<p>Most calls from my freshman daughter looking for advice have been laundry related (especially when washing something for the first time). She has the laundry instructions in a note on her phone and she refers to it every time (the washers and dryers have very odd settings on them, so they do not at all match the machines we have a home).</p>
<p>The sick thing is also true - when she calls complaining of not feeling well and I say did you take a Tylenol, she says no I did not think of that.</p>
<p>The stamp one also happened. I sent her with some stamps and in the fall when her friends were filling out their absentee ballots and wanted to buy a stamp from her - since today’s stamps don’t have amounts on them - she called me to find out how much a stamp costs.</p>
<p>Teach your kids that dishes don’t wash themselves, there are roommates that might need quieter sleeping atmosphere than you do yourself. Also , how to speak to adults.</p>
<p>Laughing about the dry cleaning… we go weekly, sometimes twice a week. All H’s work shirts, plus some of my more delicate sweaters, etc. S18 knows to go dig his dress shirt out of the floor of his closet when a dressy event is coming up and take it to the cleaners in time to get it back. Ha!</p>
<p>“About mail-do these kids never get actual snail mail at all?” - Maybe not. Some know where to put the address (like my 3rd grade niece / pen pal) and some don’t.</p>
<p>“Student here but make sure your kids know how to use the washers at school. Our washer and dryer at home are completely different than the ones in the dorms, all the buttons have different names it has stuff like colors/knits/delicates versus temperatures at school. When I moved in my parents came to the laundry room with me and told me what to use here and the differences for front load washers since we have top load.” </p>
<p>Guess what? Your dorm buddies would have helped you out on the front load washer if needed. But it’s neat that your parents (who also never used a top load) figured it out.</p>
<p>I seriously doubt many 4th/5th graders are getting mail to them. Did most of you write letters when you were in 4th/5th grade? Even if they’ve seen it multiple times, unless they’ve written it they may not actually fully understand what that means.</p>
<p>Fwiw, this 22 year old gets snail mail all the time. Did in high school, too.</p>
<p>Schools don’t teach letter-writing anymore? My D (8th grade) wrote letters and addressed them in early elementary, she says they were to family or friends, though they weren’t actually mailed, and her 6th and 7th grade LA classes wrote actual letters to local political leaders supporting various causes as part of their school work. But even if SCHOOLS don’t teach this, don’t kids even look at the mail that comes to the house?</p>
<p>I’m really surprised about this. It seems like such a basic skill to have.</p>
<p>My kids write thank you notes and send them in the mail. They don’t take typing any more. That was where I learned to write resumes, cover letters and business correspondence.</p>
<p>lol! The first time DS used the W/D at school, he poured the liquid laundry detergent into the dryer, confusing it w the front-load type washer we have at home</p>
<p>With 4 people in the house and three different last names, whoever gets the mail has to look it over and deliver it to the right person.That requires looking at the front of the envelope, where the address, return address and stamp go. It’s really kind of obvious what goes where. I remain shocked that anyone over the age of 6 or 7 wouldn’t know this.</p>
<p><em>shrug</em> I don’t remember handling mail at the age of 6 or 7. My mom would make it home before my dad and I so she would grab the mail and do whatever with it. I don’t remember getting a lot of mail as a 6 year old…</p>
<p>My teenagers can’t address a snail mail envelope w/o help, but they can navigate international travel unaccompanied w no hand-holding, involving consecutive changes of planes in multiple foreign countries, negotiate transactions in different currencies, account for time-zone differences, fill out Entry Forms & Customs Declarations, decipher subway route maps in a strange city, and not be a pushover when their bully neighbor tries to hog the center armrest…</p>
<p>I thought that all schools taught little kids-6,7,8-how to address an envelope, to write a simple letter. I figured that it’s the older elementary kids who occasionally bring in the mail and thus might actually LOOK at it. And I’d think teenagers would get paychecks, or at least W-2 forms in the mail. My D gets her grades in hard copy form as well as online, and even if you have online banking, the banks sometimes mail out notices-GMT-your kids get NONE of these? Not even college postcards? Even my 8th grader is getting some of those!</p>
<p>Shrug-guess it’s great to be able to travel internationally if that’s your thing. I can see these same kids ending up with late fees due to mis-addressed bills, missed deadlines because they mailed something without a stamp, scrambling to get taxes filed because they didn’t even KNOW they got a form from work. I mean, this is REALLY simple, everyday stuff. I think it’s even more important than knowing how to go through customs.</p>
<p>@sseamom, knowing how to deal with Customs is pretty important when you live abroad. Bills, taxes, W-2’s, banking, school reports are all handled electronically.</p>