Ah, yes. I wondered what a parent could do if he/she had only a single child and nothing else to do but mentor her/him from very early on. Having been precocious myself, my mother couldn’t fall back on TV, internet, or video games. To get me under some sense of control and out of her hair, she taught me to read…at four. My father taught me electronics.

My point isn’t to brag. I’m merely illustrating the intent of this thread as well as my painful observation that the automated baby sitters of today are breading generations of drones. Our plugged-in society is generating a legion of drones who can barely spell LMAO, much less use all the letters between. We have masses who can’t read very well, who converse at preschool levels, who don’t comprehend critical thinking, who can’t focus due the distractions they allow to interfere with their lives and who are almost entirely unemployable.

So, why are these children left to the wiles of the entire world brought to their sponge-like brains through the wonders of electronic nannies?

Reflecting on fifty plus years ago, my thought is that my mother was trapped at home in the 1950s without much money and an almost dead black and white TV receiving two channels off the air while my father spent 12 hour days working. She taught me because she was bored to tears.

Today, we have 500 channels of garbage through which to scroll. We have billions of computer, console and cell phone based games and other apps to distract. We have millions of feature length movies at our fingertips and billions of hours of videos to peruse. We have “friends”, thousands of them, who are in our face with texting, social sites, cell phones and email.

Hmmm. Now that I think of it, I don’t think intentionally keeping our children away from something they want to try is even the tip of the iceberg as to why they don’t excel. Maybe there is too much candy and not enough vegetables in their lives.

It takes a rare personality today to remain blind to the temptations of our gadget happy society and focus on a talent that builds character and a foundation for their future.

Watch this youngster crush "sweet child of mine"!

http://www.wimp.com/gunroses/

Little Korean girl playing a guitar bigger than she is.

http://www.dump.com/girlguitar/

She's awesome.

My best friend teaches guitar to kids. She has seen amazing talent from kids as young as 4.

Parents should not smother their kids. They should have their freedom as they grow up. I have written an article on this... could post it here but its more of a foreign outlook to the thing rather than a global or American outlook.

Parents should allow their kids to be free to chase their dreams.

Yeah, children should be encouraged to try out many things, and encouraged to continue with it....as long as they are not pressurised to perform, constantly made to practice for hours because they have to become the very best, and put into total anxiety by their parents and relatives about living up to expectations! Then they become suicidal as teenagers...

watch this young lady RIP IT UP!

http://www.wimp.com/vivalditribute/