The one thing I realize with the youth of today

[Alex K]

2 bad, U lose, lolz

PS -- It's not the generation itself; it's the parents who don't involve themselves in the education of their children. My son can textspeak, and can write shimmering essays for his university classes, because his mother and I decided when he was born that he would not get baby-talk, and we each kept a good dictionary in our houses. I read to him nightly the three days a week I had him, and by four, he read to me -- he had read Call of the Wild by five, and Lord of the Rings by eight. He still reads daily, for pleasure -- stuff like The National Interest, Raw Story, and less often nowadays, books.

Parental investment is key to a child's learning. You're seeing the results of a generation of parents accustomed to treating the computer as a babysitter, I think.

Yes, exactly.
We also speak (admittedly sometimes a bit cutesy) standard language to our daughter, at her daycare she even gets some exposure to English - she's now reached the age where she starts forming her first words.

Somehow, I myself grew up speaking proper standard German as well as our local not-so-subtle dialect - telegram texting style is just another dialect for a special application. It is the parents' responsibility to ensure that it doesn't remain the only one!