Having Millenial and Gen-Z Kids

Millenials, otherwise known as Generation Y and Generation Z are two consecutive generations with differences and similarities. Millenials are people born from 1981 to 1997 while Gen-Z are kids born from 1998 onwards. I am lucky to have both generations in my household. My son was born December 28, 1995. He is a kid with so much to offer, intelligent, goal-oriented coupled with ambitions and ideals. His generation is known for the time of 9/11 ,cd’s and usb. Although, theirs is the generation of so many choices the specific idea of success is in every millenial you will meet. However, my Gen-Z daughter is another issue to reckon with. She was born November 7,2001 during the time when US President George Bush and Britain’s Prime Minister Tony Blair allied in the war of terrorism. This information was made possible because of the onslaught of the social media tecnologies such as facebook and twitter. Probably, this makes this generation more global and tech-crazy. Everything is available on the internet, from friends ,food and entertainment, etc. So how do these two generations similar in some ways? Aside from, they are both my favorite, of course. They both share liking in anything Korean, from food to fashion and kpop singing groups. Awareness of the issues in politics, society and entertainment is evident when they try to discuss or debate about them. They can be both critical of each generation but will agree on things that are the same, too. I am so amazed how different these two generations are but the same in some ways.

Being a Generation X myself, I can hardly relate to these two unless I do a lot of research on everything about their generations. I realized that millenials are born with lesser exposure to the recent technology such as cellphones, tablets and updated laptops and computers. Thus, they are not as addicted to gadgets as the Gen Z’s. I can talk to my son about the books he read lately or the latest news over the television. We can simply discuss things over coffee. He has friends of the same interests such as art and music. They are more conservative on relationships and sexuality. As the counterpart of the millenials, the Gen Z’s are also into technology and it is a big part of their life development. Most of them grow up with cellphones and gadgets to swipe for information. It is like a second part of their life. I can almost imagine my daughter in a panic mode whenever she is separated from her cellphone or if it is lowbatt. She can also multitask doing her assignments on the laptop and chatting online with her friends through her phone at the same time. Her exposure online made her very discriminating about her choices of her course in college, the clothes she wears and the friends she has. This also helps her become open-minded about sexuality and acceptance of LGBTQ. However, these things lessen her interactions with me , but makes up by texting me and chatting with me if she’s far from me. She also amazes me with her computer skills and online transactions abilities.

Having these two generations in my life give me the realizations that they can be born in different years, situations and circumstances but enivitably they can influence each other with the impact of the generation a person is born. For example, my son was so into Power Rangers robots in his time. While they are watching Transformers, he can tell the similarities of the show he grew up with to the movie he is watching with his sister. At the same time, my daughter can explain the games she love to play online to its semblance to the characters of his favorite robots. They may be born dissimilarly as in years and time, but they can share the good of each generation to enhace each other’s growth as a person. From these diversities in years, they can nurture each other’s likeness and teach the other about the uniqueness of one’s generation. There’s a point of concurrence even between two people of different generations if both will try to talk about the good and the bad of each other’s years and learn from each other.