New Zealand Students May Text-Speak in Exams

[ZapperZ]

Am I the only one who thinks that http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/asiapcf/11/11/nz.text.ap/index.html" ? Honestly now, how low do we have to keep lowering the standards of everything here?

Zz.

 

[scott_alexsk]

Do you mean here on Earth? At least I do not feel so bad about America's standards getting lower, but now there's no where to run.

 

[Astronuc]

New Zealand Students May Text-Speak in Exams!

This IS a horrible idea!

The objective in education is to ascend to the highest standards, not to settle/descend to the lowest common form.

 

[turbo]

That is a horrible idea. How can we expect students to mature and function effectively in later life if they cannot express themselves effectively in real English in school? It's not jarring to see "IMO" instead of "in my opinion" on a message board, but I would penalize a student who wrote that in an essay or on a test. The number of people who post here and don't know the difference between your and you're, there and their, and its and it's is disturbing. The teacher won't know if the student understands the usage of "your" and "you're" if (s)he can simply substitute "ur". The article clearly states that such substitutions will not be allowed in English exams, but come on! Every course is a chance for cross-discipline learning, and students should be required to demonstrate the full range of their abilities (including spelling, punctuation, grammar) in every class, even if they are not being graded on those skills in their Biology or History tests, for instance.

 

[JasonRox]

You think that's bad. I've seen high teachers here who let students text each other during the exam!

 

[Moonbear]

That is AWFUL! It also gives the message that English, or generally, written communications skills, are not important for subjects OTHER than English. If they get accustomed to that, then they will be in for a BIG shock when they get to university courses that expect them to write properly for ALL their assignments. Great, now I'm probably going to have to start adding a statement on syllabi that all assignments and exams must be written in standard English or will not be graded so that I can just hand it back with a big, fat 0[/color] when they try writing it in text speak.

 

[mattmns]

u guyz r lik totallyl wrng, this iz a gr8 idea.

 

[JasonRox]

u guyz r lik totallyl wrng, this iz a gr8 idea.

u tly mspeled al tha wrdz in ur pst!

 

[twisting_edge]

I tried digging an article up, but couldn't find it. A few years ago, there was some serious debate about introducing "street english" into the public schools in California. The idea was apparently to allow students to learn the material without forcing them to first learn English.

Conservative commentators had a great time with that one, as you can imagine. Sample exchange: "What did I just say to you? [after reading a sample of the language to be allowed]"

"You just said, 'Don't ever hire me.'"

I can probably get someone else to dig it up if anyone really needs to see it.

[edited for typos]

 

[Astronuc]

I tried digging an article up, but couldn't find it. A few yearas ago, there was some seirous debate about introducing "street english" into the public schools in California. The idea was apparently to allow students to learn the material without forcing thme to first learn English.

Was that the discussion about "Ebonics" as a language?

Conservative commentators had a great time with that one, as you can imagine. Sample exchange: "What did I just say to you? [after reading a sample of the language to be allowed]"

"You just said, 'Don't ever hire me.'"

We need to be very precise in our use of technical language - so as not to compromise economics and reliability, nor health and safey.

 

[twisting_edge]

Was that the discussion about "Ebonics" as a language?

Thank you, that was the keyword I was looking for.

Also, you should note there was an earlier attempt to instruct the teachers (not the students) in 'Ebonics', so they could understand better what was going an around them. That was years ago. The more recent effort was to teach and test in the 'language'.

MSNBC: http://msnbc.msn.com/id/8628930/"

Well, as a group, black students performed the worst among racial groups in the San Bernardino School District in California. So a sociologist from the University of California now says Ebonics, basically the codified version of African-American dialect, should be incorporated in the curriculum for black students to help them remain interested in school and to perform better.

A trial Ebonics is already in place in two San Bernardino schools.

There's probably other articles with more specifics on that proposal, but that's the article I recalled.

 

[edward]

Thank you, that was the keyword I was looking for.

Also, you should note there was an earlier attempt to instruct the teachers (not the students) in 'Ebonics', so they could understand better what was going an around them. That was years ago. The more recent effort was to teach and test in the 'language'.

MSNBC: http://msnbc.msn.com/id/8628930/"

There's probably other articles with more specifics on that proposal, but that's the article I recalled.

Ebonics is still being used by students whether teachers approve of it or not. More recently we have added Spanglish, good god how would those look in text speak?

I guess that we could presume that the letters M and F would appear quite frequently in Ebonics text speak.

 

[moose]

lolz dis is teh bst idae evr!

finly i cn pas ma exm!

This reminds me of a maddox cartoon...
I guess I won't have it displayed in this thread directly because it uses the "f word" once...
http://www.thebestpageintheuniverse.net/images/alien15.gif

 

[Moonbear]

lolz dis is teh bst idae evr!

finly i cn pas ma exm!

Is that Scottish?

When did LOL turn into lolz anyway? LOL is already an abbreviation, so I really have no idea what the z is supposed to do for it, but I see it a lot now. Then again, way back when I first started exploring chat rooms, I thought I was talking to someone British when they wrote "LOL." I just read it as a word, not an abbreviation, and for some reason, that just sounded British to me.

 

[Astronuc]

Is that Scottish?

Nah, looks more Welshish!

 

[Moonbear]

Nah, looks more Welshish!

Probably needs a few more Ls and Ws to be Welsh, but it does seem to have the right consonant to vowel ratio.

 

[Gelsamel Epsilon]

'Ridiculous' is the only word for it.

 

[Mk]

Is that Scottish?

When did LOL turn into lolz anyway? LOL is already an abbreviation, so I really have no idea what the z is supposed to do for it, but I see it a lot now.

It is supposed to pluralize isn't it? But there are never rules

Then again, way back when I first started exploring chat rooms, I thought I was talking to someone British when they wrote "LOL." I just read it as a word, not an abbreviation, and for some reason, that just sounded British to me.

Same thing with me, but I still think "lol," as the word would be instead of saying each letter individually. Like Whykipedia. Who said it was weekypedia? I'm a whykipediahead and people look at me funny when I use weeky and whyky interchangeably.

 

[moose]

I say lol in my head as one word... and damnit someone just started smoking outside and my window was open... now my room smells like smoke :angry:

lolz is a plural form of lol... because lols isn't cool enough

lawl is another way of saying lol... haha, I love (when I say love, I really mean hate, or annoyed by) it when I hear someone say "rofl" in a conversation.

also, I say faq as one word, but some people say it as eff aye que? weird... Whenever I say "look at the faq", some people think I am saying an alternate to the f word... pfft...

SHE's a MANIAC MANIAC, on the flooor, and she's dancin like she's never danced befooororeee

EDIT: it can cut you like a knife!

 

[Moonbear]

lolz is a plural form of lol... because lols isn't cool enough

But, but, but...it's a phrase consisting of a verb (laughing; well, technically, "am laughing" as in "I am laughing") and adverb (out loud), usually referring to a singular person (the one typing it), so how do you make it a plural at all? Even if it was referring to a plural subject (many people), it's still "laughing out loud" not "laughing out louds" or "laughings out loud." See, this is the problem, not only is the spelling atrocious, the grammar is too! I'm going to go back to banging my head on the desk now.

 

[Gokul43201]

SHE's a MANIAC MANIAC, on the flooor, and she's dancin like she's never danced befooororeee

You know that when you capitalize the subject that way, it goes from being a person characterized by an inordinate enthusiasm for something to von Neumann's Mathematical Analyzer, Numerical Integrator and Computer.

lolzes

 

[Kalimaa23]

Most people who speak Dutch don't find out that lol is an abbreviation right away. "lol" is also the Dutch word for "fun".

 

[Astronuc]

Probably needs a few more Ls and Ws to be Welsh, but it does seem to have the right consonant to vowel ratio.

U mn llyk Wllshysh. LLOLL

 

[moose]

You know that when you capitalize the subject that way, it goes from being a person characterized by an inordinate enthusiasm for something to von Neumann's Mathematical Analyzer, Numerical Integrator and Computer.

lolzes

only on PF...

LOL
ZOMG

EDIT: When I read Astronuc's comment, I LOLed for a long time

 

[Moonbear]

U mn llyk Wllshysh. LLOLL

Yeah, that's more like it!

 

[neutrino]

But, but, but...it's a phrase consisting of a verb (laughing; well, technically, "am laughing" as in "I am laughing") and adverb (out loud), usually referring to a singular person (the one typing it), so how do you make it a plural at all? Even if it was referring to a plural subject (many people), it's still "laughing out loud" not "laughing out louds" or "laughings out loud." See, this is the problem, not only is the spelling atrocious, the grammar is too! I'm going to go back to banging my head on the desk now.

Laughing Out Loud many times.

... ... ...

Btw, that's actually ROFLz. (Rofflez...sounds nice, doesn't it?)