Digital Literacy Is Harming Our Spelling Capabilities

After reading the article Connecting the Digital Dots: Literacy of the 21st Century, I have a firm understanding of how digital literacy (the understanding of how to use a computer) can open ourselves up to new realms of possibilities that we never conceived of before. However with these new possibilities we are slowly losing an ability that is required to consider ourselves as literate, the ability to spell. For example, when I was in Elementary School, I used to pride myself on getting every word correct on the weekly spelling test but as I went into High School and starting using Microsoft Word for writing papers my spelling skills has began to diminish. The culprit behind this is the the tool known as Spell Check and using it has put me in a position where I cannot remember how to spell words on my 2nd Grade spelling tests. Sometimes when I'm writing late at night I have become so dependent on Spell Check that I don't even stop to hit backspace to fix a word I accidentally typed wrong. On papers that I take this course of action on I always forget how to spell a word after finishing an assignment which sucks because I feel like I am diminishing my vocabulary as a writer.

The window that is diminishing our spelling capabilities.

Another issue that is diminishing our spelling capabilities is the internet lingo that abbreviates words like joking to jk and people to ppl. I know this has been made fun in commercials but it is a very bad habit and to show how bad it is I thought I would post a list of all the words and phrases that are abbreviated on the internet.

2		To, Too, Two
4		For
86		Over
121		One To One
143		I Love You
411		Information
14AA41		One For All And All For One
1-D-R		I Wonder
4ever		Forever
A&K		Alive And Kicking
A/S/L		Age/Sex/Location
A/S/L/M/H		Age, Sex, Location, Music, Hobbies
AA		As Above
AA		Adios Amigo
AAF		Always And Forever
AAF		As A Friend
AAK		Alive And Kicking
AAMOF		As A Matter Of Fact
AAR		At Any Rate
AAS		Alive And Smiling
AATK		Always At The Keyboard
AAYF		As Always, Your Friend
ABT		About
ABT2		About To
ACD		Alt-Control-Delete
ADD		Address
ADN		Any Day Now
AFAIC		As Far As I'm Concerned
AFAICT		As Far As I Can Tell
AFAIK		As Far As I Know
AFAIR		As Far As I Remember
AFJ		April Fool’s Joke
AFK		Away From Keyboard
AFN		That’s All For Now
AFWIW		Anyway, For What It's Worth
AH		At Home
AI		As If
AIM		AOL Instant Messenger
AISI		As I See It
AIUI		As I Understand It
AKA		Also Known As
ALOL		Actually Laughing Out Loud
AM		Antemeridian
AMF		As A Matter Of Fact
AND		Any Day Now
ANFAWFOS		And Now For A Word From Our Sponsor
ANFSCD		And Now For Something Completely Different
AOL		America Online
A-OL		Administrator On-Line
AOMM		Always On My Mind
AOTA		All Of The Above
APP		Appreciate
ARE		Acronym-Rich Environment
AS		Another Subject
ASAP		As Soon As Possible
ASL		Age, Sex, Location
ASLP		Age, Sex, Location, Picture
ATB		All The Best
ATM		At The Moment
ATSL		Along The Same Line
ATT		All The Time
ATYS		Anything You Say
AUT		Are You There
AWA		As Well As
AWC		After While, Crocodile
AWOL		Absent While Online
AYOR		At Your Own Risk
AYSOS		Are You Stupid Or Something
AYTMTB		And You Are Telling Me This Because
AZN		Asian

This is a list of the ever growing number of abbreviations for words and phrases that can just be applied to numbers and the letter 'A'. In the future these abbreviations could mean an end to the art of spelling. Here's to that not happening.