Kid Speak
When my brother, sister, and I were little my mom would tell us to behave. She actually probably said it more like “Bee Have“, as in two words (and yes, my mom yelled in a bold font). I always thought it was a riot that my brother and sister would respond with, “We are being have!” (Even if it was mostly a lie…)
Now that I have a significant number of English classes and some independent readings in linguistics under my belt it still makes me laugh, but I get it.
If you’re a parent and your kid says something like this you probably laugh and think how cute it is. It is cute. I’m looking at it from a language learning perspective and I still think it’s super neat. I am a nerd like this. Self proclaimed word nerd! Holla!
To my siblings “being have” was the same as “being good” and it totally makes sense because of the syllable our mom emphasized. They had already learned or picked up on the deal with “to be” even if there was no way they could describe that they knew it at that point.
I just love watching kids learn. I love watching them try and retry things until it fits. Seeing their faces as they concentrate, tongue out, piecing together the world as they know it.
Tuesday 8, 2009
You so need to baby sit my kids. Shoot, we can just have you (& the Boys) over for dinner.
It won’t be pizza.
ciao,
rpm
Tuesday 8, 2009
The kid of crazy-housemate had two that always cracked me up. One was “meatbulbs” (ya know, made of ground beef). The other was a favorite cartoon, “teenage myoo-cha nin-cha turtles”. I was really sad when her grandfather corrected her & she stopped.
This was also the kid that named the pull-on winter hats “extra hats”, a name I caught myself using just yesterday. (Kid’s father had come over in the middle of winter and had asked Kid’s mother, “Hey, do you have an extra hat I can use?” She also named a huge very red sweater I had one day when we were watching the Attack of the Killer Tomatoes. I was wearing the sweater, she was on my lap. Halfway through the movie she turned to me and said, “You’re a big fat killer tomato!” The sweater was the “killer tomato sweater” afterwards.
yeah, kids are a blast. don’t worry, you’ll have your own pile before long. & when you do, and I sing to them demented songs and regale them with tales of mom and dad in *their* insane youth, you will have your “what was I thinking?!?” moments.
Tuesday 8, 2009
My sister said “being have” once and the moment sticks in my head. I need to write a post of “Peanutisms,” he has a few, too.