The Generation Gap: Myth or Reality?

It’s well known that new time demands new way of thinking. New way of thinking demands new way of acting. New way of acting arouses misunderstanding on the part of older generation. People usually get used to certain things and some dead small changes can frighten them. Thus, trying to avoid the negative feeling of fear older people try to avoid new trends and spirits of the time. On the other hand, youngsters are eager to introduce some desperately new and young-eyed decisions in order to gain a foothold. In other words, young people want to be creative, bright and want to place themselves on record.

As a result, old traditions contradict with new trends and a problem of generation gap shapes up. For example, parents very often try to protect their children from modern entertainments some forbid playing computer games, thinking that computers can’t teach anything to their children, some prohibit wearing extravagant clothes and some prevent their infants from attending concerts of rock stars, fearing that he can fall among evil companions. However, forbidden fruit is sweet. And the offsprings start doing everything on the sly. But when finally parents find it out they can’t stop wondering why do their children conceal their affairs from them? The answer is as easy as ABC: youngsters want to express themselves, they want to get the smell of powder, they want to enjoy independence. On the contrary, the parents want to be sure that their precious offsprings are safe and sound. As a consequence, this leads to misunderstanding, quarrels and insults.

Nowadays children start using computers very early. Tweens and teens are so fascinated by them that they spend hours and hours at their personal computers or at computer clubs. The electronic universe replaces their contacts with friends and dominates their life completely. Obsession with computers brings about a mechanical, disillusioned mentality and inhibits their emotional development.  The heads of youngsters are also being filled with violent pictures they have seen on TV. Children are very naive and impressionable. And no wonder that they are so aggressive and arrogant in real life. They are thrown into such a harsh world, especially if they live in a city.
         These days a lot of parents think that they should be lenient with their children, they should let them find out about life for themselves, they should leave children to develop their own idea of right and wrong. But it's a grave mistake. Parents should try to protect their children from possible bad influences and give them clear guidance about right and wrong.
         There is no way to predict how today's children will turn out. Keeping faith in kids is necessary. They are not bad. They are optimistic. They expect to have a better life than their parents'. And grown-ups – if they are prepared to admit it – could learn a thing or two from their children. One of the biggest lessons they could learn is that enjoyment is not «sinful». Enjoyment, is a principle you could apply to all aspects of life. It is not wrong to enjoy your work and enjoy your leisure, to shed restricting inhibitions. It is surely not wrong to live in the present rather than in the past or future.

Generation gap is the major reason today why parents and children are moving away from each other. As we all know, the environment has changed, so has the life style and with that changes the mind of children. Today’s generation doesn’t like others interfering in any of their personal matters, they don’t like parents ordering them, and if they try and tell them what’s wrong for them, they misbehave with their parents. The question arises that, what is the reason behind all this. It is the parents’ mistake or is it cause of the generation gap. Generation gap is basically created by the people themselves. They don’t talk to their children and share their own points of views with the children. The point is that the parents are just so busy with their work and jobs that they don’t have time for their family and their children. And they realize it when there has a huge distance between the kids and the parents. The point is if parents give their children some time from their busy schedule then there would be no such problem.

Nevertheless the problem of generation gap can be easily solved. Patience should be the key to the common ground between adults and youngsters. People of all ages must become more tolerant and less selfish and must discuss their troubles in order to conquer misunderstanding. It’s essential that parents give more freedom to their children so that they can express themselves.  Whereas children should remember that freedom is not something to be over-indulged in. It’s not difficult to achieve understanding if you are making effort to see a problem from a variety of angles. On the contrary, if you think that your standpoint is the only one true and you don’t want to discuss and listen to other opinions, then the problem of generation gap will become a nightmare of your family.

The Generation Gap

Generation Gap :-)

Outstanding People & Outstanding Abilities

Daniel Browning Smith

Five time Guiness Record holder, The Rubberboy is the most flexible man alive and the most famous contortionist. He has been in many professional basketball or baseball games and on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno, ESPN's Sports Center, Oprah Winfrey, Ripley's Believe It or Not, Cirque du Soleil, Best Damn Sports Show Period, The Discovery Channel, Men in Black 2, HBO's Carnivale, and CSI: NY and American got a talent. He dislocates his arms to crawl through an unstrung tennis racquet. He performs contortion handstands and unique acrobatics. 

Outstanding People & Outstanding Abilities

Wim Hof (born 20 April 1959, in Sittard, Limburg) is a Dutch world record holder, adventurer and daredevil, commonly nicknamed the Iceman for his ability to withstand extreme coldness. He holds eighteen world records including a world record for longest ice bath. In 2007, he attempted, but failed (due to a foot injury), to climb Mount Everest wearing nothing but shorts. Hof has been criticized for his stated justifications for this attempt, "Edmund Hillary's ascent of Mount Everest was a testament to human achievement; my climb of Mount Everest in my shorts will be a monument to the frivolous, decadent nature of modern society."

Hof broke his previous world record by staying for 1 hour, 13 minutes and 48 seconds immersed in ice at Guinness World Records 2008. The night before, he performed the act on the Today Show. Dr. Kenneth Kamler monitored the event to explain the effects of using the Tantric practice Tummo to control your body temperature. Tummo has been practiced by Yogi monks in Tibet. Wim describes his ability to withstand extreme cold temperatures as being able to turn his own thermostat up by using his brain.

In February 2009, Hof reached the top of Mount Kilimanjaro in his shorts within two days. It took him only another two days to climb down.

In 2009, Hof completed a full marathon (approximately 42.2 kilometres or 26.2 miles long) above the polar circle in Finland in temperatures close to −20 °C (−4 °F). Dressed in nothing but shorts, Hof finished in 5 hours and 25 minutes. The challenge was filmed by Firecrackerfilms, who make productions for the BBC, Channel 4 and National Geographic.

Hof broke the ice endurance record in 2010 by standing fully immersed in ice for 1 hour and 44 minutes in Tokyo, Japan.

Personal life

Wim Hof was born in the Dutch town of Sittard, 2 kilometers away from the German border, and seven kilometers from the Belgium border.

From the days of his youth in the southern part of the Netherlands he got interested in esotericism, Buddhism, Indian traditions, cultures and languages. He grew up in a Catholic regime, with six brothers and two sisters as well as his dad and mother.

Hof has four children with his late wife, and a son (born in 2003) with his second wife Caroline.

Modern IT (Internet Technologies) in EFL teaching

New technologies are certainly great teaching resources. I personally started using my laptop and video projector and I realized that that benefited me and my students. My work has become more interesting, easier and cleaner. Chalk and talk everyday turns your classroom into a boring place for you and your students. With the new technologies my students are more interested in attending my classes. The new technologies have made my work easier too. As an example, preparing visual aids and showing them is no more hard work. There are lots of ready made pictures in the Internet that you can edit and present effectively using PowerPoint.

 Now I use my laptop mainly for presenting and practicing language. First of all you need a video projector besides your laptop. This is usually bought by the school as in my case. Then you need a screen in place of your blackboard. A white-painted wall would do. So that's all the material you need.

 As to the lesson I use PowerPoint to present it. PowerPoint is Microsoft presentation software that can be used to display text and images and play sound and video. A PowerPoint presentation is composed of slides that are displayed one after the other. Within a slide you can decide the order in which the components (text, image...) would be displayed.  

I usually start my lesson with presenting new language items using pictures or videos. Then I move on to a practice stage. The practice stage is usually a listening activity or reading activity. During a listening or reading activity the students listen to or read a text or dialogue and do some exercises. The questions are displayed using PowerPoint and the students answer the questions.

The use of Internet has brought many changes in English teaching. The contemporary students are upgrading their knowledge by surfing on the net a lot. If the teacher is able to share something new and inspiring, students would pay more attention and concentration to English. Sharing of important ideas through community services would enhance teachers one more level up. Innumerable English learning videos are available through well-known search engines and websites. If one makes use of these, English teacher can make his lecture/teaching more effective and inspiring one. Instead of continuous teaching using black board, the teacher can use visual aids like projectors, white board. It would be more useful for any teacher.

And of course the best way-is the connection with the Internet in your classroom! It gives a lot of opportunities. Nowadays there is a great number of English teaching programs online (students can record their voices, take part in improvise dialogs, test themselves, read online newspapers, listen to radio broadcasts, do dictation exercises, etc.