Things your children will never learn in school, but should.

Rule No. 1:  Life is not fair. Get used to it. The average teenager uses the phrase "It's not fair" 8.6 times a day. You got it from your parents, who said it so often you decided they must be the most idealistic generation ever.   When they started hearing it from their own kids, they realised Rule No. 1.

Rule No. 2:  The real world won't care anywhere near as much about your self-esteem as much as your school does. It'll expect you to accomplish something before you feel good about yourself. This may come as a rather rude shock. Usually, when inflated self-esteem meets the cold, harsh light of reality, kids complain that it's not fair. (See Rule No. 1.)

Rule No. 3:  Sorry, you won't make $60,000 a year right out of high school. And you won't be a vice president or have a company iPhone either.  BMW?  Forget it. You may even have to wear a uniform that doesn't have a Mossimo label, like those trendy McDonalds ones. (See Rule No. 5.)

Rule No. 4:  If you think your teacher is tough, wait until you get a boss. He either owns the company or is employed to make sure it runs correctly, so he tends to be a bit touchier to get on with. When you screw up, he's not going to ask you how you feel about it, or if you found it a valuable life experience.  Don’t even think of asking for stress leave.

Rule No. 5:  Flipping burgers is not beneath your dignity. Your grandparents had a different word for burger flipping. They called it opportunity. They weren't embarrassed being paid the minimum wage either. They would have been embarrassed to sit around talking about some talentless rap singer or how “bored” they are on facebook all weekend.  Try getting off your arse and doing something.

Rule No. 6:  If you screw up, you are responsible. This is the flip side of "It's my life," and "You're not the boss of me," and other eloquent proclamations of your generation. When you turn 18, it's on your dime. Don't whine about it, you just come off sound like a pitiful, puling infant.  Remember all that really boring advice your parents tried to give you that you ignored?  Hope you learn faster than your mediocre grades indicate.

Rule No. 7:  Before you were born your parents weren't as boring as they are now. They got that way paying your bills, cleaning up your room and listening to you tell them how idealistic you are. And by the way, before you save the rain forest from the blood-sucking parasites of your parents' generation, try delousing the cupboard in your bedroom. You can feel free to go and recycle your sandals all you like after you move out and start paying your own bills.  (See Rule No. 2, Rule No. 3 and Rule No. 5.)

Rule No. 8:  I realise your school has done away with winners and losers. Life has not. In some schools, they'll give you as many times as you want to get the right answer. Failing grades have been abolished and class valedictorians scrapped, lest anyone's feelings be hurt. Effort is as important as results. This, of course, bears not the slightest resemblance to anything in real life. (See Rule No. 1, Rule No. 2 and Rule No. 4.)

Rule No. 9:  Life is not divided into semesters, and you don't get summers off. Not even Easter break. They expect you to show up every day. For eight hours, whether you stayed up last night playing computer games or not. And you don't get a new life every 10 weeks, it just goes on and on and on, for the next 50 years. While we're at it, very few jobs are interested in fostering your self-expression or helping you find yourself. Fewer still lead to self-realisation. (See Rule No. 1, Rule No. 2 and Rule No. 4.)

Rule No. 10:  Television is not real life. Your life is not a sitcom. Your problems will not all be solved in 30 minutes, minus time for commercials. In real life, people actually have to leave the coffee shop to go to jobs. Your friends will not be as perky or pliable as Jennifer Aniston.  Their boobs will not be as perky, either.

Rule No. 11:  Be nice to nerds. You may end up working for them. We all could.

Rule No. 12:  Facebook is not the centre of the universe, and nor does anyone care how many “friends” you have other than the other self-absorbed adolescents of all ages who use this self-demonstration of lack of independent thought.

Rule No. 13:  Regardless of your own passionate convictions or those of your Facebook “friends”, the real world actually cares about your ability to communicate in proper English.  This includes subjects such as punctuation, sentence construction, and spelling.  Your boss will expect this, because like his clientele he comes from a time where shallow self infatuation was something to be despised, and a basic education expected.

Rule No. 14:  I realise that the concept of getting up in the morning, every morning, is strange and alien to you.  It might come as a surprise, but if you actually went to bed at a reasonable time at night the getting up would be less of a strain.  This behaviour will be of significant value to you should you ever be lucky enough to obtain full time employment (see Rule No. 9), but I don’t expect you to understand this until you have pissed away several opportunities telling the world how you think it should be run.  (See Rule No. 1 and Rule No. 9.)