{"id":2425,"date":"2010-09-10T14:30:00","date_gmt":"2010-09-10T19:30:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/selectmetrix.com\/blogs\/2010\/09\/texting-and-lightning\/"},"modified":"2010-09-10T14:18:58","modified_gmt":"2010-09-10T19:18:58","slug":"texting-and-lightning","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/selectmetrix.com\/blogs\/2010\/09\/texting-and-lightning\/","title":{"rendered":"Texting And Lightning"},"content":{"rendered":"

The difference between the almost right word & the right word is really a large matter–it’s the difference between the lightning bug and the lightning.<\/p>\n
-Mark Twain<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
If you would, allow me to speculate a bit.\u00a0 I\u2019ve been involved in volunteer activities with high school students over the past 2 years so I have become a reluctant texter (is that a word?).\u00a0 I learned quickly that their preferred method of communication is texting.\u00a0 I didn\u2019t even have texting on my cell service when I started.\u00a0 I now have unlimited texting out of necessity.<\/p>\n
I tell you this in regards to a concern I see in this younger generation.\u00a0 I\u2019ve read many pieces about how the younger generation uses text shorthand in formal communications, e.g. cover letters.\u00a0 That is obviously a great concern.\u00a0 However, I see a more disconcerting trend \u2013 a limited vocabulary.<\/p>\n
The modern youth needs to condense their communication into a limited number of characters for texting, Twitter, etc.\u00a0 An adverse side effect of this constraint is their condensed vocabulary.\u00a0 Common, monosyllabic words are their preferred lexicon.\u00a0 The impact is a rather limited vocabulary that is exposed in a long-format writing piece\u2026for instance, an essay.<\/p>\n
This limitation is apparent when you work with these teens.\u00a0 Their word selection (use of adjectives especially), syntax, punctuation\u00a0and idea structure are lacking.\u00a0 They have a desire to respond in a succinct manner with common words absent any punctuation beyond\u00a0a period.\u00a0 The exploration for new words seems lacking in their approach.\u00a0 Hence, the wonderful, aforementioned quote from Mark Twain.<\/p>\n
I see this subtle regression in writing skills becoming a widespread issue in the next generation of professionals.\u00a0 The ability to write effectively may be moving onto the endangered skills list right before our eyes.<\/p>\n
I mentioned in a previous post about a client who had a salesperson who simply could not convey cogent thoughts through his writing.\u00a0 The owner paid \u2013 paid<\/em> \u2013 for an English tutor to help develop this salesperson\u2019s writing ability.\u00a0 It was an abject failure and the owner eventually fired the salesperson.\u00a0 My hope is that this scenario is an uncommon anecdote.<\/p>\n
If you know of young people working their way through the education system, encourage them to expand their vocabulary and refine their writing skills.\u00a0 This much-needed ability will serve them, and us, well as they move into the workforce.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The difference between the almost right word & the right word is really a large matter–it’s the difference between the lightning bug and the lightning. -Mark Twain If you would, allow me to speculate a bit.\u00a0 I\u2019ve been involved in volunteer activities with high school students over the past 2 years so I have become a reluctant texter (is that a word?).\u00a0 I learned quickly that their preferred method of communication is texting.\u00a0 I didn\u2019t even have texting on my cell service when I started.\u00a0 I now have unlimited texting out of necessity. I tell you this in regards to a concern I see in this younger generation.\u00a0 I\u2019ve read… Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"bgseo_title":"","bgseo_description":"","bgseo_robots_index":"","bgseo_robots_follow":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[14,5],"tags":[1760,1640,72,211,1639,488],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p5Oho-D7","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/selectmetrix.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2425"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/selectmetrix.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/selectmetrix.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/selectmetrix.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/selectmetrix.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2425"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/selectmetrix.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2425\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2427,"href":"http:\/\/selectmetrix.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2425\/revisions\/2427"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/selectmetrix.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2425"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/selectmetrix.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2425"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/selectmetrix.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2425"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}