Dear Sir, letter writing is a dying art. Faithfully yours, Generation Text

ONE in ten children has never written a letter, according to a new survey.

A poll commissioned by the charity World Vision also found 26 per cent of seven- to 14-year-olds had not written a letter in the last year, and 45 per cent were unsure of the right layout.

However, 49 per cent had written an email or a message on a social networking site in the previous week alone.

Critics warned that letter-writing was an important skill. Dr Chris Holligan, senior lecturer in the education faculty at West of Scotland University, said it was a key for literacy because the discipline required greater attention to word choice and sentence structure.

He said: "Letter writing carries with it the potential for the child to engage differently, to slow down and think more deeply about their audience and their own use of written language than is likely to be the case with ubiquitous texting."

More than four in ten children, 43 per cent, according to the poll, had not received a letter in the previous year, and 20 per cent had never received one. In contrast, more than half, 52 per cent, had received an email or message on a social networking site in the last week.

Careers experts warned that the traditional skill was crucial in job-hunting despite the popularity of email. Tanya de Grunwald, founder of the careers advice site graduatefog.co.uk, said formal letters were still required for job applications and in many jobs.

She said: "I'm not surprised to hear that letter writing is dying out among young people. Many graduates tell me that applying for jobs is the first time they've written a formal letter.

"As they discover, it's a mistake to think we don't need these skills at all in life, just because the need doesn't arise during our childhood and teenage years."

The poll, conducted to mark the charity's National Letter Writing Day, also found children are less likely to write letters as they get older.

The new school curriculum, due in August, suggests using text messaging and social networking sites to teaching children literacy.

Child development expert Sue Palmer said: "If children do not write or receive letters, they miss out on key developmental benefits. Handwritten letters are much more personal than electronic communication.

"By going to the trouble of physically committing words to paper, the writer shows their investment of time and effort in a relationship. That's why we tend to hang on to personal letters as keepsakes."

A Scottish Government spokesman said: "In part, this survey simply tells us that times change and technology partly drives such changes.

"Of course, Curriculum for Excellence promotes the development of all aspects of literacy. This explicitly includes writing skills, which are crucial to the all-round development of strong literacy skills."

LETTER LAYOUT

WRITING formal letters is a skill with particular rules determining the format.

To the top right should be the sender's address, below this the date, and the address the letter is being sent to goes below this, but on the left of the page.

A title for the letter can be used and underlined, with double-line spacing between that and the body of the letter.

If writing to someone whose name and title are not known, use the greeting "Dear Sir or Madam," with the ending "Yours faithfully," before the sender's name.

If writing to a named person, address them as Dear Mr, Mrs, Miss or Ms, and end with "Yours sincerely,".

The sender should then sign their name, with it written legibly underneath.