What "old skills" students have lost

[marshwiggle]

Given the discussion in another thread about students using letter mail, what are other skills that were taken for granted in previous generations but are now gone?

First example:
Cursive writing.

[Langue_doc]

Card catalog in the library

[FishProf]

Talking on the phone is increasingly uncommon.

[sinenomine]

Using a rotary dial phone. Or a pay phone.

[the_geneticist]

Writing anything by hand.  They really, really want to just type.  I can't really blame them - I'd rather read something they've typed.  Some of their handwriting looks like they were writing with their non-dominant hand, while sitting in a bus driving down a gravel road, and kind of drunk. 

[lightning]

not a skill but,

using a stapler

[lightning]

Here's a lost "old skill":

Counting and giving back the correct change when a customer pays with cash.

[clean]

writing checks

Drive a stick shift

Program a VCR!!

use DOS

Format their floppy disks!

anything with punch cards  (even SEEN one)!

hell, anymore, they probably can not text on a flip phone!!  (my bride is 10 years younger than I and her iphone was giving her issues so I gave her my 'home' flip phone.  She wasnt really able to use it and was very happy to get her iphone working again!)

[Parasaurolophus]

Dunno what it's called, but using the credit card printing press slider thingummy.

Also, greetings and salutations in written communication.

[Charlotte]

Riding a horse.
Churning butter.
Milking a cow.
Butchering chickens.
Putting on a corset.
Hitching a wagon.
...the list goes on and on.

[Volhiker78]

Reading a map. 

[hmaria1609]

Great list! Some of these I remember as a kid growing up in the 1990s.

Using a tape player and loading cassettes in them.

Dunno what it's called, but using the credit card printing press slider thingummy.

Hey, I remember seeing this gizmo! Retail stores and restaurants had them back in the day. This portable print press created an impression of the credit card on perforated paper slips.

[teach_write_research]

Riding a horse.
Churning butter.
Milking a cow.
Butchering chickens.
Putting on a corset.
Hitching a wagon.
...the list goes on and on.

lol, imprinting cuneiform characters on a clay tablet, beating papyrus into paper pulp, cultivating a terrace farm

I get it. They're young, we're not. Everything was better when we were younger. I mean, 80's alternative music? <chef's kiss> Should we follow this thread with one on how the current power holders (40-60 year olds) can't keep up with modern X or stay current on Y? That said, yeah, I'm also feeling pretty overfull of contact time with traditionally-aged, young adult college student and so very ready for a break.

[Stockmann]

Riding a horse.
Churning butter.
Milking a cow.
Butchering chickens.
Putting on a corset.
Hitching a wagon.
...the list goes on and on.

At least a couple of these are less obsolete than using a rotary phone or formatting a floppy disk.

[ciao_yall]

Giving directions.

Back before GPS I moved from a big city to a small town and people had no idea how to give directions. "Well, um, you know where McDonald's is? Turn at that street." Which McDonald's? Where I'm from there's one on every corner!