People of all ages seem to make assumptions or generalizations on subjects and people. It seems like adults do all the assuming which tends to be negative. We say or think things like why people are broke, why other peoples children behave a certain way, and how things could have been better "if only...". But then there are kids who haven't learned to be cynics yet. They have to whole world to look up to and learn from. They are learning to cope and figure things out and try to find a place and make a statement. Here are some of the great things I've heard/seen come from kids lately:
"I love you three" in response to my "I love you two." I'm sure both my kids have used this one when they were in the learning to count stage.
"The freeway is loose today" came from my 9 year old. Well, why not? It's not bumper to bumper so it's loose. Now we joke about it all the time.
"Only girls go to preschool" came from Tasha's 4 year old friend Justin. I guess when the only kid you knows that goes to preschool is a girl, then that is true.
Friends when they meet just once. Tasha will go play at IKEA and talk about her friend. You can also convince her to go someplace because her "friends" will be there. She may or may not know someone, but if they are her age they are her friends. WOW! Could adults learn something from that!
Now here's one that relates to reading. Good generalization, bad assumption, and terribly difficult to overcome...I had a first grader that used the sound "w" every time he saw the letter "o". What?! I was so frustrated. Here I'm teaching him phonics, he knows that "o" has the sound in "hot", but insists on saying "w" every time he sees it. It took me a month or more to figure out why he was doing it. We were reading a book, he was sounding out most of the words and occasionally there would be a sight word he would just say. Hmmmm, one of those sight words was "one". DUH! He probably learned it in pre-school with all the numbers on the wall or with flash cards he did with someone. So gosh, there's no good solution to this one. We discussed the issue of "cheater words" again and it took a good month to fix but he got over it.
So what's your favorite (or least favorite) generalization?!
2 comments:
I was just a-giggling at all those funny kiddo stories. My most recent favorite generalization is that apparently when people see a baby in a sling they automatically feel more at ease and welcome to talk to the mother and baby. I love it! I never take her to the grocery store anymore without the sling, mostly for convenience, but also because we make all sorts of friends that way. People LOVE it. Seriously. It's very community building and I welcome all the oohs and ahhs over how sweet and cute my little pumpkin is. And she just smiles right back too, so it's good for her also! :)
I completely understand the sling thing! I always thought that was hilarious. It was also nice that you didn't have to hand over the baby to everyone :)
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