Alarmed at the increasing use of SMS language and abbreviations in exam sheets and notebooks, teachers and principals in city schools are busy chalking out ways to curb the trend.

Students and parents are now being told that using such language in their exams would mean lower marks, with some schools also conducting special sessions for students to address the issue.

According to an official of the state education board, Mumbai division, they found students forming sentences using abbreviations and colloquialisms common in mobile phone messaging services. “At least 20-30 per cent of the exam papers have SMS language, and it’s more commonly used by students from urban areas. We have instructed teachers to deduct marks and point it out to students at school exams itself,” said the official.

Meenakshi Walke, principal of IES school, Bhandup, shared an experience she had while chatting on a social networking site with a student. The student told her that she was very slow. “The student said that typing full sentences was time consuming and boring and that one needs to use abbreviations and short form while chatting. This is fine as long as it remains part of chatting on social networking sites. However, in school, grammar is the first casualty. Some common SMS words we found in notebooks and project works are ‘bcuz’, ‘dat’, ‘tmrw’ and numerals ‘2’ and ‘4’ instead of the words ‘to’ and for’,” added Walke.

“At EuroSchool, we ensure that students, starting from Grade 1, undergo a system of constant reinforcement through reviews and assessment, so that they internalise the learning that use of short form is not permitted in any written assignment. We have also told our teachers that they too must not use any short form,” said Sudeshna Chatterjee, Principal EuroSchool, Airoli.

Teachers say the problem starts from class V and is more serious among class VII and VIII students. “Wanna , gonna, nuf (enough), dis and many other words have unknowingly become a part of students’ vocabulary. In practice books this is fine but not in school notebooks, assignments and exams. We have started pointing it out to students from class IV. We have started conducting sessions for students and parents to address this issue,” said Gayatri Mahajan, principal of Saraswati Vidyamandir.

Hanif Kanjer, director of Rustomjee Cambridge school, believes that the problem is more prevalent among college students than school students. “In my opinion, it’s alright if students use short forms to write their notes more efficiently, but the very purpose of a written examination for a language is defeated if they cannot construct a complete sentence using the existing vocabulary. I have found students in MBA courses using such SMS and chatting abbreviations in their project works. It looks very unprofessional. We penalise students by deducting marks and giving negative reviews,” he said.

“We have requested parents to not provide cellphones to students till they pass out from schools,” said Prashant Redij, principal of Hilda Castellina school.

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