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Millennials

Learn English meaning of 'millennials'

Date: May 26 2020

Themes: Family, News

Grammar: Comparing Quality

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Intro

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How old are you? In your country, is there a special name for your generation? In the United States, every generation has a special name. Parents and grandparents are Gen Xers and Baby Boomers. People born between 1982 and 2000 are called Millennials. People born after the year 2000 are called Generation Z.

It’s very common to talk about Millennials, since most Millennials are now 20-30 years old and starting families, finding jobs, and buying homes. This generation has challenges like paying back student loans and fixing race relations. Some people think Millennials are cynical slackers. Other people think Millennials are idealists and have a lot of big problems to deal with.

Andy and Jessica are talking about the Millennial generation. Listen to today’s English lesson to find out what they think.

Dialog

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2. Study - Read the dialog again to see how the vocab words are used.

Andy_H

Jessica

Andy_H: I am so tired of my dad calling me lazy just because I was born a Millennial. Give me a break, okay? We inherited a bunch of issues that we want to deal with as our own generation. Don’t you agree that Millennials really get a hard time?

Jessica: Actually, I have a friend who works in an office environment. She complains all the time about the Millennials she works with, saying they are very cynical and they are slackers sometimes. They tend to want things handed to them, and they don’t always work as hard as everybody else.

Andy_H: That’s typical. I really have a hard time believing that every single generation before us had it figured out. We have a better understanding of social media, and we might be more idealists, thinking that, maybe, we can make a better future for our grandkids by fixing climate change problems or helping out with race relations.

Jessica: It sounds like there might be a lot of generational differences between us, but I think we can work together to fix a lot of these challenges.

Andy_H: I one hundred percent agree. And if there’s one thing I know about Millennials, it’s that we’re optimists.

Jessica: There you go.

Andy_H: We’re ready, baby.

Grammar Point

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Discussion

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Andy and Jessica are talking about the Millennial generation. Andy’s father thinks that Andy is lazy because Andy is a Millennial. This makes Andy mad. Jessica’s friend works with Millennials and has the same opinion of them. She thinks that people from this generation are slackers and that they want to have an easy life without hard work. This also makes Andy mad.

Andy just wants people to stop thinking bad things about his generation. Maybe, Millennials haven’t figured out everything yet, but that’s because they inherited a lot of problems. Andy believes that his generation will be able to deal with these problems because Millennials are idealists and optimists. Jessica agrees, and she also hopes that all generations can work together on fixing the world’s problems.

Were you born in the Millennial years? What do you think of the Millennial generation?

Comments

j12widiawati

Indonesia

I do the same thought about millenial as andy’s father and friend of Jessica. Why that they think they inherited so much problems?

pcpd

Brazil

I didn’t born in the Millennial years. I am older. I’m from the Generation X. The big issue about the Millenial generation is the fact that they borned at the digital age with the computer technology and fast communication networks. So they use these technologies to do many things very fast and this is one of the reasons they are a little lazy or slacker. They don’t like to use the traditional tools and do real things or hold things and work with real things. They don’t like to communicate with other people using the phone, they prefer to use instant message communications systems and they have an expectation that all the issues must be solved quickly very quickly. The big problem of this generation is that they don’t have much patience, they want to achieve the success very fast and they see all the time a perfect world, the world of Facebook and the life is a little bit different and much harder. They need have a hard work to achieve the success and sometimes it takes much more time than they would like and some of them can give up early. No pain, no gain.

Djana

Algeria

yes i was born in the Millennial years & I’m happy about that.I think our generation is so optimistic towards everthing..although what happens in the world we still trying to figure out things we don’t know,and find solutions..Saying the Millennials are slackers,I don’t think is right,I mean if one or two millennials are like that..it’s not supposed that the rest of them must be like that.

ola3

Ukraine

I can’t say there’s much difference btw generations. Just the lifestyle, I think. But all strive to get a good job, to be successful, to find love, to be financially independent. So let’s go fo it by working hard and asking God to give us some luck.