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Post-Crescent, The ( Text-messaging and IM:
The bane of English teachers everywhere or harmless shortcuts between
friends? Author: Heather LaRoi,
Post-Crescent staff writer Section: Life! Estimated printed pages: 6 Article Text: d eng lngwij
az we nO it mA nvr b d sAm. Huh? OK, let's put it another way. The English language as we
know it may never be the same. Text-messaging, with its strings of abbreviations and jumbles of consonants, was originally created to cram as much content as possible into the teeny 160-character space of
a typical cell phone screen. The same kind of hieroglyphics show up in instant
messaging, where speed is of the essence to keep up a real-time, typed
conversation going online. Fair enough. But this "language" has also jumped off those screens and landed smack in the middle of places where it's not always wanted or appreciated. Like in high school English classes. "I'm grading papers right now and that's what I'm
circling constantly," said Susanne Bruce, a communication arts teacher
at "It's all that abbreviation, the use of the number '4' as opposed to 'four' or 'for,' that is cause for concern. It's definitely showing up in papers. The lowercase 'i' is rampant. And the 'CU' and
'n' or '&' for 'and.'" A generation growing up with text-messaging and instant
messaging is posing new challenges for writing teachers everywhere. "Where we're finding the struggle is because it's so prevalent and pervasive," Bruce said. "Even when kids do a paper exchange and they evaluate each other's papers, they don't pick
up on those things because they see an '&' or they see the small 'i' and they know what it means -- and they don't correct
it. They don't even see it." For many students,
it's just a way of life. "Instant messaging has been around since I was in, like, fifth grade so you just pick it up," said Jack Arpin, a senior at Appleton North. "A lot of my friends do the messaging and I mean, it's
informal. They don't spell out words and they use little symbols." "It's just faster communication," added Neha Mohan, also a senior at North, with a shrug.
"Instead of y-o-u, you just write the letter u." Is this a problem? In this new world, it might be the traditional written
English that's seen as quaint. Mohan, for example, exchanges e-mails frequently with her
grandmother in "She writes in full sentences, she doesn't shorten
things," Mohan said. "I'm like, you don't
have to do that." No big deal, right?
Well, yes and no. The key thing to get across is that there's a time and
place for everything, said Karen Gibson, communication arts program leader
for the "Just as we teach voice in writing, when you are writing to admissions officers at a college, you're going to use a very different voice, a very different tone than you would use sending a thank-you note to grandmother or sitting in the commons chatting with your friends," Gibson said. "As long as they can differentiate between those informal settings
and the formal settings, it's not going to be problematic. "But more and more, we see students just using some of those shortcuts that they use in instant messaging in formal essays. Absolutely. They're so used to doing that in their other forms of
communication. It takes constantly reminding them." Certainly, it's not the first time English teachers have
had to tidy up their students' word choices, grammar or spelling. As Gibson put it, "We've been doing that with slang and other things forever. It's not just the instant messaging. Really, this is just another form of language that has been
evolving and it's going to continue to evolve." Say what? One thing's for sure. This IM language is taking now
old-fashioned abbreviations like ASAP (as soon as possible) or SNAFU
(situation normal all fouled up) to a whole new level. Even those who use it regularly can be stumped on
occasion. SWDYT? So what do you think? "Some things you can just kind of infer what they mean, you can figure it out from the context or you can just kind of assume ... but some are really hard, like when it's a series of
letters," said Michael Hovde, an Appleton
North senior. "And honestly, I just ask people. I would just put a
question mark and say 'what does that mean?'" Kids may not talk about it but there's also the unmistakable attraction of conversing in a language that their parents aren't clued in on. It might not be the motivation, they
say, but it is certainly a bonus. That "POS" on the screen? "Parent over
shoulder." And yes, for those who want to venture into the great unknown, there are Web sites out there that offer translations of the more common abbreviations. One site to try is www.webopedia.com. Hope for the future Not all educators are waving the white towel over all
this. Indeed, some take heart that there's apparently renewed interest out
there in the written word, whatever form it takes. "I know there are those who want to recoil in horror but I'm not one of them. I see an opportunity," said Michael Day, an associate professor of English at Northern "As a fully socialized human being, someone who communicates with all kinds of different groups, you need to be able to code-switch, to be able to read a context and then come up with a set of
strategies for operating and then communicating within that context,"
Day said. "This is a great opportunity to use the example of instant messaging as just one of the codes that they use with their friends but that needs to be altered in various ways, the strategies, the
correctness, the way you type words, the capitalization, the punctuation, all
those things." Making that code-switch, then, is really all about
awareness. Arpin agrees, though he conceded
that abbreviations and other IM lingo can be tough habits to shake. "I'm usually able to distinguish between a formal writing and informal writing," Arpin said. "But it takes basically the first week of school to get back into grammar. I don't know if that's solely because of IM or it's just because I haven't done a lot of extensive writing over the course of the summer. But as the school year progresses, I can pull it off
usually." Bruce said it helps to keep an eye on the ultimate goal. "My goal, of course, is to get students to write," she said. "When they're writing in their personal journals, I don't care as much about the traditional conventions, grammar, punctuation, spelling, because I want them to have voice, I want them to have word choice, I want them to have organization of thought. Those are all the things that I'm most
concerned about. "But then we also talk about taking things to publication, to that final version. Having them build in those kind of ideas about what does a published paper look like,
what does a polished piece of writing look like. "This is not going away," she added. "So as teachers of English, or communication arts, we have to find ways to work that process into our lesson planning and into
our language and into our process of teaching." Said Day: "Actually, it's kind of a delightful new species of the English language because it is funny. I think we are all the richer for it. ... It makes life more interesting. It also makes it
more complicated." If nothing else, you can always ROFL. Or roll on the floor laughing. ------------------------------ Heather LaRoi can be reached at
920-993-1000, ext. 238 or by e-mail at hlaroi@postcrescent.com. ------------------------------ In translation Notable quotes translated in text-messaging: 2 b o not 2 b: dat iz d :-Q To be or not to be, that is the question. nw iz
d tym 4 aL gud men 2 cum 2 d aid of thR cuntrE Now is the time for all good men to come to the aid of
their country. www.transl8tit.com A sampler Some common
messaging abbreviations: AFAIK — As far as I know ATM — At the moment B4N — Bye for now BC — Because BCNU — Be seein' you CRBT — Crying really big tears CUL8R — See you later DIKU — Do I know you? EMFBI — Excuse me for butting in GAL — Get a life HAND — Have a nice day ILU — I love you JJA — Just joking around LMAO — Laughing my a** off NMH —Not much here OTOH — On the other hand POS — Parent over shoulder RME — Rolling my eyes RUOK — Are you OK? SETE — Smiling ear to ear SIS — Snickering in silence SOTMG — Short of time, must go TAFN — That's all for now TMWFI — Take my word for it TTFN — Ta ta for now WAYF — Where are you from? WOMBAT — Waste of money, brains and time WTG — Way to go www.webopedia.com Copyright (c) The Post-Crescent. All rights reserved.
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