Teachers can help their students connect their abundant and abbreviated texting with formal writing. Justin Reich, a doctoral student at the Harvard Graduate School of Education and a co-director of the Center for Teaching History with Technology, explains, "I've had great success occasionally using instant message conversations as a critical inquiry tool in the classroom. My students love the chance to use their social milieu as a space for learning." Writes Reich:

Imagine 20 students in invisible groups of three, all silently, furiously typing and reading, immersed in conversations about the dialogues of Socrates or the teachings of Confucius. That classroom time is incredibly intellectually productive: all 20 students are simultaneously sharpening their arguments, supporting them with evidence, and questioning their colleagues.

My students know that they must practice these analytical conversation skills, which are easily transferred to the realm of formal writing, since I'll be reading and grading a copy of their transcript.

Students who use interactive Web tools in the classroom learn that certain features of effective communication transcend media. Strong arguments; compelling evidence; and clear, concise language are prominent features of analytical writing on the Lincoln-Douglas debates, in those oral debates themselves, or on a blog post persuading friends to support a current presidential candidate.

Reich's plea to harness youth's "journaling culture" comes in response to a Pew Internet in American Life report showing that teens do not see a connection between their social communications and the formal writing of school.

Source: Christian Science Monitor, Turn Teen Texting Toward Better Writing. For more on the Pew Internet Report, see Texting Not Writing for Teens