Learning and Leading with Technology comment published

My reply to comments on the topic, "Is Chatspeak Destroying English?" was published in this month's Learning and Leading with Technology, a print magazine that goes out to the 85,000plus members of ISTE, the International Society for Technology in Education. I don't often respond to the occasional calls for comment, but I felt pretty strongly about this one. (Possibly mis-)Quoting David Warlick, "Our students are communicating competently with the tools that are part of their daily lives. We take those tools away as they enter our schools. What's wrong with this? Everything."

From Learning & Leading with Technology February 2008

I wrote:
No More Than Rock ‘N’ Roll

The fact that modern digital communicants
utilize chatspeak is no more
destroying English than rock ‘n’ roll
destroyed music (though rap may
yet--LOL). Savvy humans nuance
their language style according to its
effectiveness, and I’d wager that formal
English will always have its place (Probs).
Scott Merrick
University School of Nashville and
Vanderbilt Center for Science Outreach
Nashville, Tennessee