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Yeah...well most kids in the age group you mentioned can't TALK either, at
least without saying a hundred times "You know" or "You know what I mean?"
or ""You know what I'm saying?" They also say everything in the present
tense: "So he says to me...." or "So I say ...." etc. How do we expect
them to write? They never visualize the words....only images and
sounds...because they don't write. Their vocabulary is extremely limited
and they can't spell, either. I truly feel sorry for them, because
employers are screaming all over the place because they're getting
applicants just out of school who can't read or write.
I've taught technical writing and composition to college students,
beginning in 1993. It's appalling. On the other hand, I've also taught ESL
students (students for whom English is a second language), and they have
much better writing skills than do American students, so it can't be
blamed on the immigrants. Personally, I think it's more related to the
visual inundation (TV, movies, video games, etc.) and to the laxity in the
schools. The public school teachers that I know say they are having to
deal more with behavior problems and administrative tasks than with
teaching basic curriculum. I wonder if English is in such bad shape in the
UK, Canada, or other English-speaking (as a primary language) countries.
WHOEVER is our new President, I hope he makes education a priority. We
simply cannot compete in the global marketplace without basic skills in
reading, writing, and math. We've lost our focus and it's very scary.
> I'd like to divert this thread to a different subject, that I think
> we will find more suitable to this forum.
>
> Some background. My girlfriend has a 15 year old daughter, and my
> best friend has a 17 year old daughter and a 15 year old son.
>
> Every once in a while, I'll get an email or IM from one of them, or
> from kids of other friends (I'm working with two teenagers to teach
> them how to put up a simple web) and I'm appaled at the lack of
> structure, lack of grammar or punctuation, continuity, run-on
> sentences, and spelling. Everything is reduced to the minimum number
> of characters; ur for your, u for you, etc. I understand the purpose
> of shorthand, but for those that are at the stage of learning complex
> composition, are they able to keep the two separate?
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