Are the kids okay? I might be a compulsive over-thinker, but I’m worried about our children. If you’re a baby boomer, you’d recall the 1966 song by The Who called “The Kids Are Alright” and the 1979 documentary film about the same English rock band, The Kids Are Alright. A few years later, there was even an episode of That ‘70s Show titled “The Kids Are Alright.”
Then and Now: Changing Concerns About Kids’ Education
Back then, our parents were concerned that the student rebellions of the sixties and seventies were harming their children. My parents were aghast at what was happening on college campuses across Canada and the U.S.
Today, parental worries remain, though they are entirely different. Instead of focusing on social change, our children and grandchildren are encountering a barrage of digital information, games, gossip and advertising that has shifted their attention from reading, studying and original thinking to online pursuits.
Here’s a particularly meaningful June 2025 post by a teacher: “Many of my 9th grade students never memorized basic multiplication facts & they struggle with factoring and other basic algebra concepts. A calculator cannot do all the thinking for them!! But their K-8 teachers did not see value in holding them accountable for math facts.’
How Digital Tools Are Reshaping Learning and Literacy
On CBC radio, I’ve heard numerous teachers admit that their students were never taught cursive writing. Without a digital device on hand, they don’t know how to take notes. I still take notes and jot down to-do lists on paper more than once a day. I can’t imagine reaching for my cell phone every time I do. Isn’t it more efficient to write it down? In Ontario, learning cursive writing in elementary school was made optional in 2006 although the provincial government has now made it mandatory again. In some schools there are even special classes for cursive writing.
More importantly, kids aren’t reading. Recent studies, articles and podcasts report that college and university students are less willing and less able to read entire books. The Globe and Mail recently ran a story about “a new class of microlearning apps that promise to make you smarter in just 15 minutes – one bite-sized book summary at a time.” There are apps for that: Wiser, Headway, Blinkist and Shortform compress thousands of books – ranging from business to psychology – into audio or text summaries. According to The Globe, Blinkist counts more than 26 million users globally, while Headway boasts more than 50 million downloads “evidence that microlearning is no longer a fringe habit.”
In my day, we had Coles Notes, boring little pamphlets that weakly summarized Shakespeare’s plays or Dickens’ novels. These new apps are far more sophisticated, aiding students to hand in their assignments without fostering real understanding. College and university professors are loath to assign entire books. Students prefer reading a chapter here and there rather than an entire book. Even at Ivy League schools in the U.S., parents paying $100,000 a year for their child’s tuition are noticing that entire books are no longer mandatory.
In Canada, because there are virtually no copyright rules concerning books, professors often copy chapters from books and compile them into digital packages for their students to purchase. Publishers and writers never see a dime when this occurs unless they compile the packages. The students pay a steep price for the collections, but none of it reverts to the original authors.
AI and Academic Integrity in Modern Schools
An even bigger issue is how to evaluate student work in the ever-expanding world of AI. In the U.S., there are reports of rampant AI cheating that led to an explosion in sales of “blue books” which are used for old-fashioned pen-and-paper exams, this school year. In Canada, six in ten students said they use generative AI for their schoolwork, according to an October 2024 study from KPMG Canada. As a result, more and more teachers are relying on in-person exams so they know the student actually wrote down the answers rather than looking up the answers with AI.
Why Reading and Writing Still Matter Today
I admit it: I’m concerned. Reading an entire book has been one of the great joys of my life. Novels taught me empathy and humility. Non-fiction books, everything from biographies to history books to how-to guides, helped me understand my place in time in relation to other historical periods. For instance, why is democracy important? Why are tolerance and open-mindedness crucial to making life decisions.
We were fortunate to be brought up before the digital age. Now is a good time to share some of that wisdom with our offspring. Like you, I want the kids to be alright. One of the best ways of getting them there is through reading and writing, and by diverting their attention from screens. It’s worth the effort.
