First of all, apologies for not keeping the promise of connecting with you all in a week.
Ironical as it may seem, just when we were talking about the dependence on technology reducing our urge to take a pen and paper in our hand to communicate, I was betrayed by technology. My laptop breathed its last and took with it all my thought process for the article.
Join me as I ponder aloud on whether the current Gen Z needs to be formally taught about Letter Writing as a topic.
In the CBSE Syllabus (Indian) of Grade 10, letter writing is an 8 mark question and the students have to prepare 4 types of letter writing skills – Letter to the Editor, Complaint, Order Placing letter and Enquiring letter. The students are required to keep a 7-8 pointer format in mind as they write.
Ideally, what we teach our children should have a real-world implication so that knowledge equips them for life. But, the letter-writing exercise done in notebooks or during the assessment remain just that- an exercise. The habit of posting a letter has become obsolete even for a generation that grew up with that primary mode of communication, so to expect our children to write and post letters seems futile.
During one of my learning walks, I happened to overhear the conversation in a second-grade class. The teacher was engaging the students in a conversation about ‘People who help us’. Many names of community helpers were rattled off enthusiastically and the teacher added, the postman. Most of the children looked puzzled and one asked, ’Who is a postman?’ A smart one quipped, ‘Like Super Man,’ amidst guffaws from his friends. The teacher was quick to explain that a postman delivers letters, telegrams, postcards, parcels and showed pictures of a khaki-clad man with a bicycle and a letter bag. The smart one wasn’t convinced, ‘But, letters come via email and parcels are delivered by Amazon.’
Even if I discount the fact that this class was in Dubai, I feel the postman is not someone even the children in Indian cities can relate to. Maybe the quintessential postman still does his rounds in the rural areas.
However, people haven’t stopped writing to each other and they generally do follow a format. If we look at the guidelines for both: Formal letters in traditional mail and formal letters in electronic mail, they are not widely different.
It is interesting to note that the medium evolved but the format and etiquettes remain unchanged.
The only difference and a positive one is that the email can be easily edited and retracted.
We are looking at technology having more understanding of human follies and giving us another chance.
So, coming back to my thought on whether Gen Z needs to be formally taught about Letter Writing, I would say, yes. But, we have to move with the times. The need of the hour is to teach our students to write good emails in the right format, with correct usage of the language, without short forms and minimum grammatical errors. When they run a spell check, the letter mustn’t resemble a bloodied war zone with red streaks. They also need to be sensitized to the fact that there is a person beyond the digital realm who gets affected by their words and the emotions conveyed (even without emoticons).
With the hybrid learning opportunities, thanks to Covid-19, and technological leaps in online assessment techniques, students can be easily evaluated on their email writing skills. So, let our postman rest in history while we continue perfecting the art of writing good letters.
It will help us all to remember this quote by American entrepreneur, John Rohn, “Take advantage of every opportunity to practice your communication skills so that when important occasions arise, you will have the gift, the style, the sharpness, the clarity, and the emotions to affect other people.”
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