Is Typing Ruining Your Ability To Spell?

NSN A392-99-964-5927 writes "My handwriting abilities have deteriorated over the years. Putting a real pen to paper, I get frustrated over how to spell correctly, as I am so accustomed to using a keyboard and knowing where the letters are. Having spoken to a few friends, I've found that this has become apparent to them, too. I've noticed that my grammar is also affected; maybe this is because I spent too much time on IRC and lowered my standards. Hand-written words are now becoming obsolete. There is often no need to think about writing anymore, or about how something is spelled. Are other Slashdotters having the same problem? (I'm used to Telex machines, which should give you an indication of how old I am.)"

Not just spelling ...

[nervepack]

... penmanship is no longer a scholastic requirement. Long live printing!

I don't think it has been a problem.

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

I usually try to stick to full sentences when typing(though my abuse of commas and parenthetical comments is egregious) so I don't think that it has done my grammar much harm.

Spelling, also, seems to be ok. Because I can't quite trust automatic spell checks, I still find that making spelling mistakes carries a small cost in time and annoyance. However, my spelling mistakes do annoy me a great deal more when I am writing; because I don't have an easy way to look up corrected spellings and corrections tend to be messy.

As for "writing" more broadly, I've not found any reason to think that computers reduce the need for that. Until we come up with an interface that allows me to dump mental state directly to the machine, and shove that around, writing will still be the only real option for expressing complex ideas in a reasonably precise and concise manner.

No

[GroundBounce]

Typing has definitely reduced my ability to hand write quickly and legibly, but not my ability to spell. I think spelling has been affected more by the fact that I write much less now than a long time ago.

Re:I don't know, but...

[VoyagerRadio]

That's why I've always maintained correct/proper capitalization and grammar and compete sentences, even in IMs and IRC chats. In fact, it actually slows me down when I have to purposely corrupt a text message in order to reduce its size (such as on Twitter or SMS).

I find my spelling has actually improved over time

[Coolwave]

I have always been a terrible speller it was always my least favorite part of school because it was a matter more about rote memorization and nothing to do with logic. I find the instant feed back loop from modern spell checkers, the ones that underline mistakes once I complete a word, help me to learn the correct spelling.

My problem is even now that my spelling is better I still have no confidence in my ability to spell when I don't have that safety net.

Is this a confession?

[joocemann]

What is the point of this confession or whatever it seems to be? Do you want my attention? Do you want me to agree with you? I don't... I've been typing and using the interwebz for about 14 years now with plenty of IRC, 1337 speak, and degenerate behavior --- and in all that I have maintained my cognitive capacity to recognize the difference between the variants and the proper.

I think your problem (if you feel there is any, such as an employer wondering why you write like a 12 year old), probably stems from the lack of regard for your variance as 'variance', and embracing that way too often, if not completely, as a way of life.

In excess, nearly anything can be problematic. Maintain a balance between work and play; in this case having a deliberate regard for maintaining both your interwebz-bs-style and your proper-for-work-and-standards style.

What I mean is... you need to actually give a shit about what you're doing. Degenerate yourself for fun, but not for habit.

Re:I don't know, but...

[Seumas]

This whole topic doesn't make much sense to me. A word is spelled the same way, whether you're writing it or typing it; a properly phrases sentence doesn't change based on the medium in which it is written.

Schools still in the dark ages

[Trip6]

I don't know about where you live, but the school curriculums I see are not doing nearly enough to prepare our kids for a lifetime of typed communication, which they surely face. Penmanship, while still important, is the only way kids are being taught in most schools. It's time to teach kids to be proficient typists and spellers using keyboards to at least the same extent as old fashioned written communication.

Re:It's not the typing

[cekander]

Although rare, sometimes you do need an apostrophe for plural. As in, "Mind your P's and Q's."

I find typing with automatic spell-checkers has improved my ability to spell, and I would've thunk other people felt the same way.

Bad grammar don't bother me none. Writing/speaking is about communicating with an audience. It seems the english language is way more nuanced than it needs to be to fulfill this function. The internet and the virtually unlimited networking it provides seems like the perfect ingredient to support evolution of typed languages (and friends).

Re:I find my spelling has actually improved over t

[Anonymous Coward]

This is true. I read (er, have read..) so much that I automatically can tell when something's misspelled. It's really quite handy.

Re:I don't know, but...

[nortcele]

Amen. Preach it! I also don't participate in the 'leetspeak'. I backspace to correct spellings as I notice them and attempt to use full length words with correct grammar. If one can type even a reasonable speed, it takes very little extra effort. (At the same time it can also indicate to others you probably don't have baggy pants showing your underwear, untied sneakers, spray can in one hand, and your hat on backwards.) It's just my personal preference, and messages that use good grammar tend to get a mental +1 from me. Your messages (email, IM, IRC, etc) are the "visual" by which others perceive you, so it can only be a help to yourself to always put the best foot forward.

Re:It's not the typing

[smellsofbikes]

When I see something like "walla!" I think it's funny. That is: I think the person put it in there knowing it was only a vague approximation of the original. But when I see a there/they're/their substitution, or 'where' for 'were', I think the person doesn't know the difference. That tarnishes the person's credibility in my mind. That's probably not warranted: there are plenty of bright people who make spelling and grammar errors. I'm probably going off an obsolete mindset, that most people who are writing in a public space are paid to do it well, and I haven't accommodated to a world in which everyone who has an opinion can present it globally. (Emily Dickinson: "There are a lot of people reading and writing who would be better employed keeping sheep.") I base my bias on my judgment of the mistake's motivation: clever, or stupid? 'Walla' so off-base it's probably clever. Homonym substitution, probably stupid. While I understand that carelessness might let things through, at least for my own part I don't make homonym substitution errors in the first place, so (all elitist and snotty-like) I eye people who do make those mistakes warily.

Re:FingerWorks TouchStream

[Bandman]

I'm pretty sure I would stab that keyboard in short order. Unless it knows unix commands, of course.

Re:I don't know, but...

[Neeperando]

Oh yeah, well your mother was a woman of lose morals!

Re:I don't know, but...

[James McP]

Typing is muscle memory just like playing music. Guitarists don't consciously think "E-G-A-E-G-B/A-E-G-E-E-G" any more than a typist thinks "s-m-o-k-e- -o-n- -t-h-e- -w-a-t-e-r". (Well, bassists might but we're known to be pretty dense.)

I actually had trouble typing the hyphenated parts as my hands initially would spell out the whole words.

Have you never had a case where your fingers know your password but you don't? Happens to me all the time.

Re:Is this a confession?

[steelfood]

Very insightful post, and by far the most insightful comment I've read today. But you missed a crucial point:

you need to actually give a shit about what you're doing.

If he actually gave a shit, he wouldn't be bitching and moaning about his decadence and instead, well, be doing something about it. The fact that this appears on Ask Slashdot means that this guy doesn't give a rat's ass, and only is trying to figure out what to point his finger at when his inability to create complete sentences or spell bites him in the ass.

Re:I don't think it has been a problem.

[Carpeaux]

Jokes such as this make me want two things: 1. Some way to mod a commentary as "Brilliant", so that, when growing bored of a topic, I don't miss something truly awesome. 2. Some part in Slashdot where we can read all these "Brilliant" commentaries, the funny, the insightful etc. This would be one fucken awesome book. Sometimes I feel we are loosing great material here, things which are really interesting and get lost in the hundreds ofn topics, never to be read again. ??? Still not convinced whether I should create a signature or not.

Re:I don't know, but...

[Anonymous Coward]

E-G-A E-G-Bb-A E-G-A G-E

Re:I don't know, but...

[dangitman]

Working in a large business where writing professional emails helps as well; I purposely try to use proper capitilisation and punctuation as required.

I wouldn't be surprised if in some not-too-distant idiocratic future, you'd be fired for using proper spelling and grammar in business correspondence, because you "talk like a fag."