"L33T" Speak Invades Schools

Masem writes "NYTimes reports on how common chat room/IM shortcuts (such as 'u' for you, 'r' for are, etc) are creeping into the classroom and homework assignments from those teenage kids that spend a significant amount of time in chat programs. This is giving the teachers headaches in trying to grade the assignments, much less understand them because of the techno-generation gap, and to try to prevent further abuse of the language, have begun penalizing students for using the net slang. Students sometimes don't even realize they use the chat room shorthand until it's pointed out to them, because that method of chatting has become second nature to them."