Can you teach us not to be so ghetto?

Such was the question from one of my students after several requests of certain members of the class to utilize "inside voices". To which my response was, "Believe me, I'm trying."

I'm beginning to realize that the charms of ghetto-culture do not merely grace the speech of my students in the form of colorful metaphors and shortened word forms.

There is a tone of voice, usually several decibels higher than necessary, that goes along with every phrase spoken with any sort of emphasis or passion. Hence were I to translate this tone into text, a simple inquiry such as: "Would you be so kind as to provide me with a writing utensil" turns into: "I NEED A PENCIL!!!!!!!!" (which explains a great deal about the multitude of issues in their writing).

Although they were not so congenial at the beginning of the school year, my students and I have now achieved a rapport such that most things said in the classroom nowadays lack any sort of malcontent. However, they are said with such volume and gusto that they continue to disrupt the class. It has been an ongoing struggle trying to teach them to lower the volume of their voices. Often times, even when the entire class is quiet, they will shout a random thought or question out or burst out with a laugh so astoundingly loud that I'll wonder if it were a laugh or scream.

Last class period, I gave a lengthy lecture on the overuse of the exclamation point. Too many of my students were turning in essays that contained phrases punctuated with multiple exclamation points. I had to explain to them that a single exclamation point is considered such a potent form of expletive that multiple explanation points simply do not exist. But then again, in the world of formal writing, one can only speak in "inside voices".