. According to the Annie E. Casey Foundation,
Gen Alpha children are acquiring portable technology at a younger age than previous generations: 40% have a tablet by the age of two, 58% by the age of four, and almost one in four children has a personal mobile phone by the age of eight. Studies conducted by pediatricians show that short content that impairs adults' attention spans is expected to do the same for children. One teacher told Newsweek: " There have been noticeable changes in student engagement and responsibility. " Many students today seem apathetic and disengaged from their own learning, and it's not just a question of motivation, it's a systemic problem.
Technology is influencing this generation powerfully, both positively and negatively. Students have unlimited access to knowledge-it's a gift, but the price for this gift is instant gratification, making it difficult for students to focus on learning processes that are slow, difficult, or exhausting." End of quote. And again, this is not just a US problem. UNICEF tracks online behavior, and the use of short-form content and the desire for instant gratification are widespread in all countries of the world, and this indicator continues to grow. So, although it's a cliché, the bottom line is that overuse of technology does have some negative effects on students if used incorrectly. But, surprisingly, technology is only a small part of the problem.
There are also long-standing structural problems that have also led to this situation. In the early 1980s, many governments around the world began to notice hidden disparities that could be addressed at a higher level. The United Kingdom was one of the first to tackle this problem. They believed that the lack of regional uniformity caused difficulties. There was no national curriculum. There was no proper systematic methodology for measuring success. Local authorities decided which schools children went to, what books they read, and even what teachers' salaries would be. Seeing this problem, governments got to work.
They began drafting their own legislation that would encourage schools to strive for a uniform educational standard over the next 30 years. Things like the Education Reform Act in the UK, the No Child Left Behind Act in the US, or the National Assessment Program in Australia have become commonplace. The idea was to set common goals for learning. Of course, it's worth noting that these efforts were not identical, but they all introduced standardized testing and promoted transparency. At first, it seemed like a great idea. Theoretically, this new focus meant that teachers would be motivated to ensure their students' success. Schools will compete to be the best, providing the best quality for every student, not just the top performers. And so a lot of
funding was allocated to these initiatives. But along with funding came increased attention. The results of these standardized tests suggest that education is only getting worse, or at best, showing minimal progress. And across all countries the OECD looks at, the decline appears to be much more dramatic between Generation Z and Alpha in math, reading, and science. But that's only part of the story. However, let's focus on reading, because there seems to be a You may have noticed the recent headlines that have been circulating online. American schools report that 40 to 65% of children can no longer read. But while these articles attract general attention, the problem turns out to be much more complex.
These statistics come from the National Assessment of Educational Performance, or NAEP, and they divide readers into three distinct categories in American grades: 4th, 8th, and 12th. Basic, confident and advanced levels. But here's where the fun begins, and it has to do with the average scores on these standardized tests. When it comes to experienced readers, nothing has really changed, at least not more than a few points . In fact, it was the basic level readers who started to fall behind. And again, this is not just about the US, it's happening all over the world. Successful students either stagnate or recover somewhat from previous failures, but those who study below average
quickly find themselves on the sidelines. The gap that standardized testing attempted to close between successful and unsuccessful students is now wider than ever. Standardization is a kind of failed experiment that just doesn't want to die. The unintended consequences of standardization have led to teachers, fearing job loss, being forced to narrow the curriculum, and schools have come under the same pressure. And, as we discussed earlier, while the situation has worsened with Generation Z and Alpha, it is not a new problem. Back in 2007, David Hersh of the University of Rochester outlined some of the extreme consequences of low scores within policies like No Child Left Behind. He argues that standardization has forced teachers to focus lessons on
scores that do not reflect long-term development, but only how much a student can remember in a short time, in order to improve statistics. In 2015, Anya Kamenetz, author of the book The Test, explained how this radically changes the way students learn every day. Not only do they do this, but because of the high stakes involved in testing, districts and schools are spending more and more time preparing for them, as well as administering midterm and final exams-up to 113 tests by the time students graduate. Well, 113 tests seems like an incredible number, but, you know, we've already done a few stories about testing in our program. What surprised you the most in your research? Is it because of the industry that has grown up around it
? Is this a difference in performance between different states? I think it's, you know, given the stakes that we again place on these tests and how much weight people seem to give them. We talk about data-driven decision-making and results as if they were some kind of objective metric, but in reality, psychometricians will tell you that tests are being misused. And what is called " perfection" in the No Child Left Behind law doesn't actually have a single scientific definition. And so there's a real gap, I think, between the level of science that we're working with and the decisions that we're making based on those measurements.
You know, it seems like the seeds were planted decades ago, and this environment, combined with new technologies, has made the situation even more precarious than it was before. When teachers are more constrained than ever before, forced to only prepare for tests combined with shorter attention spans, it's no wonder kids don't care anymore. Teachers are also exhausted from working long hours, and people like Gabe Dennenbring have conducted massive surveys pointing to this as the main reason why teachers decide to quit. If you look at the number of students who no longer consider their education important to them, a lot of students feel this way. And I've talked to many teachers, mostly high school teachers, who say they've had more
students who frankly don't care about learning. They don't care, they want to sit on their phones the whole lesson, and they have no desire to study because they don't consider it important. Is this an exception? Perhaps. I mean, there are a lot of great students who come to class every day. So many children are doing brilliantly. But the fact is that there are many students who are no longer interested in their education, and this happens for many different reasons that teachers are struggling to cope with. And if you look at your students. But let's go back to reading for a moment: the fact that some kids can't read by the time they graduate from high school may not just be due to testing and
faulty metrics. If their parents don't like to read and don't encourage reading from a young age, many children may simply not see the point in it. Some reading researchers, like Marianne Wolfe, argue that the modern environment simply isn't conducive to reading. There are more distractions around us with rapid dopamine releases. Less than half of all parents with children under 13 say that reading aloud is fun. And children aged 0 to 4 are read to frequently only 41% of the time, a sharp drop from 64% in 2012. In other words, this is not just a Generation Alpha problem. Instead, it is a problem that affects all of us.
These children are graduating from school. I have graduates who simply can't read and can't write. I literally broke down in the middle of the lesson because we had to read two paragraphs, write one complete sentence, which we analyzed together. I gave them answers, but they couldn't do it. It sounds terrible, but are there any Gen Alpha success stories in other parts of the world? Maybe we have something to learn there. There may be other ways to look at this. Let's see how society adapts to new challenges. Singapore is a great example. They have just as much, if not more, access to technology, yet they are significantly ahead of others
in terms of performance. But why? Well, for starters, Singapore has started moving away from standardized testing. They no longer make him the center of the universe. And that doesn't mean they've completely abolished it, but they're looking to develop social skills and decision-making skills, not just grades. Children often still have phones, smartwatches, and tablets, but the administration keeps a close eye on this. They take care to minimize harmful effects. They ban them during classes, breaks, and even at certain hours at night. Another example is Finland. They have significantly higher rates than most European countries.
However, unlike many of their neighbors, they promote greater autonomy for educators, rather than ruling exclusively from the top. Finland also shares Singapore's growing interest in less stressful testing and limiting the use of technology in primary school. In the UK, children aged 6 to 15 were asked what they wanted to learn, and here's what they said. Sophie, 10 years old: "I want to learn more about musical genres." Nicole, 6 years old: "About unicorns." Sam, 14 Money management. They don't teach it in school, so you have to learn it yourself, by trial and error. And AI is pretty scary. It has power over people and
can take over the world. We learn about it, but not enough." In fact, in a related survey, 84% of youth ages 6-18 expressed a desire to receive more financial education in school, with a focus on practical skills such as budgeting, ways to earn money and build a career, and how to achieve important goals, such as buying a home. Other children said: Abigail, 7 years old, -how to survive in the wild. Tara, 15 years old-psychology. Some people are too quick to judge, and that's completely unnecessary. It's worth understanding a person and really getting to know them better before you start judging. Sure, the chances of a unicorn class appearing are slim, but it does dispel the myth
that Gen Alphas are just a bunch of "iPad zombies" who are destroying schools and driving teachers crazy. In fact, children are still curious. They still want to learn. They want to explore the world and understand how to live in it, but the only thing that seems to be stopping them is a broken system. We should look to countries like Finland and Singapore and know that there is a way out. After all, the first step to solving a problem is admitting you have one. So, what do you think? What was your impression of the school when you studied there? When did you go to school? Did you feel that the education system failed you, or did you like it? And what do you think about the decline in educational standards today? For today's students,
access to information has become easier than ever, but receiving information and answers to questions does not always translate into true understanding. As AI becomes more prevalent, some parents are worried about their children's ability to truly grasp complex topics. That's why I find what Brilliant is doing very interesting. Brilliant created a tutor named Koji. It's designed for students from fifth grade to college, but here's the difference. Unlike an AI chatbot that simply gives you an answer, Koji does the opposite. He works through the tasks with you, asks questions, and guides you to solve them independently. I took their Thinking in Python course and I got help directly from Koji to understand the next steps. And that's the part that's
really cool. If you get stuck, Koji can interact with what you're doing on the screen, break down the problem into steps, and ask you questions until you figure it out. He doesn't just give an answer. It's more like someone is sitting next to you and helping you think through a problem, rather than just doing the work for you. If done right, technology in education can be very interesting. Private lessons can be incredibly valuable, but tutors aren't always available, or sometimes it's just impractical. But something like Koji can help when a student needs it.
Brilliant covers subjects from fractions and algebra to calculus, programming, and logical thinking. So there will be a lot for students at different stages of their studies. And for me personally, it's more in line with the technologies that really excite me. Not to replace someone's thinking, but to help people become better at it. You can try Brilliant Tutor for free by following the link below or scanning the QR code on the screen. And you can upgrade to the premium version to unlock all courses. And right now, ColdFusion viewers can save 20% on an annual subscription at brilliant.org/coldfusion. Thank you Brilliant for supporting this part of the episode.
Anyway, that's all from me. My name is Dagogo, you watched Cold Fusion and I will see you soon in the next episode. All the best, friends. Have a nice day. Cold Fusion. This is new thinking.
