Having my baby cousin lodging with me while he goes through college has opened my mind to how much life has changed since I was a teenager.
Mostly for the better but also not.
It’s made me wonder how my own life would have been with the freedom, the knowledge, the free speech that teenagers have today.

If I had sat down with my step dad and talked through the topics that myself and my baby cousin do, I think I would have had the belt across my back side and spent weeks in my room walking on eggshells.
Teenagers really don’t know how lucky they are.

School – wow if I could go back now, I think I may even learn something.
The help these kids get is amazing. No longer are they just thick and told they will not amount to anything. (the story of my school life)
These kids are given laptops and full use of spell check. No more are dictionaries thrown across the room at you while being shouted at to look it up. They also have a one to one helping them if they need it.
Gone are the days were education is just the standard English, English literature, Math, Science, Art, Drama and PE.
They have the world at their finger tips with trips to college to start NVQ’s in what ever they fancy and b techs that from what I have been told are sometimes a higher level than GCSEs and NVQ’s, strange that they don’t count as the c and above grads that you need to get into college.
Gone are the days of trips to the library to look stuff up for homework, waiting lines for photocopiers so you can take your information home with you.
Now you have the world at your fingertips.
The biggest change of all !!! 😀
When I was a school we had this huge, I mean huge computer that had to be wheeled around the school and yeah there was only one for a good few years. In the last few year we got one computer room and boy that seemed like heaven.
Now every home has one, it no longer jams up the phone line and doesn’t take a good half hour or more to load. But still we all swear away at the Internet for not being fast enough 😝

There are no more days of sneaking out for the crafty cigarette that you spent your dinner money on to buy. If your old enough you have a dedicated smoking area. (guess it could take the fun out of not getting caught, I swear that’s why half of us did it. We were breaking the rules which was always fun.)

The biggest change I would say is that the children are treated with respect and as adults almost like friends.
The stories I have heard about my cousins teachers are very interesting to say the least.
I give my up most respect to teachers, they must have one of the hardest jobs in the world.
30+ children in one room that more than likely only want to be there for their social life’s, that know that the worst you can do is send them to the head and maybe get time off school or one to one in isolation.
A huge high-five to all you teachers and class room assistants, your all saints in my book.

Knowing all this would YOU go back?