Language Deathwatch: New Zealand Schools Allow "Textspeak" on Exams
Blog friend Pursuit of Serenity just emailed me this loopy story from New Zealand.
Apparently, now some schools will allow students to write their exams using "textspeak." Yes, TEXTSPEAK, the unreadable gibberish people use for text messages!
It's horrible! It's another nail in the coffin of proper language usage. You do know that already schools do not teach grammar, punctuation, and the other foundations of language. Now we're all rushing to oblivion as fast as we can. Textspeak! I'm waiting for some "progressively minded" fool to argue that we should use textspeak because it's more "relevant" and "inclusive," that teaching grammar and spelling rules is "oppressive" and hurts "self-esteem."
*Sigh.*
The news story ends with an example of Shakespeare turned into textspeak: hamlet's immortal words "To be or not to be" becomes "2b or nt 2b." I could just scream. The insane world of "education" should be relabeled with something more accurate, like "institutional stupidity."
Well, for the record, in MY classroom, I insist on standard written English, and that means correct grammar, syntax, punctuation, and spelling!