I know it wasn't the liberals fault, I just like needling them about their attitudes towards the three Rs today. You're right on the money with the advent of television as having a major influence on education levels.

My mother's family never owned a television. As a result she was well-read, spent time in libraries, performed in plays and was much more socially active than her tv watching peers. On the flip side, my father's family had one of the first televisions, first color television, etcetera. The stories and lifestyles are worlds apart. Cookies and milk watching television every night robbed them of the joy of books. Wealth had nothing to do with it. Both were equally well off, but the culture in America demanded a television set and westerns, crime shows and soap operas were born in America to addict kids to the tube and to suck up adults free time.

When my mother returned with my Father, a lady neighbor asked my mother if she had picked out her daily soaps. After talking awhile this woman explained how she lived her day around the daytime television schedule: Laundry, cooking, etcetera all controlled by the TV. It was her first exposure to TV in America. At many homes she described that the TV was always on, like a radio, even if no one was watching. It was the youngest member of many American families and a demanding one at that.

Naturally, as a result we watched far less tv than other families - an hour a day and two hours on Saturday. And, not surprisingly, we had bookshelves in the family room, dining room and bedrooms. As a kid I would amuse myself reading the childrens Golden Dictionary with all those great and interesting hand drawn illustrations and trying to draw some of the things that caught my eye - tanks, cars, ships, fire engines etcetera. I won my first spelling bee in the 2nd grade and I owe much of it to those hours spent perusing the Golden Dictionary. It's impossible to read a lot and not learn how to spell well.

Now when a computer and internet access is free - kids feel obligated to go on it the same way families in the fifties always had the TV on as a constant presence. Books, writing, drawing and exercise are shortshrifted. I understand the allure, as I had the first ZX80 Sinclair back in 1980 and taught myself BASIC and wrote a few games for it, but I am so very glad that my formative years were free of videos, computers and computer games. I remember how guilty I felt when I spent a few hours on it uninterrupted at a time - it almost felt 'shameful' to spend so much time with a mere machine!

Thanks for the insight ER. I'm sure this conversation wouldn't have taken place had television a more prominent role in our lives.

;-)