Educated adults worry that 'reading and writing on a normal level' is becoming a thing of the past for Gen Alpha: 'The literacy level has dropped so much in last ten years'

JR Atkinson • Writer and Editor

Jun 18, 2024 6:00 PM EDT

The whole goal of school is to teach reading, writing, and arithmetic. The bare bones of knowledge. But now, according to some pundits on Twitter, some of that is starting to disappear. We all know that social media is dwindling our attention spans and the proliferation of user-friendly AI has made it easier to cheat, but what does that mean for the future of intelligence? Some see it as the rarefaction of certain skills, like reading comprehension. Some see it as an advanced accessibility tool.

Either way, people love to catastrophize about the future, and they have for centuries. Remember when everyone was freaked out about TV and its ability to hold your attention for hours? Now watching an hour of uninterrupted television feels almost monastic. This doesn't mean that we're always moving in the right direction. Perhaps we really are doomed! This thread has some interesting insights, though, for those who find their minds wandering.