# data[].attributes.body
"Southeast Missouri State University writing instructor Eric Sentell said in an email to the Southeast Missourian that since he began teaching six years ago, he's noticed a difference in the quality of students' writing. 'Students are more likely to commit certain grammatical errors because they use the conventions of texting, tweeting and Facebooking in their formal academic essays.'"

# data[].attributes.body
When I was beginning high school in 1994 boys knew not to reveal weakness and insecurity. Girls didn't seem to like guys who vocalized vulnerability. Athletes usually projected stereotypically masculine traits: along with imposing physical size, aggressive, even belligerent confidence, an easy stance, gait, and casual presence, the signs of being comfortable in their own skins.

# data[].attributes.body
"My students in 2013 are more comfortable writing about personal issues than were my classmates in the mid-late '90s."

# data[].attributes.body
"An online survey by the Pew Research Center's Internet & American Life Project, in collaboration with the College Board and the National Writing Project in 2012, conducted among 2,462 middle- and high-school teachers showed while half of teachers say digital tools make it easier to teach writing, 18 percent say those tools make it more difficult."

# data[].attributes.body
"Our teachers really try to help our students understand the difference between formal and informal writing,"

# data[].attributes.body
"For younger high school boys particularly, social networking has actually improved writing—not the product or the process, but the sensitivity and inward focus required to even begin to produce a draft that will eventually be worth editing."

# data[].attributes.body
"On Facebook, even popular students post statuses in which they express insecurities. I see a dozen every time I log on. A kid frets that his longtime girlfriend is straying and wishes he hadn't upset her."

# data[].attributes.body
"68 percent of teachers polled by Pew say digital tools make students more likely to take shortcuts and not put effort into their writing. 46 percent said these tools make students more likely to "write too fast and be careless."

# data[].attributes.body
'My students in 2013 are more comfortable writing about personal issues than were my classmates in the mid-late '90s.'

# data[].attributes.body
Occasionally, I see actual 'text language,' like using the letter 'u' instead of the word 'you,'" Sentell wrote. Most of the time, it's lack of capitalization, punctuation and apostrophes, Sentell said.

# data[].attributes.body
Central High School principal Mike Cowan, a former English teacher, said texting language has become so commonplace, he even noticed a billboard between Cape Girardeau and Oak Ridge that used "U" instead of "You."

# data[].attributes.body
"As a high-school English teacher, I read well over a thousand student essays a year. I can report that complete sentences are an increasingly endangered species. I wearily review the point of paragraphs every semester."

# data[].attributes.body
"An online survey by the Pew Research Center's Internet & American Life Project, in collaboration with the College Board and the National Writing Project in 2012, conducted among 2,462 middle- and high-school teachers showed while half of teachers say digital tools make it easier to teach writing, 18 percent say those tools make it more difficult."

# data[].attributes.body
"After all, we write for an audience and we write for ourselves too. I see students recognizing the value of tackling these topics with honesty. I notice that they are relieved when they do so."

# data[].attributes.body
"My observations have reaffirmed the widely held notion that the Internet is no refuge from the pains of adolescence. It's a really bad neighborhood. On Facebook and Twitter, students humiliate, jeer, and shame one another. They engage in antisocial, even criminal behavior—leaving belligerently racist comments on links, harassing classmates with derogatory posts.

# data[].attributes.body
"Half of teachers say digital tools make it easier to teach writing, 18 percent say those tools make it more difficult."

# data[].attributes.body
"Also, I was a boy once, and so I understand them better than I understand girls. The emotional distance fostered by Facebook and other sites can encourage a healthier candor."

# data[].attributes.body
"I observed a significant reduction in those errors and an increase in the overall quality of my students' writing. But some capitalization, punctuation and apostrophe errors still creep in every now and then."

# data[].attributes.body
"Keyboarding itself doesn't have an effect on grammar and formal writing, but with people relying more on electronic devices, physical handwriting also is disappearing"

# data[].attributes.body
"I see students recognizing the value of tackling these topics with honesty. I notice that they are relieved when they do so. Sometimes students address the same topic in several essays over the course of the year, updating me, their confidante, on the status of a specific situation. When they share these essays with the rest of the class, they turn the two-way conversation (their writing, my feedback) into a network. Writing isn't just about the spilling of guts, obviously, but the transparency encouraged by social networking has laid the foundation for this freedom."

# data[].attributes.body
'"Everyone speaks and writes differently for different audiences, but some students struggle to switch between the informal codes of texting and social media and the more-formal codes of standard written English and academic or professional writing. After noticing increases in text language and other grammatical errors, I began emphasizing 'code-switching,' or adapting one's writing to one's audience," Sentell wrote.'

# data[].attributes.body
As a high-school English teacher, I read well over a thousand student essays a year. I can report that complete sentences are an increasingly endangered species. I wearily review the point of paragraphs every semester. This year I tried and failed to spark a senior class protest against "blobs"—my pejorative term for essays lacking paragraphs.

# data[].attributes.body
"Social networking has dramatically altered how high-school boys deal with their emotions."

# data[].attributes.body
"I have a Facebook page dedicated solely to my position as an educator. I don't send friend requests to students but current and former students can send them to me and I always accept. I don't post much, but I keep up with some students and share literature-related links when I delude myself into thinking they'll be of interest.

# data[].attributes.body
"High school is cruel to all genders, an equal-opportunity destroyer of spirit and self-esteem. I'm focusing on boys because I've seen the phenomenon play out more intensely with them. Also, I was a boy once, and so I understand them better than I understand girls."

# data[].attributes.body
"My observations have reaffirmed the widely held notion that the Internet is no refuge from the pains of adolescence. It's a really bad neighborhood. On Facebook and Twitter, students humiliate, jeer, and shame one another. They engage in antisocial, even criminal behavior—leaving belligerently racist comments on links, harassing classmates with derogatory posts."

# data[].attributes.body
"For a while, Cowan said he fought texting, but he's doing it himself now. "Often I'll get comments that I've been texting in complete sentences. Now I'm going for declarative sentences. I guess I've even relented to some degree," he said.:

# data[].attributes.body
"An online survey by the Pew Research Center's Internet & American Life Project, in collaboration with the College Board and the National Writing Project in 2012, conducted among 2,462 middle- and high-school teachers showed while half of teachers say digital tools make it easier to teach writing, 18 percent say those tools make it more difficult."

# data[].attributes.body
Older students—those in their mid- to late 40s—are "totally lost" on that score, she said.

The two largest age groups served by the Adult Education and Literacy program are 19 to 24 and mid-20s to 40s. Atwood said it doesn't serve "all that many" in the 17- to 18-year-old range.

# data[].attributes.body
"If we have a disciplinary situation in school, we always invite the student to write a statement about what happened to try and get down to the facts of the situation. They'll write in that kind of informal expression. I see it more all the time. I think it is indeed an academic battle that faculty teachers are fighting ..." Cowan said.

# data[].attributes.body
"Everyone speaks and writes differently for different audiences, but some students struggle to switch between the informal codes of texting and social media and the more-formal codes of standard written English and academic or professional writing. After noticing increases in text language and other grammatical errors, I began emphasizing 'code-switching,' or adapting one's writing to one's audience."

# data[].attributes.body
In regards to code switching:

"I observed a significant reduction in those errors and an increase in the overall quality of my students' writing. But some capitalization, punctuation and apostrophe errors still creep in every now and then."

# data[].attributes.body
" I don't send friend requests to students but current and former students can send them to me and I always accept. I don't post much, but I keep up with some students and share literature-related links when I delude myself into thinking they'll be of interest"

# data[].attributes.body
"Hinkebein said students are taught cursive writing the second semester of second grade, and kindergarten through 12th-grade students are taught when it's inappropriate to use informal language. 'Our teachers really try to help our students understand the difference between formal and informal writing,' she said."

# data[].attributes.body
"However, while Facebook and Twitter have eroded writing conventions among my students, they have not killed the most important ingredients in personal writing: self-reflection and emotional honesty. For younger high school boys particularly, social networking has actually improved writing—not the product or the process, but the sensitivity and inward focus required to even begin to produce a draft that will eventually be worth editing"

# data[].attributes.body
Atwood said economic and education background affect electronic literacy, as well. "If you were raised ... middle class or above, you're probably technosavvy," she said. "People in some of the lower income brackets, not so much," because they haven't had access to technology.

# data[].attributes.body
"On Facebook, even popular students post statuses in which they express insecurities. I see a dozen every time I log on. A kid frets that his longtime girlfriend is straying and wishes he hadn't upset her. Another admits to being lonely (with weepy emoticons added for effect)..."

# data[].attributes.body
'"It has affected students' ability to write and write coherently. They have to relearn what they might have already known, or learn new skills that they never mastered, because again, they're used to writing informally and now we're asking them to write with a much more formal ... purpose, defending their reasoning, and that's not what they're doing when they're communicating, oftentimes, between friends," Atwood said.'

# data[].attributes.body
"Ruth Campbell covers K-12 and higher education for the Southeast Missourian."

# data[].attributes.body
"'I observed a significant reduction in those errors and an increase in the overall quality of my students' writing. But some capitalization, punctuation and apostrophe errors still creep in every now and then.'"

# data[].attributes.body
"Andrew Simmons is a writer, teacher, and musician. He has written for The New York Times, Slate, and The Believer."

# data[].attributes.body
"Our teachers really try to help our students understand the difference between formal and informal writing," she said.But students come to school "already immersed in technology," Hinkebein noted.

# data[].attributes.body
"I have a Facebook page dedicated solely to my position as an educator."
"A few times a week though, I log on and observe what students post.
My observations have reaffirmed the widely held notion that the Internet is no refuge from the pains of adolescence."

# data[].attributes.body
"Despite the Drake pics captioned with the rapper's soft-headed couplets, the fight videos, and the countless time-wasting surveys and games that pollute the average high- school student's feed, I see the online social universe my students traverse as an improvement over my high-school terrain."

# data[].attributes.body
"Current and former students can send them (requests) to me and I always accept. I don't post much, but I keep up with some students and share literature-related links when I delude myself into thinking they'll be of interest. Current students often send me requests without thinking of the possible consequences of being Facebook friends with a teacher. I have made it a policy to avoid bringing a student's posts into a conference with a parent or counselor unless required to do so by law. A few times a week though, I log on and observe what students post.

My observations have reaffirmed the widely held notion that the Internet is no refuge from the pains of adolescence."

# data[].attributes.body
" At age 14, I was small, smart, and artistic. I wrote well, but the prospect of writing anything that would permit even a teacher to know what I really thought terrified me. Spilling my guts in a writers' workshop with my classmates would have been social suicide"

# data[].attributes.body
Many of my students grow up in households in which machismo reigns supreme. They've never been allowed to cry. Their mothers and sisters cook and wash the dishes and clean. They've been encouraged to see themselves as dominant, powerful, swaggering, sullen men, not sensitive and reflective men, powerfully kind, confidently open. Fostering those traits is a woman's responsibility, like housework. In this sense, Facebook is a genuine outlet for the young men I teach.

# data[].attributes.body
"At age 14, I was small, smart, and artistic. I wrote well, but the prospect of writing anything that would permit even a teacher to know what I really thought terrified me. Spilling my guts in a writers' workshop with my classmates would have been social suicide."

# data[].attributes.body
"Becky Atwood, coordinator of the Cape public school's Adult Education and Literacy Program, said her students are excellent at texting, because that's their primary written communication. Older students—those in their mid- to late 40s—are "totally lost" on that score, she said. The two largest age groups served by the Adult Education and Literacy program are 19 to 24 and mid-20s to 40s. Atwood said it doesn't serve "all that many" in the 17- to 18-year-old range."

# data[].attributes.body
"Also, a lot of the assessment tests students take in high school or adult education programs are computer-based.

"They have to have the ability to keyboard and communicate their thoughts in that manner," Atwood said. "The use of pencil and paper is going away."

# data[].attributes.body
"When I assign narrative essays, students discuss sexual abuse, poverty, imprisoned family members, alcoholic parents, gang violence, the struggle to learn English in America—topics they may need to address, not merely subjects they believe might entertain or interest a reader."

# data[].attributes.body
""Students are more likely to commit certain grammatical errors because they use the conventions of texting, tweeting and Facebooking in their formal academic essays. Occasionally, I see actual 'text language,' like using the letter 'u' instead of the word 'you,'" Sentell wrote. Most of the time, it's lack of capitalization, punctuation and apostrophes, Sentell said"

# data[].attributes.body
My observations have reaffirmed the widely held notion that the Internet is no refuge from the pains of adolescence. It's a really bad neighborhood. On Facebook and Twitter, students humiliate, jeer, and shame one another. They engage in antisocial, even criminal behavior—leaving belligerently racist comments on links, harassing classmates with derogatory posts.

# data[].attributes.body
Mainstream mid-90s rappers had cold-blooded personas. Even [rock singer for Nirvana] Kurt Cobain mumbled through interviews, only opening up in cathartic song, where the rawest admissions could be obtuse and readily cloaked in distortion.

# data[].attributes.body
"The Internet has ruined high-school writing. Write the line on the board five hundred times like [cartoon character] Bart Simpson. Remember and internalize it. Intone it in an Andy Rooney-esque grumble."

# data[].attributes.body
"Meanwhile, teachers in the Pew study "expressed concerns about the 'creep' of informal grammar and style into 'formal' writing, as well as students' impatience with the writing process and their difficulty navigating the complex issues of plagiarism, citation, and fair use.""

# data[].attributes.body
"Instead of being mocked for revealing too much, students who share in this way win likes and supportive comments from male friends. Perhaps part of it is the fact that girls appear to appreciate the emotional candor and publicly validate it with likes and comments, giving boys the initiative to do the same. In high-school halls, guards stay up, but online, male emotional transparency is not only permitted but also celebrated."

# data[].attributes.body
"Southeast Missouri State University writing instructor Eric Sentell said in an email to the Southeast Missourian that since he began teaching six years ago, he's noticed a difference in the quality of students' writing."

# data[].attributes.body
"Students are more likely to commit certain grammatical errors because they use the conventions of texting, tweeting and Facebooking in their formal academic essays. Occasionally, I see actual 'text language,' like using the letter 'u' instead of the word 'you,'" Sentell wrote. Most of the time, it's lack of capitalization, punctuation and apostrophes, Sentell said.

# data[].attributes.body
"Central High School principal Mike Cowan, a former English teacher, said texting language has become so commonplace, he even noticed a billboard between Cape Girardeau and Oak Ridge that used "U" instead of "You."

# data[].attributes.body
"When I was beginning high school in 1994 boys knew not to reveal weakness and insecurity. Girls didn't seem to like guys who vocalized vulnerability."

# data[].attributes.body
" Atwood said economic and education background affect electronic literacy, as well. "If you were raised ... middle class or above, you're probably technosavvy," she said. "People in some of the lower income brackets, not so much," because they haven't had access to technology .

# data[].attributes.body
"Instead of being mocked for revealing too much, students who share in this way win likes and supportive comments from male friends."

# data[].attributes.body
"Students are more likely to commit certain grammatical errors because they use the conventions of texting, tweeting and Facebooking in their formal academic essays. Occasionally, I see actual 'text language,' like using the letter 'u' instead of the word 'you,'" Sentell wrote. Most of the time, it's lack of capitalization, punctuation and apostrophes, Sentell said."

# data[].attributes.body
"Individually these may seem like small-scale admissions. But the broader trend I have witnessed in the past few years stands in sharp contrast to the vigilance with which my generation guarded our fears both trivial and deep. In this sense, social networking has dramatically altered how high- school boys deal with their emotions."

# data[].attributes.body
"An online survey by the Pew Research Center's Internet & American Life Project, in collaboration with the College Board and the National Writing Project in 2012, conducted among 2,462 middle- and high-school teachers showed while half of teachers say digital tools make it easier to teach writing, 18 percent say those tools make it more difficult."

# data[].attributes.body
Cape Girardeau public school students, for example, start learning keyboarding in kindergarten to get them used to technology, curriculum coordinator Theresa Hinkebein said. But she noted kindergartners already know how to operate smartphones and have computers at home.

# data[].attributes.body
" 'I guess you could argue it's not a loss, but it's a displacement, a change. I'm not so sure how far you can change and still continue to communicate accurately,' Cowan said."

# data[].attributes.body
When I was beginning high school in 1994 boys knew not to reveal weakness and insecurity. Girls didn't seem to like guys who vocalized vulnerability. Athletes usually projected stereotypically masculine traits: along with imposing physical size, aggressive, even belligerent confidence, an easy stance, gait, and casual presence, the signs of being comfortable in their own skins. Even the scrawniest punk guitarists wore hoodies like armor and possessed a prickly toughness seasoned by the experience of having been bullied in middle school.

# data[].attributes.body
"I have a Facebook page dedicated solely to my position as an educator. I don't send friend requests to students but current and former students can send them to me and I always accept. I don't post much, but I keep up with some students and share literature-related links when I delude myself into thinking they'll be of interest."

# data[].attributes.body
On Facebook, even popular students post statuses in which they express insecurities. I see a dozen every time I log on.

# data[].attributes.body
As a high-school English teacher, I read well over a thousand student essays a year. I can report that complete sentences are an increasingly endangered species. I wearily review the point of paragraphs every semester. This year I tried and failed to spark a senior class protest against "blobs"—my pejorative term for essays lacking paragraphs.

# data[].attributes.body
"A kid frets that his longtime girlfriend is straying and wishes he hadn't upset her. Another admits to being lonely (with weepy emoticons added for effect)."

# data[].attributes.body
However, while Facebook and Twitter have eroded writing conventions among my students, they have not killed the most important ingredients in personal writing: self-reflection and emotional honesty

# data[].attributes.body
" 'I observed a significant reduction in those errors and an increase in the overall quality of my students' writing. But some capitalization, punctuation and apostrophe errors still creep in every now and then.' "

# data[].attributes.body
""I observed a significant reduction in those errors and an increase in the overall quality of my students' writing. But some capitalization, punctuation and apostrophe errors still creep in every now and then.""

# data[].attributes.body
"It's a really bad neighborhood. On Facebook and Twitter, students humiliate, jeer, and shame one another. They engage in antisocial, even criminal behavior—leaving belligerently racist comments on links, harassing classmates with derogatory posts."

# data[].attributes.body
Atwood said economic and education background affect electronic literacy, as well. "If you were raised ... middle class or above, you're probably technosavvy," she said. "People in some of the lower income brackets, not so much," because they haven't had access to technology.

# data[].attributes.body
" Occasionally, I see actual 'text language,' like using the letter 'u' instead of the word 'you,'" Sentell wrote. Most of the time, it's lack of capitalization, punctuation and apostrophes, Sentell said."

# data[].attributes.body
I have a Facebook page dedicated solely to my position as an educator. I don't send friend requests to students but current and former students can send them to me and I always accept. I don't post much, but I keep up with some students and share literature-related links when I delude myself into thinking they'll be of interest. Current students often send me requests without thinking of the possible consequences of being Facebook friends with a teacher. I have made it a policy to avoid bringing a student's posts into a conference with a parent or counselor unless required to do so by law. A few times a week though, I log on and observe what students post.

# data[].attributes.body
"On Facebook and Twitter, students humiliate, jeer, and shame one another. They engage in antisocial, even criminal behavior—leaving belligerently racist comments on links, harassing classmates with derogatory posts."

# data[].attributes.body
"I guess you could argue it's not a loss, but it's a displacement, a change. I'm not so sure how far you can change and still continue to communicate accurately"

# data[].attributes.body
"Over the next year, Atwood said, her program will launch a transitions course in which adult education and literacy staff will work with students on the next steps to take after earning a high school equivalency diploma.

"Because that or a high school diploma will not be enough to earn a living," she said." D

# data[].attributes.body
"I guess you could argue it's not a loss, but it's a displacement, a change. I'm not so sure how far you can change and still continue to communicate accurately."

# data[].attributes.body
"68 percent of teachers polled by Pew say digital tools make students more likely to take shortcuts and not put effort into their writing. 46 percent said these tools make students more likely to write too fast and be careless."