Younger generation struggling with basic life skills - so what can we do to instil that Kiwi can-do attitude?

Changing a tyre, sewing a button or cooking a roast may seem like simple tasks, but for the younger generation, they can be near-on impossible.

AA statistics show 18 to 30-year-olds are over-represented in their callouts for changing tyres - so what do we do to instil that can-do Kiwi attitude back into our young New Zealanders?

Parenting writer John Cowan told Seven Sharp young people are struggling with what others may consider to be basic life skills “because we love them too much”.

“We’ve done too many things for them,” he said. “We just need to realise that it’s more loving to let them do things.

“If we do something for our kids that they could do for themselves, we’re actually robbing them – robbing them of the chance to become independent and skillful, so taking the dishes to the dishwasher, doing the laundry, doing some cooking – it’s more loving to let them do it.”

Cowan said an increasingly ‘throwaway culture’ has also influenced the change.

“Why would you fix your shoes if you can just buy a new pair for a few dollars or why would you re-dye a shirt or stitch something up?”

He said while it’s become more practical due to economics, the planet “can’t afford it”.

“We’ve got to move back to repairing things and fixing things.”

Cowan said adults can better transfer basic skills to younger people by going through a “life skills course called ‘chores’”.

“They aren’t just cheap labour to get things done around the place because it’s more effort to get a child to do it than to do it yourself,” he said.

“It teaches them resilience; it gives them the self-esteem and it does give them those skills that are so missing.”

He added that they should not be paid to do them, saying it’s “just part of their duty as a family”.

Cowan said older adults can learn from the younger generation, too.

“The skills that people require are changing all the time,” he said. “My dad probably was amazed that I didn’t know how to shoo a horse or use a coal-fired cooking range but you don’t need those skills.

“We should be learning from each other all the way.”