Why should one write a letter? Now that the Internet exists and in just a few clicks and a "Welcome, You've Got Mail", one could send instant messages, email, or web cam, and in less than 30 seconds one receives a response. A phone call could be made in the time it takes for the writer to get the paper to write the letter, and then brainstorm about what to write, and how to write the letter. One could have picked up a cell phone and dialed five telephone numbers and could have carried at least three efficient conversations. The major reasons for the decline of letter writing include, the decline in handwriting skills in American classrooms, increase access to the worldwide web and all its advancements, and the urge to talk and go has a cell phone attached to every Americans ear. Although, the trend for a faster and more efficient technological age continues to increase letter writing is still a longer lasting conversation, which does not fade away with the hit of a button, or the hang up of a phone line. Computers have taken the place of the pencil and paper in today's classrooms across America. In the average elementary classroom, students begin their year learning the sound and shape of the English alphabet. This continues to be a trend across America, which in more recent years has adopted also the Spanish alphabet in the primary learning experience. Now a students classroom time is cut in half to learn two separate languages, English and Spanish. This brings less time in the classroom to focus on the curves, and loops if the English alphabet, and with this less time teachers are forced to redesign the teaching of the alphabet from a black board print to pointing to keys on a keyboard. When the American classroom g... ... middle of paper ... ...he time it took to brainstorm the introduction and thesis statement to this essay (one hour), one could have learned half of the alphabet, in print and in cursive handwriting. In the time it took to write the body paragraphs of this essay one could have instant messaged over 25 friends, typed and emailed 10 well written letters, and could have come in contact with over 1500 people in less then 10 chat room visits. In the 150 words in this paragraph one could have typed over 30 text messages averaging at least five words per message. So why would one choose to laboriously write a letter by hand, when technology gives an advantage. As society pushes for everything to be easier, and faster pencil and paper will become history and the streams of technology commodities and with this letter writing is another lesson taught to an ignored hand in an English classroom.
Kutcher claims “ We haven’t lost romance in the digital age, but we may be neglecting it, in doing so, acquainted art forms are taking on new importance.The power of a handwritten letter is greater than ever. It’s personal and deliberate and means more than e-mail or text ever will.’’(96)Handwriting is different and unique for each individual. You can look at the letter and judge how much effort a person put into writing it. The mistakes they make show how we as humans are not perfect. and in an intimate relationship writing to your signficant other in a sense you are giving them apart of yourself.It shows feeling, sensitivity and thoughtfulness.Your thoughts and feelings written on paper that they can go back and review it at any time they wish. It has much more meaning versus a text that may have taken just a few seconds. The meaning behind handwriting and letters are by far much deeper. It takes a few effortless seconds to glide ones fingers across a screen and send a text.The effort put into a text does not compare to the time thought out in physical form. Thus the connection is simply not as
Michaela Cullington, a student, wrote a paper “Does Texting Affect Writing?” in 2010 for an English class. The paper is an examination of texting and the belief that it negative effective student’s writing. Cullington goes into detail about textspeak- “language created by these abbreviations”- and their use in formal writings. She organizes the paper in a way that is confusing to understand at first (pg. 1). At the end of the paper, she discusses her finding in her own research which comes to show that texting does not affect writing. But this is contradicting to the information she received from the teachers. The students and the teachers were seeing differences in the use of textspeak in formal writing. Cullington has good support for her
Technology is not killing our ability to write, but it is reviving it and pushing our literacy to new directions. Andrea Lunsford, from Stanford University, conducted an experiment to scrutinize college students way of writing. Her results were alarming, "I think we are in the midst of a literacy revolution the likes of which we haven't seen since Greek civilization." Lunsford discovered that only 38% of students writing occurred within the classroom, the rest was written in their own free time. Most of our socializing now takes place online and always involves text or writing. Before the Internet, most of our communication was verbal. The only time Americans wrote was for a school assignment and if their job required writing. Otherwise most people didn't write another paragraph once they left
Many were once against typography when it first emerged. One prime example was Plato, who Ong and Postman both mention at some point in their work. In fact, Ong states that “Writing, Plato has Socrates say in the Phaedrus, is inhuman, pretending to establish outside the mind what in reality can only be in the mind. Writing is simply a thing, something to be manipulated, something inhuman, artificial, a manufactured product” (Ong 27). He then goes on to say that many have made the same argument about computers today. However, the essential message from this quote is that many believed that these technologies would have a negative effect on the way we think. Ong goes on to disprove Plato’s rationale by explaining that “…his philosophically analytic thought, including his analysis of the effects of writing, was only possible because of the effects that writing was having on mental processes” (Ong 29). Due to the fact that he was even able to analyze typography meant that he was subsuming to typography’s nature. Postman would agree that Plato would not have been able to formulate his analytic views if it were not for writing. Postman wrote that literacy is highly rational. He iterated that discourse in a culture dominated by print tend to have a coherent arrangement of an idea, a fact, or a claim. Postman would explain to Ong that the cause of this is similar to some of the reasons Plato
Cullington responds to the criticism in her article by conducting her own research on this controversial topic. She does this in the second part of her article, where the methods section is located. Cullington gains support for the two conflicting views from interviews and past studies. Cullington starts off by citing many professors and giving statics as well as adding the views of her two past professors. Although there is great evidence for and against texting, she carries out her own research by collecting the results from students and teachers that she knew. She does a detailed analysis of the students’ English papers to see if her results were legitimate. Despite the fact her own research supports the idea that texting and writing have no direct link, she observes the impact of technology and the improvement and growth of modern communication.
While preparing for one of his college lectures, Dennis Baron, a professor and linguistics at the University of Illinois, began playing with the idea of how writing has changed the world we lived in and materials and tools we use in everyday life. This lecture slowly transitioned into “Should Everybody Write?” An article that has made many wonder if technology has made writing too easy for anyone to use or strengthens a writer's ability to learn and communicate their ideas. Baron uses rhetorical strategies in his article to portray to his audience his positive tone, the contrast and comparison of context and his logical purpose.
With technology on the rise students will be spending more time typing, and less time actually writing. Rafael Guerrero states in his article “Are We Seeing the Death of Cursive?” that “[I]n the minds of some, the need for teachers to spend more time getting students to meet state standards and master computer technology has made cursive less relevant.” A large concern for teachers today is to get students to the point of being able to satisfy state standards rather than teaching them material which will benefit them in the future. Teaching third graders how to write in cursive has been one of the main lessons taught for years. Just because the technology is on the rise it should not mean that children do not get the same education generations before have received. Depriving children of this knowledge would be unfair. Students need this writing skill in order to read historical documents from the past. Students will also need to know it when they take the PSAT and SAT in high school for the written statement. Teaching young children how to write in a whole new form of writing is a daunting task, but it is a necessity for them to be able to develop properly and succeed in
Critics of phonics claim that the curriculum is too boring, that the endless worksheets will turn children away from the joy that could be reading and writing. Critics of whole language, however, claim that there is too little structure and that the students will fail to properly comprehend what they are reading and spell words correctly (Curtis, 1997). At times the debate has become rather polarized, despite the fact that the methods are not necessarily dichotomous. People have often politicized the debate as well, which fails to keep the best interest of students in mind (Rothstein, 200; Strickland, 1998). Instead of choosing between a phonics based and a whole language method of teaching reading, educators should use a combination that is specifically tailored to the needs of his/her individual students. This allows the students to use their phonics knowledge within a larger whole language context, eventually instilling in children a desire to read and enabling them to read well.
In the article, “Does Texting Affect Writing?”, the author Michaela Cullington conveys her speculation that texting does not correlate to how students write formal essays. At the beginning of the article Cullington introduces the term texting and the convenience texting brings. Later expressing her concern that the texting language “Textspeak” is actually affecting students writing; then contradicts these views by using primary and secondary sources (news articles, books, her own surveys and research). In addition, she uses an anecdote to tell of her own experience with texting and writing. Together with other evidences and research put together, she uncovers the debate between textspeak and formal writing. On the basis of her research, she concludes that the state of texting does not interfere with writing or writing abilities.
What happened to the pen and paper quality of literacy? Traditional elements such as the pen and paper method has been changed due to the advancement of technology the quality of learning has been digitized to fit this day and age. “Just as the nature of and expectation for literacy has changed in the past century and a half, so has the nature of writing. Much of that change has been due to technological developments from pen and paper, to typewriter, to word processor to network computer, to design software capable of com...
Computer has made the life easier by providing various applications and technologies. For example, while computer has replaced typewriter, it helps the students to become a better writer as they can “revise text, rearrange paragraphs, and experiment with the tone and shape of an essay” () while using word processing. Thus, the computer helps the students to improvise their writing. Human relationship with co...
Ong, Walter. “Writing is a Technology that Restructures Thought.” Writing Material. Ed. Evelyn Tribble. New York. 2003. 315-335.
Our schools have progressed tremendously in the past century.In fact, in the past three decades, we have seen much progression with the use of computers in the classroom.We have gone from one room school houses with one teacher teaching many grades, to schools that may be two stories high or more with many teachers for each grade.More students are in school in today’s society than there...
College students must learn how to write adequately so they sustain mental health, make better grades, and compete in the workplace. As the modern world evolves, one of the basic characteristics of humanity, communication, becomes more essential. The development of technologies such as email, texting, and social media have led to an increase in the value of proficient writing.
Writing has changed because of the efficiency that technology provides. With the invention of instant messaging, writing has started to become something new entirely. People are writing more often and faster to get a message across. Luckily, students know that the writing that they do with friends is much different than what employers are looking for in the work place (Guffey, M.E., & Loewy, D., pg. 3-29).