I got a kick out of George Siemens's description of his daily information processing tasks. Maybe, as he says, it will "sound familar" to some of you:

Monday morning...open Outlook - 120 new messages (on top of the messages I reviewed through out the weekend)...skim Internet sites - elearning, knowledge management, information technology. Some items are saved in an increasingly complex "favorites" file structure, a few are printed, some are forwarded, and some are blogged. Try to stay on top of email as it comes in...another 150 will hit the inbox by the end of the day...complete job tasks - i.e. the reason I'm actually at the college. Skip lunch (or eat lunch while battling with email/phone calls)...and spend a few hours in the evening reviewing sites that changed through out the day...and responding to email (so the inbox is moderately clean Tuesday morning).

However, more intriguing to me is his list of solutions, particularly his suggestion to "lose aesthetics":

Spelling and grammar, while important for formal documents and email, are not critical in handling most emails and communications. Take a page out of the teenager's instant messaging handbook: focus on communicating ideas/concepts, not syntax.

Is it possible that students have made an implicit connection between IM and email, one which recognizes the importance of efficiency in communication? Granted, students often do need to develop some awareness of email as a genre differing from IM, but perhaps, as George has pointed out, we can learn from them as well.