Taught a young guy how to sweep the barn floor yesterday...

You just can't believe how many younger guys we hire that haven't learned the easiest of tasks growing up now a days. I asked a 19 year old to sweep out the barn before all the other crews came back yesterday. Watched him do it the total wrong way, no sweeping just pushing to the front of the barn, then walk 56' back carrying the broom. I said did your Dad ever teach you how to sweep? "Nope". Well I'm going to. I've even taught my 6 year old daughter how to sweep the garage! Oh you'd be surprised. Many of these 19 yr olds have never had a job and have only played video games in their life. It really is sad. Rant over, have a good Saturday!

I am a manager of a park system. I get a fair amount of community service workers. I don't know if they are lazy, or just don't know how, but sweeping out the shop is next to impossible for some of them. Some if they work an hour ask if they can get double time..I normally say sure, I can double how long you are working here for free.

Had a 17 year old try to help me a year ago, Didn"t know how to stack fire wood, drive nails, never done that kinda of stuff before. Only have Amish boys help now, 13 to 18 best help I"v had some are lazy most aren"t. Had a 18 year old Amish boy help remove the ft. clip off a pickup, Drop the engine in, He ask what we would be doing when I pick him up, When I told him He said he didn"t know how much help he would be since he had never worked on a pickup before, He did fine. Only thing he did wrong was to carry a four speed trans. upside down and got about 1/2 gal of gear oil on his pant leg. lol.

Asked my 19 year old G. Daughter to sweep off the concrete porch, 9' x 6'.
20 minutes later the dozen leaves were crushed to bits and still all over the porch. She was still a sweepin'. Kinda like dragging the push broom around.... lots of family were to come over and I didn't want the leaves tracked into the house....

Her brother, is 9. Still haven't gotten him to eat over his plate.... he's now learning to sweep the dining room floor, and eat over his plate, at the same time!
The same grandson was still squattin to pizz @ 6 y.o. he now takes showers instead of baths too. This is the result of a mom raising her kids by herself because the father is too busy chasing a buck!!!
Next year I hope to teach him how to drive the dozer, If I can get him away from his mom for a few days.

Their twin 6 Y.O. cousins were here a year ago, (as well as the parents). The twins left a terrible mess under and around their chairs, complete with napkins on the floor. Parents didn't do anything about it. I do KP when the family is over, so the kids can visit with the mom, I said something to the twins about cleaning up their mess. Their parents looked at me like I had lobsters crawling out of my ears. I started to pick it all up, but decided to leave it for the parents. One of the parents cleaned it up the next morning. They came by a few weeks ago, they stayed in a local motel and ate out. The kids are the ones that will suffer...
sl

Re: Taught a young guy how to sweep the barn floor yesterdayhay, mow yard, cultivate beans, remodel a bathroom, paint the house, varnish the boat, rebuild the tractor engine, etc. He only expectation was you would help and give your best efforts working along side him. He was a great teacher friend and father. I remember the day he taught me how to use a push broom.

This didn't post quite right, talking about my dad

This reminds me, we have lots of fancy new schools with hi-tech stuff, but where's common sense gone? Our society of mega-farms with fewer and fewer kids growing up around the chores we used to do on small farms is hurting us!

ive had the same problem when i hire help, most of these young guys have never done "guy things' even if they had a dad growing up, they can run a computer, and spend all their time either watching tv, or talking trash on social sites, when we wanted to see our friends we had to go see them, now they just sit there and click on them and see how much has changed since they last talked to them, [which is usually less than 10 minutes ago], if their car has a flat, most of them dont know what to do ive seen that around here a lot, i just cut a yard on a rent house that was over 4 feet tall because the kid and his girl living there just didnt know what they needed to do- all summer- its a shame i guess they figure the government will save them all

Haven't you heard. Its against every moral and legal rule in this country to have any young person to lift a finger other than text message.

exactly why vintage tractors/vehicles is no longer a sound investment. no one knows how or want to work on them. notice every small town in america is using federal funds for sidewalks all over town to nowhere and redoing all streets in town with lighting and brick crossings and do not forget all those miles of bike trails. by the way; ever notice how little they are used. federal gov. is fast luring/forcing folks into a herd mentality.

My ten year old is finally getting the hang of it. I grew up as son of a mechanic, so knew how to do it as soon as I could walk.

it is sad how useless and lszy kids are today,I hadmy sisters kid at the shop I had a couple of things to do and I suggested we sweep the floor,the kid said Oh that will take all day, another time i was fixing up the back yard after getting a septic system installed asked the same kid to help pick up some of the rocks and stones so I could seed the lawn he said "thats too hard" rather sit in the house and eat cookies
i guess

don"t think most younger people (25 or less) have been exposed to very much manual labor had a young fellow weedeat around the plant this summer, had no idea how to start it -how it worked or anything- asked who took care of their yard work -he said my mom.

I forgot to say the positive side, there are still a lot of good kids out there. Just there's a huge space between common sense/work ethic/etc. now. They are usually good/really good or about as good as my 4 yr old. I have taught many kids how to dig a hole and that a round point is for digging, how to sweep, how to rake leaves, how to mow, etc. Side note, you know how younger people can't drive a stick? I can't buy a stick becaue only 1/2 to 2/3 of them can drive one!

To many parents decided to let their children be just kids as they grow up. When the kid becomes an adult, he still hasn't learn what it takes to be an adult. It isn't that the kids are stupid, it is that the parents did not do there job of being parents. They definitely have not done their kids any favors by not teaching them how to be responsible for themselves.
SDE

I see that all the time. I am the maintenance man at the local school. Anything remotely manual in labor is foreign to them. Used to have boys lining up to be on my hay crew for the summer. Last year I had one. A girl. She didn't know squat, BUT she put the effort into trying and learning. I ended up putting her on the baler and she turned into a great operator. Yea. Good, willing, hard working kids are still around, but they are definetly in the minority.

Young folks can learn how to work or avoid it..

Sadly; some have to learn on their own; as their elders are either too busy to bother with the kids, or totally lack the teaching skills...


Many highly skilled folks invest little time in answering the questions of youngsters... Youngsters are told to "get out of the way"... Electronic baybsitters replace "hands on" experience... Broken families.....

Hats off to folks who take the time to answer the questions of our youth, and have the patience and understanding to teach them skills that they, and often their PARENTS, are lacking.

I must be one of the lucky dads here,I usually don't have much trouble getting my three boys ages,17,15 and 12 to do the chores like weeding or mowing. My 15 year old helped me replace the roof on inlaws home next door.yesterday when I got home from work two oldest boys were in hay field with mother and uncle clearing tree lines of brush and pulling trees.During firewood season they are waiting at the door when I get home and won't even let me sitdown.
The boys do however find more than enough time for "gaming".

Not that I disagree with what you're saying, it bothers me just as much - BUT I do have to defend the other side of the spectrum, and assure you that you don't have to lose ALL hope!

As a 4h leader in a urban/rural transition zone -I get to see a lot of young kids that start off appearing hopeless, like little pale xbox rats caught outside of their caves.

But when you challenge them and motivate them properly, they start to come around. I've seen some amazing improvements.

After a while you can actually detect of sense of well earned pride in them - like when a 12 year old girl takes control of a spooked 1500 pound cow in a 4th of july parade, or even shoveling up some cow crap with all the spectators gasping and half fainting at the sight of it.

We also have started a little haying operation and there's already a lot less moaning and groaning than there used to be. Again - a sense of pride building when they get to tease the new kids who complain about hay splinters, and heavy bales.

And we restore our own equipment - some of the kids did most of the work on restoring our super A recently - stripping it down to the ground and rebuilding it completely. And an old IH side rake. In fact, I'll have to stick in some pictures here because I'm really proud of what they've done.

And we're working on an old NH super 66 baler right now - just starting to rebuild the wisconsin engine.

Most of the kids start out not even knowing what a wrench is - and a few months later they'll be rebuilding carburetors and welding broken parts.

So - I agree MOST kids these days are useless - but there ARE still some good ones who are coming along just fine.

And these are the ones that'll keep our country great.




(provided we don't screw it up too bad for them first!)

Yes, it has turned into a sad situation. But as has been indicated, a large part of the problem is MOTIVATION. or lack of it. So, if their parents won't do it, and their teachers don't do it, (and I know, some teachers do try) Then it is up to those of us who still have these "old fashioned" values to try to instill some of them into the younger generation. As mentioned also, there is a lot of potential there and once they start learning and feel a sense of accomplishment, they understand what it means to take pride in a job well done.

Just part of our world but many of us learned how to work from Dad. Today most Dads come home from work and don't do much but watc h tv. How can a kid learn anything from that? If my tin y farm didn't do anything else, it taught my kids to work.

I still recall the first time I was handed a street broom and told to sweep my parents bar/restaurant parking lot. I was maybe 10-11 and of course said, "This will take forever!!!" My Dad said something to the effect of "Yup, you aren't going to get it done in one or two days, so you'd better learn to pace yourself." He did show me "how to use a street broom", that you had to bear down on it a bit and that you only could go a certain distance before it was time to get the shovel and wheelbarrow. Other than that it was me and the broom. I think it took me about 3 weeks working 3-4 hours a day, it was a pretty good sized parking lot with a lot of sand and gravel left from winter. I also found about a half dozen pocket knives, $25-30.00 in bills and change, a lot of keys and lighters, a couple wallets and a few watches and rings. Pretty good haul actually.