Examining the Difference Between Oral and Written Language

Below is my 5 minute voice-to-text story. I used Google Voice Typing to create the text

In 2002 I enter the faculty of education at UBC and at the time there were too many teachers and not enough jobs. So when the New York Board of Education visited UBC as part of a recruiting attempt, I decided to take a chance and interview for a job in one of the five Bros. I remember going to the interview was at a big hotel downtown and being intimidated as a large oval table filled with candidates and interview panelists. surprisingly I was hired on the spot and then guided to a room to begin the paperwork process for my work visa.

In 2003 there was huge blackout in New York City which had an effect on my paperwork making it to Vancouver before my flight was booked leave on this new adventure. I decided to risk it and went to the airport anyway and of course was turned back. the next day my paperwork arrived and I was on my way to New York.

I arrived in New York JFK Airport sometime around midnight and headed to my apartment and in Manhattan where the rental brokerage firm was waiting. For the next 12 months this would be my home. my apartment was a small one bedroom located in Spanish Harlem which is on the upper  east side of Manhattan. in 2003 this was a rough neighbourhood that presented many opportunities to develop my street sense.

My teaching assignment was a kindergarten classroom in Washington Heights. Washington Heights is on the upper west side of Manhattan up past Columbia University. Each morning I would take a bus across town and then grab the train  up to the stop near my school. the school looks more like an office building and housed approximately 15 classes ranging from kindergarten to grade 2. There was no outdoor space or playground. At lunch time students simply headed down to the cafeteria for lunch was provided and some light tivities. my floor was an entirely kindergarten. Some of the classrooms where Spanish speaking only as many of the students families who immigrated from the Dominican Republic. well I look back fondly at this experience it’s certainly presented challenges for a first-year teacher you grew up on a small blueberry farm in Pitt Meadows British Columbia Canada.

Identify the general patterns that make your story deviate from written conventions. What are the most common “mistakes” in the text?

To begin, I must confess that my husband started a sales company a few years ago and does much of his work over his cell phone. This is pertinent because he only engages in email using Google Voice Typing. For the past few years I’ve been listening to him say, “period…comma…new line…”, and as a result of this exposure, I found myself doing the same thing! This has resulted in my version of Task 3 having some punctuation and a few new paragraphs.

Where my story deviates from written conventions, is in the correct and consistent use of punctuation. Furthermore, expression is not represented, as I’m not in the habit of saying “exclamation mark”, and I appear to have a number of run-on sentences. Grammatical errors in capitalization have surfaced, as well as incorrect word representation (Bros. vs boroughs).

Why do you consider these “mistakes”?

In thinking about text and written communication, sentence structure, word choice, punctuation and grammar all play a role in developing clarity. They are the vehicle through which meaning is delivered. I consider these deviations from conventional writing mistakes because they detract from my meaning and my ability to generate an accurate written representation of my first year teaching experiences in New York.

Oxford Dictionary connects the word mistake with misguided, which perfectly represents my talk-to-text story. I’ve misguided my readers, in that my story isn’t totally accurate.

What would you have done differently if you had had the chance to script the story?

Scripting the story would have allowed for balanced pacing. I found myself running out of time, but nowhere near the end of the story. Originally, I had planned to talk about experiences with students and colleagues, but unfortunately, I had to cut it short, as the timer went off just as I was introducing my school. Following a script would have also allowed me to get through my story more quickly, in turn allowing for greater detail.

In what ways does oral storytelling differ from written storytelling?

Oral storytelling is casual, flexible, forgiving and tolerant, while written storytelling is the antithesis. Readers expect written word to be an accurate representation of the author’s voice and to be grammatically correct. The context of discussions within the Canvas platform provides the perfect example to illuminate my thinking. In a face-to-face course at UBC, group discussion takes place informally, where poor word choice can be quickly substituted, grammatical errors are overlooked and the stopping and starting of ideas is natural. Within a Canvas discussion, words must be precise, grammar correct, ideas complete, and sources cited. There is a formality to the written word, that is accepted and understood within our society.

Gnanadesikan (2008) parallels this idea of casual versus formal when she compares the way a message is transmitted via oral “telephone” versus a written note. In the case of the note, the integrity of the message remains intact, whereas the oral message becomes lost with each pass. Do we criticize the oral message? No. There is an understanding that oral story-telling evolves and changes, and we accept the inconsistencies.

References

Gnanadesikan, A. E. (2011).“The First IT Revolution.” In The writing revolution: Cuneiform to the internet(Vol. 25). John Wiley & Sons (pp. 1-10).