Today is “Grandma gets to brag” day. My oldest grandson is six years old and finished kindergarten in early June. I recently received a letter from him. He wrote: “Dear Grandma” and then drew a heart. Inside the heart he wrote: “ty for the books and candy! I love you very much! please write back! Love, [Name]”
All spelling, capitalization and punctuation is exactly as written. Name has been omitted to shield him from hordes of fan mail.
After a while I guessed that “ty” meant “thank you.” When I checked with my daughter, she confirmed that the people in the “I still only have one digit” age group play lots of computer games and use short cuts similar to the ones adults use in text messages and IM messages, and on Twitter, etc.
I have spent far too much time fretting that all this short cut stuff was going to bring intelligent literary life to a grinding halt. I am going to stop worrying right now because my daughter told me that when grandson’s five year old sister looked over his shoulder and said “ty” doesn’t spell anything, he shouted at her, “It means thank you. You know, t-h-a-n-k-y-o-u.
And isn’t that how cultures decided the symbols for their written languages in the first place?
Terrie
All spelling, capitalization and punctuation is exactly as written. Name has been omitted to shield him from hordes of fan mail.
After a while I guessed that “ty” meant “thank you.” When I checked with my daughter, she confirmed that the people in the “I still only have one digit” age group play lots of computer games and use short cuts similar to the ones adults use in text messages and IM messages, and on Twitter, etc.
I have spent far too much time fretting that all this short cut stuff was going to bring intelligent literary life to a grinding halt. I am going to stop worrying right now because my daughter told me that when grandson’s five year old sister looked over his shoulder and said “ty” doesn’t spell anything, he shouted at her, “It means thank you. You know, t-h-a-n-k-y-o-u.
And isn’t that how cultures decided the symbols for their written languages in the first place?
Terrie
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13 comments:
I'm going to weasel the name and address out of you- I'm an instant fan of that cutie-pie!
I heard an excited lady on the radio yesterday who'd won concert tickets to the Jonas Brothers, a feat of luck to make her tween daughter ecstatic. "OhMyGawd, OhMyGawd," the lady said, then "Sorry, OMG, my daughter says!"
Clare,
He is a cutie-pie!
Great story about OMG. It took me years to learn what BFF meant. It was in a TV commercial and I had no idea what they were talking about.
Terrie
TY for this.
Patti,
YW (I am aiming for you're welcome.)
Terrie
Grandma has every reason to brag.
ty,df Leah.
With a grandma like you, he's destined to be a literary genius.
Travis,
The secret to my success: as long as there is some candy or cookies in the package, the books always get read!!
Terrie
Congrats on your grandson's graduation from Kindergarten! Thanks for sharing this cute story with us.
I've heard that teachers are seeing an increase in the use of abbreviations and emoticons in essays and assignments.
LOL!
I love it! Yes, they're all using texting language now. It's a whole new world!
Elizabeth
Mystery Writing is Murder
Kathy and Elizabeth,
I guess as long as the kids know how to put what they want to say in real language, then the test talk is harmless. I just didn't expect it from young kids.
Terrie
Terrie, it`s us old folk that have to puzzle out the text talk! And we are likely the generation that started it...NATO, UNICEF and so on and it has spun out of control.
TTFN ;)
Reb,
That is an excellent point and well taken.
Terrie
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