Are your kids speaking a secret language? Somehow, overnight, it seems every kid out there old enough to write is fluent in techno-speak. It?s a language that?s evolved for use in chat rooms, on IM or text messages for fast, informal conversation. But it?s also shorthand for communicating what you wouldn?t ordinarily have to say in person: BBIAF? LTK (Be Back In A Few ? Leaving The Keyboard).
More and more, a lot of parents believe it?s a good idea to know the basics. It keeps adults engaged and communicating in a world where kids rule. But it also helps decipher a situation that may be of concern. Has a phone text come in from her BFF? Or her BF you?ve never met? What about when your son announces ?YNBOM!? (You?re Not the Boss of Me!) at the dinner table? If you knew what it meant, you?d probably have the perfect response.
Of course, sometimes it?s all just TMI (Too Much Information) and it?s better to KISS (Keep It Simple, Stupid). Well informed parents will ultimately decide when their kid?s privacy is more important and when a caring, parent intervention would be more appropriate.
In the comment field below, share the stories that have made you LOL or put you OTE (Over the Edge) and we?ll randomly select 50 responders to receive a Code Orange Digital Thermometer. How do you learn the latest expressions? Should spotting PIR (parent in room) on the screen be a warning sign? Or should we all just tell each other to MYOB (mind you own business)? HTH! (Hope this helps!) ; )
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Comments: 15
The techo speak goes with the techno gene. My granddaughter and I chat online and play games together at Club Penguin although we live 150 miles apart. I'm fairly fluent in shortcuts and slang. My favorite is the word "coolio". It's fun to watch the kids at Club Penguin chatting in shortcuts. Sort of a polar alphabet soup!
My daughter does a lot of the techno lingo. While she doesn't text message, she does use the computer alot. She buils webpages, and look-up pages for other people (she should be getting paid for it) So using the lingo, for her, is very normal. Although she never uses it in regular speech (does anyone?) it is more a typed language than a spoken one~
My daughter also would sometimes type some code to make her messages do different things, like flash etc. Se didn't seem to mind me looking over her shoulder as long as I didn't ask too many annoying questions.
My son took another path, he decided that since he didn't know any of the people he was talking to, he could say anything he wanted without consequence, and he eventually got kicked out of the chat rooms because he was saying mean things to many of the other kids there.
This was a school sponsored email and chat system shared by most of the local school districts, and he could still use the mail, but he was banned from chat for a year or so. By that time he had lost interest in chatting and insulting people he didn't know.