Should children be allowed to receive marks for text message language use in an English exam?

Ayla Cook: Should children be allowed to receive marks for text message language use in an English exam?
Listening to radio 4 this morning a exam body is awarding marks for the use of text language in and English Exam eg
2b or not 2b as opposed to To be or not to be, a quote from Shakespear. They would not recieve marks for spelling but they would for the answer. I think this will lead to the decline of the English Language and make Higher study harder for the children. What do you think?

Answers and Views:

Answer by Panda Derp
No.
Proper english is required in English Exams. I don’t get why people would allow text msg language…

Answer by Tyson Clarke
i absolutely agree with u……..

Answer by MzCalypso
NO. ABSOLUTELY NOT!

Text abbreviation is not English. Half the time I can’t tell what these little nitwits are trying to say and if they can’t communicate in English they should not pass an ENGLISH LANGUAGE EXAM.

I think students are doing poorly enough without encouraging them to spell like illiterates.

Answer by druNKENmunky
i believe that they should have to use English language spelled right, if they are allowing them to use short text, it is not doing them any good, to learn something you must use it, if things keep on going the way they are our kids and grandkids will be doomed…what happened to good old fashioned education? seems like all the new generation teachers just don’t care about our kids education the way that the older generation of teachers did…i’m 25 and all my teachers in school were older, smart and dedicated…we could have never gotten away with short text.

Answer by Regan
Who ever is dumb enough to use text message language in important things like test should already get an F. When people start excepting lower standards, education will decline and children are the future. Unless we want a rewrite of the Constitution looking like this, We the ppl, we should set regulations on thing like this.

Answer by V
Absolutely not, it’s ridiculous to use text-messaging language in everyday life such as on exams.

Answer by मिखेल
I don’t see why you consider changes in orthography to be indicative of a “decline of the English language”, or how this would make higher study more difficult. I would challenge you to find someone who understands “2b”, but not “to be”. In the 1950’s, the government of Guyana launched a formal inquiry into why Guyanese children scored so poorly on English exams. The government initially thought that this was caused by the prevalence of an English-based creole in Guyana, which they saw as nothing more than a “degraded” form of English. If a government expressed a similar opinion today, it would most likely draw widespread condemnation from linguists and educators alike.

I, for one, think that the move made by the exam body is a progressive one. Of course, the use of “text language” on one’s English exams strikes me as utterly inappropriate, but, in recognizing the language, the body is signaling that it understands how language works. Languages evolve so as to meet the communicative needs of their speakers. This is signaled by these new developments in orthography (teenagers often find themselves attempting to convey maximum meaning in minimal space, for example, in a text message or on a website like Twitter, hence the need for new, shorter spellings), and other shifts that you may not realize.

For example, it is becoming increasingly common to see the third person plural pronoun (they) used as a third person singular pronoun of a neutral gender. When gender is unspecified, or indefinite, it is proper to use the third person singular masculine (he). Of course, in an age that stresses political correctness, there is a clear and present need for a “gender-neutral” pronoun.

While it may seem like a strange course of action, it is very prudent for this exam body to award marks for correctness, but not spelling, in the example you’ve given above.