From generation to generation, educators have been blaming technology for ruining students’ grammar. In “Texting Ruins Students’ Grammar Skills,” Scott Warnock argues that theirs is no actual proof that digital writing ruins students’ grammar and that people who voiced their opinions all have different meanings of grammar. While in “Why Johnny Can’t Write,” Merrill Sheils argues that television and classroom creativity is the reason students don’t have any writing skills. Even though both writings take place in different time frames, they do have common solutions which are to help rediscover what grammar is. Educators need to reconsider what grammar means and how to pass it on to students because each person has their own perception of how to write, this may mean going back to the basics.
Grammar between teachers and students can be classified as different things. In “Texting Ruins Students’ Grammar Skills,” Warnock quotes Robin Zeff, which says his students only see writing as something they do for class, and anything else are modes for talking (Warnock, 306). Educators can start with coming to common grounds with what grammar is and how to properly teach it. With everyone’s different ideas of what grammar is, it can be hard to teach without hindering a student’s learning process. English professors Kenneth Lindblom and Patricia from Warnock’s essay and Linguist Suzette Elgin from Sheils article all agree that teaching “right from wrong” in English can leave traces of bad habits in students’ English, especially when there is no agreement upon what is “right.” It will be damaging in the long run to have all these misconstrued ideas about what English is.
In his essay, Warnock doesn’t really give the effects of not getting taught English properly, but Sheils does. From the very beginning of her article, she tells her readers that whatever grade a child is in, they will go to the next grade less likely to write ordinary, including college graduates. Back in 1975 writing skills were needed for a job just as much as they are needed now. Michigan State University considered that they would need a test for undergraduates to make sure they had literacy skills because these students would soon become teachers and such. Researchers had discovered that more than 50 percent of secondary English school teachers did not specialize in English during their college years (Sheils, 3). It was imperative then, and now, that English teachers—or others that fall into the subject—make sure their students leave their classrooms with a full grasp of what they have learned. Although today it doesn’t seem like students don’t have a hard time transitioning from digital writing and formal writing in school.
It would be like code-switching for students today when they go from texting to writing. As much as certain people who think texting interferes with students’ grammar, there has been no proof whatsoever. Warnock uses writing researcher Michaela Cullington’s research on the matter to prove this point, “texting is not interfering with students’ use of standard written English,” (Warnock, 305). The same people who think it’s texting that is ruining students’ grammar are just unfamiliar with how they text, so they immediately go into a mode where they think it’s a problem. Warnock suggests that in reality this new generation of “screenagers,” may be the most literate and that instead of trying to patronize this generation for their shortcut texting, criticizing people should embrace how humans adapt to a new reality.
As much as old generations want to accuse technology of tarnishing the new generation of students’ grammar it will always be false. The problem starts with blaming the forms of technology, and it is damaging to students when taught as such. A lot has improved since the 1975 Newsweek article “Why Johnny Can’t Write,” because of teachers making better curriculums since then. Current educators should have no worry about how good students’ grammar is, but rather get on the same page about what grammar is and teach it in unison.
Works Cited
Warnock, Scott “Texting Ruins Students’ Grammar Skills” Bad Ideas About Writing. Edited by Cheryl E. Ball and Drew M. Loewe, West Virginia University Libraries, 2017, pgs. 301-307 https://textbooks.lib.wvu.edu/badideas/badideasaboutwriting-book.pdf
Sheils, Merrill. “Why Johnny Can’t Write.” Newsweek, 8 Dec. 1975, https://www.leetorda.com/uploads/2/3/2/5/23256940/why_johnny_cant_write__newsweek_1975___1_.pdf