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Myopia: My husband and I each got glasses (for near-sightedness) in fifth grade. So I was expecting that our children would have similar fates.

And boy was I wrong. Only one of our children--and we have a quite-a-bit-larger-than-average-size family--has had to get glasses so far, and that in her twenties.

My husband and I and our kids did/do spend plenty of time outside as children. Why did my husband and I need glasses so much earlier, while our kids didn't? The only thing I can think of is that lots of time spent in the lighting conditions in classrooms may have had an effect. (Our children were/are homeschooled for most or all of their K-12 education, whereas hubby and I were not at all.)

An optometrist told me once to periodically spend time looking out a window (or going outside) and focusing on a distant object. I wonder if many are getting advice like that anymore.

Before being perscribed glasses the hospital opticians had me exercising the eye muscles by focusing on the tip of my nose. It seemed to work for a while. But no thoughts about distance vision exercises.

The human eye has a fairly narrow range of pupil size - roughly f/2 through f/8 in camera lens terms. Focal length (roughly 25mm) is also quite short for the size of the retina, so we have good depth of field. even at f/2.

Try looking at that index finger, then at a distant object -- say 5 meters or more away. Do that with one eye open at a time and you'll see the focus rack if you still have young enough lenses -- in any case, you'll see the DOF. Then do it with both eyes open. The clear result is that parallax is far more powerful than DOF in limiting the range of distances you can pay attention to at one time.

Going back and forth between arm's length and a few meters works those eye positioning muscles if both eyes are open, but only the lens focusing if one eye at a time. That should make it clear that convergence is the hard part. That's a big part of why some people throw up at 3D movies. (3D is worse for people with small interocular distance, which is why children get sick at them more than their parents.)

I think we're talking about different things. Paying attention to something is quite different from actually seeing something clearly. The brain filters out extraneous stuff.

In bright sunshine, I can read a car number plate (with one or both eyes open) at 50 feet without my glasses/contact lenses.

In dim evening light, it's just a blurry mess. If I partially close my eyelids (simulating a smaller pupil), I might just be able to discern through the gloom that it's actually black and white rather than a grey mess.

BTW, there is a huge difference in DOF between f/2 and f/8.

Yes, the brain is very good at ignoring all the double images at distances other than where the eyes converge. That region of convergence is much smaller than the DOF for our eyes, which is probably why we accept very narrow DOF in movies.

To answer the original question, I feel that my students haven't declined in learning, but perhaps today's media is very distracting, and so they're less inclined to sit and practice for longer stretches of time, or even practice everyday at all!

And your students are not distracted by the 83 extracurricular activities that their parents want them to do?

I have some students who are extremely intelligent; however, their brainspace is scattered 47 different directions, and it's amazing how they can cope with such a multitasking lifestyle. I know I would be dumber than a stool had I grown up with so many distractions.

Good grief. Go to CERN and ask people if they rely on empirical research or if they ask people on the internet to draw conclusions from personal experience.

Good grief!

A bit late to the party, aren't you?

And why don't you read up on the subject first before dissing everything I wrote?

BTW, I have been to CERN.

I looked up "CERN" and found a definition https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CERN
European organization for nuclear research. What does that have to do with the possibility (or not) of students having become slower learners in recent years? Or eyesight?

Might this, in fact, be an answer to what you have been observing, or maybe in part?

Ah! but Gary you such the air out of you! Your in control of your emotions. I offered to assist an employee working on a master's in nursing because she failed research once, if she failed a second time she would be dismissed from the government scholarship program (I coordinate this program) and in breach of her contract and pay funding back. It is not in my job description that I have to mentor people. This was above and beyond. I really tried hard to help her, finally she said I was being too hard on her and did not need me to mentor her anymore. When she stopped coming to see me she was passing. She ended up failing and owed back 28,000. I felt like saying was I 28,000 to hard on you?

Then I held a basic life support class, one employee in front of everyone yelled at me and said I am here, I was made to come. Was angry at me. I said calmly your not a hostage you can leave at any time. He said I need it for my job, I replied maintaining employment is a personal choice. He sat down did not hear another word.

My point, I could feel bad, I don't! people make their own decisions. You only can do what the student and the parent support. My mom made me practice. I did not want to take piano lessons. Today, I am glad I had those teachers who put up with me. If only I could remember them and say, I appreciate what you did.

Feel good about doing your best and helping people develop in the arts. Your not going to help everyone succeed and everyone will not appreciate what you do. That is ok!

Merely seeking confirmation.

One of my colleagues told me yesterday that she's seeing the same thing, but she thinks it's a shift in parenting objectives that's the main problem. She has more tolerance for high-maintenance parents than I do. She and I teach in the same area that has LOTS of students who do piano as just another thing to check off on their competitive college resume. There are actually high school students who put together these "disaster relief" concerts and raise $$$. I'm not sure how much of that is honest volunteer/charity work and how much of that is to get into Harvard and Yale.

My cynicism meter is rather high at the moment, since one of my worst students EVER got accepted into a rather prestigious university, while the boatloads of great students I've had in the past had no such luck. I can't tell you how little piano achievements factor into college admissions.

Sometimes, it can take a lot of time.