Renowned Chav Professor Advocates Use of SMS Text Language and Spelling Errors

RUNCORN - England - A highly respected Professor of Chavology at the University of Runcorn

has proposed that the English language be adjusted to include mobile phone text language and
incorrect spelling.

Labour education ministers were today considering the latest proposal from a highly
respected professor of Chavology at Runcorn University.

Professor Ken Smith is so proud of marking his Chavology students' lazy nonsensical
attempts at English that he has proposed the most common spelling atrocities committed by
his moronic pupils be accepted as "variant spellings".

"2b? nt2b? = ???"

The Labour government keen to carry on with their mantra spin of "Education, education,
education" are seriously considering adopting mobile phone SMS text language and
misspellings within the national curriculum.

"We would like to leave something for the historians to write about. Something that will
remind people of the Labour legacy in our great country. This new proposal will entail re-
publishing all English dictionaries worldwide to include the improved spellings," Ed Balls, the
education minister told us.

The professor has also proposed that the English language should be altered in all legal
documents and medical literature as well.

The entire works of Shakespeare and John Milton have already been re-written in mobile
phone text language.

"Rmeo, Rmeo - wher4 rt thou Rmeo?"

An example of the English words that will be changed have been included in an information
leaflet handed out to all libraries in England and Wales. Scotland will also be updated with a
new vocabulary but first linguistics experts have to try and understand what the Scots are
saying before they can draft a proposal.

To start, he suggested 10 words including "arguement" for "argument" and "twelth" for
"twelfth".

There has also been calls for "shanking" to be included in the English dictionary because of
the current popularity in the UK for knife murder amongst children. The rise in daily
stabbings and knife murders has made the word "shank" (to stab) so popular that it is now
a game on networking site Facebook.

He added: "We need to adapt to the youth of Britain. The truth is none of them can spell
anymore and are more used to SMS text language than proper English, innit. My proposal is
designed to make it betterer for the youth of this country to be included."

Gramr? Wat's dat?

Spelling Society chairman Jack Bovill welcomed the Runcorn New University lecturer's idea:
"This is a marvellous proposal by the professor and our spelling society welcomes it
wholeheartedly. It is high time that the youth of Britain brought something positive to the
English language."

A-level and GCSE exams in the UK will also be altered to accept the SMS text language
along with common spelling mistakes.

Labour ministers say that everyone in England and Wales is now guaranteed an A+ mark in
all exams.

The exam board for England and Wales has provided an example of what is now acceptable
in the English literature A-level exam.

An excerpt from Hamlet's famous soliloquy in SMS text language:

HAMLET: 2 b, or nt 2 b--tht is = ?:
Wether 'tis nbler in da mynd 2 sffr
Da slings N arrows ov outragus 4toon
Or 2 tke rms agst a C of trubles
N by opposin end dem. 2 die, 2 sleep--
No mre--n by a sleep 2 say wii nd
Da hartake, n da 1000 nturl shoks
DAT flsh is air 2. 'Tis a consmtion
Dvoutly 2 b wshed. 2 die, 2 sleep--
2 sleep--perchnce 2 dreem: ay, dere's da rub,
For in dat sleep ov deth wot dreems may cum
Wen wii av shuffled off dis mrtal coil,
Mst gve us paws. :-)

http://www.dailysquib.co.uk/index.php?news=1443

British teacher appalled by spelling errors

Inquirer
First Posted 08:30:00 08/14/2007

Filed Under: Education, Language

LONDON -- A British university lecturer plans to launch a shame campaign against his students’
lack of orthographical ability after he became increasingly dismayed at their poor spelling.

Bernard Lamb, a reader in genetics at Imperial College, London, hopes that by publishing the
errors he has noted during years of marking papers, it will put pressure on education ministers to
raise teaching standards.
“Errors in the English of highly selected undergraduates,” which will appear in the next issue of
the Queen’s English Society’s journal “Quest,” will highlight howlers, such as students
discussing “cows inseminated by seamen.”

Atrocious spelling mistakes include “rouge genetic elements” and “plants sewn together.”
Similarly appalling is the frequent misuse of “compliment” for “complement,” “effect” instead
of “affect,” and “sun” for “son.”

The errors were committed by students in the second and third years of undergraduate degrees.

Lamb, chair of Queen’s English Society’s London branch, said: “It’s important we draw
attention to the issue. We are aiming to improve education because if school leavers put in job
applications full of errors, it’s going to have a bad effect on their careers and their firms’
progress.”

“It’s very important people should be able to express themselves clearly and accurately for their
benefit and the country’s,” he added.

In 1992, Lamb studied the English of arts and science undergraduates at 17 British universities
and found that tutors were “despairing” of their students’ grasp of the language.

“This year, I just found the errors were so frequent I wanted to get publicity to put pressure on
the education establishment. Ministers say things are getting better, but they are not,” he added.

Traditionalists have long bemoaned the falling standards of English usage among native
speakers.

Many trace the phenomenon to the lack of formal teaching in schools, which has a knock-on
effect in the education system.

Text messaging or an increasing reliance on computer spell checkers have also been cited as a
major reason for the rise in spelling mistakes.

To protect the English language, some sticklers have set up groups, including The Apostrophe
Protection Society.

There is even a (mostly) tongue-in-cheek group on Internet social networking site Facebook
called “If you can’t differentiate between ‘your’ and ‘you’re’ you deserve to die.”

Agence France-Press

http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/breakingnews/world/view/20070814-
82415/British_teacher_appalled_by_spelling_errors
RU Kidding - txtspeak Has No Impact on Children's Spelling Ability

Published on: 22nd Sep 2009

Parents, get ready to say OMG and watch your teens roflol.

This will prolly comes as a bit of a shock to UR system, but findings from a group of University of Alberta
researchers show that language commonly used in instant messaging has no effect on your child's
spelling abilities. If anything, says study author Connie Varnhagen, using language variations commonly
used in instant messaging and texting is actually a good sign.

Varnhagen's findings come from a class-based study that was recently published in Reading and Writing.
A group of third-year psychology Students proposed and designed a study to test whether new SMS,
language - also known as txtspeak - had an influence on students' spelling habits. The group surveyed
roughly 40 students from ages 12 to 17. The participants were asked to save their instant messages for a
week. At the end of the study, the participants completed a standardized spelling test.

Students' use of txtspeak is only one shared concern between parents and educators about children's
spelling abilities. But, with a growing usage of connected resources such as Skype, Facebook and Twitter,
understanding the relationship between this virtual dialect and use of the Queen's English is of
significant importance.

While the researchers expected there to be some correlation between poor spelling and txtspeak,
Varnhagen said they were pleasantly surprised by the results.

"Kids who are good spellers [academically] are good spellers in instant messaging," she said. "And kids
who are poor spellers in English class are poor spellers in instant messaging."

What was surprising, though, was how txtspeak use and spelling played in the battle of the sexes. Girls
used more txtspeak than boys, who preferred to express themselves through repeated use of
punctuation. However, the study found that boys who used txtspeak and abbreviations more frequently
were poorer spellers. Conversely, girls who used more abbreviations were better spellers than girls who
did not use many abbreviations in their messages.

Nicole Pugh, a student researcher and one of the study's co-authors, was amazed at the complexity and
volume of txtspeak that the students were using.

"Going through the participant conversations, it was interesting to note how many new words that
children are using online," said Pugh. "We would have to decipher the meaning of the language with
online dictionaries or by asking younger siblings."

http://www.cellular-news.com/story/39719.php
Text messaging 'improves children's spelling skills'

Varnhagen and Pugh both agree that the results of their study should ease some concerns and even
open up discussion on how this language can be perhaps be embraced within an educational or
academic context.

"If you want students to think very precisely and concisely and be able to express themselves, it might
be interesting to have them create instant messages with ideas, maybe allow them opportunities to use
more of this new dialect in brief reports or fun activities," said Varnhagen. "Using a new type of
language does require concentration and translating it to standard English does require concentration
and attention. It's a little brain workout."

The use of “textisms” can improve literacy among pupils by giving them extra exposure to word
composition outside the school day, it was claimed.

The conclusions come despite fears that the use of abbreviations such as “CU L8R”, “Gr8” and
“innit” can undermine children’s reading and writing.

Critics have suggested that text messaging can blur the boundaries between colloquialisms and
standard English, with some teachers claiming that slang is now creeping into children’s school
work.

But academics from Coventry University said there was “no evidence” that access to mobile
phones harmed children’s literacy skills and could even have a positive impact on spelling.

In the latest study, researchers recruited 114 children aged nine and 10 from primary schools in
the Midlands.

The pupils, who did not already use a mobile phone, were split into two groups.

Half were given a handset to use for texting over weekends and during the school holidays over a
10-week period. The remaining pupils formed a control group.

Academics then gave pupils a series of reading, spelling and phonological awareness tests before
and after the study. Pupils’ reading and spelling was also monitored week-on-week.

The research, to be published in the Journal of Computer Assisted Learning next month, found
evidence of a “significant contribution of textism use to the children’s spelling development
during the study”.

This study, which took account of individual differences in IQ, found higher results in test scores
recorded by children using mobile phones after 10 weeks compared with the start of the study.

According to the report, the association between spelling and text messaging may be explained
by the “highly phonetic nature” of the abbreviations used by children and the alphabetic
awareness required for successfully decoding the words.
“It is also possible that textism use adds value because of the indirect way in which mobile
phone use may be increasing children’s exposure to print outside of school,” said the report,
funded by Becta, the Government’s education technology agency.

Prof Clare Wood, senior lecturer in the university’s psychology department, said: “We are now
starting to see consistent evidence that children’s use of text message abbreviations has a positive
impact on their spelling skills.

“There is no evidence that children’s language play when using mobile phones is damaging
literacy development.”

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/educationnews/8272502/Text-messaging-improves-childrens-
spelling-skills.html

Text message speak 'not harmful to children's spelling', says research

Using text message language – the OMGs, m8s and 2mros – does not harm children’s spelling abilities,
new research suggests, and may even be a good sign.

The study, carried out by Canadian researchers at the University of Alberta, suggested that
children who are good at spelling “real” words are also good at spelling in text speak.

Professor Connie Varnhagen, who led the research, said: "Kids who are good spellers
[academically] are good spellers in instant messaging.

"And kids who are poor spellers in English class are poor spellers in instant messaging."

It did find that boys who used text speak frequently tended to be worse spellers. However, girls
who used a lot of abbreviations tended to be better.

The study also found that children using text speak were using a lot of newly created words. One
of the researchers, Nicole Pugh, said: "We would have to decipher the meaning of the language
with online dictionaries or by asking younger siblings."

Professor Varnhagen compared using this new type of language to a “little brain workout”,
saying that it required more concentration and attention than simply reading English.

The research looked at around 40 students between 12 and 17. The students were asked to save
their text messages for one week. At the end of the week they were given a spelling test.

While the study is a small one, it is not the first research to draw the conclusion that text speak is
not harmful for children.
A 2009 report in the British Journal of Developmental Psychology said that regular text-speakers
tend to have a better vocabulary and grasp of word reading than their peers, Similarly a 2006
study at the University of Toronto said that instant messenger speaking, which is similar to text
speak, does not affect writing abilities in any meaningful way.

The researchers suggest that their trial should lead to an easing of concern over the use of text
speak, and teachers should perhaps start thinking of ways that the new language can be used
educationally.

Professor Varnhagen said: "If you want students to think very precisely and concisely and be
able to express themselves, it might be interesting to have them create instant messages with
ideas, maybe allow them opportunities to use more of this new dialect in brief reports or fun
activities.

"Using a new type of language does require concentration and translating it to standard English
does require concentration and attention. It's a little brain workout."

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/science-news/6221875/Text-message-speak-not-harmful-to-
childrens-spelling-says-research.html

ERIC Identifier: ED250695

Publication Date: 1984-00-00
Author: Hodges, Richard E.
Source: ERIC Clearinghouse on Reading and Communication Skills Urbana IL.

Spelling. ERIC Digest.

Spelling instruction in American schools has traditionally proceeded on the basis that
memorization of needed words is the most productive route to spelling ability. Indeed, spelling
as a school subject has long been regarded by society as a subject whose mastery symbolizes the
values that diligence and hard work play in achievement. This view of spelling reinforces the
belief that memorization is not only a necessary but an appropriate means of acquiring spelling
skills.

However, recent findings of researchers who have studied how children learn to spell and new
views on the nature of the English writing system suggest additional ways to teach spelling.

WHAT IS SPELLING?

Spelling is the process of converting oral language to visual form by placing graphic symbols on
some writing surface. Because writing systems, or orthographies, are inventions, they can and do
vary with respect to how a particular language is graphically represented. The Chinese language,
for example, uses a system of graphic characters that represent complete words or ideas.)

The writing system used in the majority of the world's langages, however, is alphabetic in
structure; that is, the graphemes, or graphic (visual) characters, represent speech sounds, ideally
with a unique grapheme for each speech sound. English orthography is based on this principle.
But, on the surface at least, our written code appears to be erratic, even untrustworthy, in its
relationship to the spoken language. As a result, mastering English spelling has been regarded as
an unnecessarily time-consuming and arduous task.

In the past several years, linguists and others interested in English orthography have helped to
clarify the actual relationship between our writing system and the spoken language. Their studies
have revealed that English orthography, while appearing quite irregular on the surface, is
considerably more logical than it appears when examined at deeper, more complex levels of
language.

Their work reveals that such factors as the relationships among letters within words, the ways
prefixes and suffixes are appended to roots, and the ways words related in meaning remain
related in spelling despite sound changes (for example, derive-derivative-derivation) are
fundamental properties of the orthography.

HOW IS SPELLING ABILITY DEVELOPED?

In addition to significant gains in our knowledge of English orthography, we now better

understand the nature of spelling ability from studies of how young children learn to spell.

One of the first major studies to examine how children learn to spell was conducted by Charles
Read, a linguist now at the University of Wisconsin (Read 1971, 1975a, 1975b). Read looked at
the way in which children four to eight years old used their knowledge of English phonology (the
sounds in spoken English) to spell words. Among his subjects were approximately twenty
preschoolers who were able to identify and name the letters of the alphabet and to relate the letter
names to the sounds of words. These children then "invented" spellings for words that they wrote
or constructed by arranging movable letters.

Read found that even at an early age children are able to detect the phonetic characteristics of
words that English spelling represents. More interesting, although these young children
misspelled most of the words they attempted, with minor variation they misspelled the words in
the same ways. For example, children typically spelled the sounds of words with the alphabet
letters whose names were like those sounds: bot for boat, fas for face, lade for lady.

Read's seminal work disclosed that children, even very young children, try to make sense of the
world around them by using the information that is available to them; in this instance, they
applied their intuitive knowledge of the sound structure of English to spelling. Moreover, Read
demonstrated that the judgments of children about relationships between speech and writing are
qualitatively different from those made by adults. In short, learning to write, like learning to
speak, is a developmental process.

But what about the spelling strategies of older students? One examination of spelling
development among youngsters in later school years was undertaken by Templeton (1979). To
determine the extent to which knowledge of graphic structure contributes to spelling ability, he
studied the abilities of sixth-, eighth-, and tenth-graders to construct and spell derived forms of
real and nonsense words. Templeton found considerable evidence that spelling ability does not
rely solely on skills for relating sound and spelling, nor upon rote memory. Rather, both
phonological knowlege and visual knowlege about words are brought into play when older
students spell, the visual knowlege having been acquired, of course, only from extensive prior
experiences with reading and writing.

These observations do not refute the fact that word memory plays an important role in spelling
ability. But, just as we now know more about the complex structure of our written code, we also
now know that spelling ability involves more than memorizing the spelling of individual words.
Researchers' observations reveal that spelling ability is a developmental achievement gained
through interaction over time with the orthography in both writing and reading. With experience,
children learn much about the general structural properties of English words--about their sounds,
graphemes, roots, affixes, and so on. Learning to spell, in short, involves learning about words
over a long duration and in a variety of contexts.

IMPLICATIONS FOR INSTRUCTION

Among the several important insights that have been gained about the nature of spelling ability,
perhaps the most important is the realization that this ability involves more than word memory
skills. Learning to spell involves learning about written language in everyday use and about the
interrelationships of components of words as reflected in the orthography.

We need to be aware that students contribute actively to their own learning. Accordingly, we
need to provide them with numerous and frequent opportunities to explore English spelling in the
context of daily writing and reading activities. Although formal spelling study has a legitimate
place in the school curriculum, every interaction with written language both in and out of
spelling class provides students with opportunities to gain new information about the structure
and uses of the written code. The foundation of spelling instruction is the study of written
language itself.

FOR MORE INFORMATION

Bissex, Glenda L. GNYS AT WRK: A CHILD LEARNS TO READ AND WRITE. Cambridge,
MA: Harvard University Press, 1981.

Chomsky, Noam, and Morris Halle. THE SOUND PATTERN OF ENGLISH. New York:
Harper and Row, 1968. ED 020 511.

Frith, Uta, editor. COGNITIVE PROCESSES IN SPELLING. London and New York:
Academic Press, 1980.

Hanna, Paul R., Jean S. Hanna, Richard E. Hodges, and Erwin H. Rudorf. PHONEME-
GRAPHEME CORRESPONDENCES AS CUES TO SPELLING IMPROVEMENT.
Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, United States Office of Education, 1966. ED
003 321.
Henderson, Edmund H. LEARNING TO READ AND SPELL: THE CHILD'S KNOWLEDGE
OF WORDS. DeKalb, IL: Northern Illinois University Press, 1981.

Hodges, Richard E. LEARNING TO SPELL. THEORY AND RESEARCH INTO PRACTICE.

Urbana, IL: ERIC Clearinghouse on Reading and Communication Skills and National Council of
Teachers of English, 1981. ED 202 016.

Hodges, Richard E. IMPROVING SPELLING AND VOCABULARY IN THE SECONDARY

SCHOOL. THEORY AND RESEARCH INTO PRACTICE. Urbana, IL: ERIC Clearinghouse
on Reading and Communication Skills and National Council of Teachers of English, 1982. ED
218 645.

Read, Charles. CHILDREN'S CATEGORIZATION OF SPEECH SOUNDS IN ENGLISH.

National Council of Teachers of English Research Report No. 17. Urbana, IL: ERIC
Clearinghouse on Reading and Communication Skills and National Council of Teachers of
English, 1975. ED 112 426.

Read, Charles, and Richard E. Hodges. "Spelling." In Encyclopedia of Educational Research, 5th
ed., edited by Harold Mitzel. New York: Macmillan, 1983.

Templeton, Shane. "Spelling First, Sound Later: The Relationship between Orthography and
Higher Order Phonological Knowledge in Older Students." RESEARCH IN THE TEACHING
OF ENGLISH 13 (October 1979):255-264.

Venezky, Richard L. "English Orthography: Its Graphical Structure and Its Relation to Sounds."
READING RESEARCH QUARTERLY 2 (Spring 1967):75-102.