Game Shows - Please not five more minutes.....
Soooooo.......... I am on my lunch break at work and the tv is on in our break room. There was this "game show" on the air (IF you can call it that.) Something called - "street smarts". I don't mean to criticize - but either the American public is getting dumber OR the game shows are lowering the bar. They ask random, everyday, trivia questions that most of us refer to as "common sense." The contestants have to guess who will either get the question right or wrong - between three people randomly approached on the street by the announcer.
For example - one of the questions asked tonight was "what country are you in if you are in Athens, GA?" Beleive it or not - two of the three people asked were WRONG! HELLO!!!!
This got me to thinking about game shows that my parents watched as I was growing up. I was never a "game show" person but I do remember my parents fanatically fixated at watching shows like Jeopardy, Wheel of Fortune (while lower leveled - this Street Smarts show makes it look like a graduate school lit class.) and the recent "Who wants to be a Millionaire." These shows had some level of expectation that the contestant had some level of intelligence. I am getting the impression that the game shows produced today are lowering the bar and continue to lower the bar as people apparently are not able to even measure up.
This truly concerns me. Newspapers dumb down their articles to a fourth grade level of reading, Popular fiction has been grammatically watered down while anything at a college lit level is considered "Literature." Expectations are lowered at schools for reading skills and no one bats and eyelish when someone signs with an "X" on a Legal Document.
I am truly worried about the education of my children in the future. To meet with low expectations does not allow them to do their best.... When did this happen? How did this happen? Why aren't we - as parents - more enraged and proactive?
Can you tell I am a little upset and concerned???? Ok I'll get off my soap box.....
watch that game show and I bet you might be a little concerned as well.....
For example - one of the questions asked tonight was "what country are you in if you are in Athens, GA?" Beleive it or not - two of the three people asked were WRONG! HELLO!!!!
This got me to thinking about game shows that my parents watched as I was growing up. I was never a "game show" person but I do remember my parents fanatically fixated at watching shows like Jeopardy, Wheel of Fortune (while lower leveled - this Street Smarts show makes it look like a graduate school lit class.) and the recent "Who wants to be a Millionaire." These shows had some level of expectation that the contestant had some level of intelligence. I am getting the impression that the game shows produced today are lowering the bar and continue to lower the bar as people apparently are not able to even measure up.
This truly concerns me. Newspapers dumb down their articles to a fourth grade level of reading, Popular fiction has been grammatically watered down while anything at a college lit level is considered "Literature." Expectations are lowered at schools for reading skills and no one bats and eyelish when someone signs with an "X" on a Legal Document.
I am truly worried about the education of my children in the future. To meet with low expectations does not allow them to do their best.... When did this happen? How did this happen? Why aren't we - as parents - more enraged and proactive?
Can you tell I am a little upset and concerned???? Ok I'll get off my soap box.....
watch that game show and I bet you might be a little concerned as well.....
posted by B at 23:37
1 Comments:
Kinda scary, eh? I've been starting to wonder if "common sense" really does exist. I'm taking two correspondance courses this summer and have been warned not to "waste time" writing the papers at college level...that high school level will get me an "A" just fine. What does that mean? Am I really supposed to lower my standards that much?
Thanks for calling us out as a culture...it's bad...but as a word of encouragement, I have a numer of friends who are training to become teachers and they'll teach Nat and Ro wonderfully!!!
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