Monday, March 29, 2010

Do you ever wonder?

Do you ever stop to ponder how much our dialect effects our speaking, writing, and reading skills? As the year progresses and my students become more independent writers, these things rise to the surface more and more.
I have this little boy and he is certain that there is such a word as AV. Yep just an A and a V. AV....You know...I av a new horse. When you go sledding you av a sled. Makes total sense. Right? WRONG. Every. day. I remind him that there is no AV...but HAVE H-A-V-E. Today I punctuated every letter by tapping my finger on my desk. Tomorrow I might tap my finger on him:)
And then there is the most faithful of all words...SOL!
Oh how I love this word. I ask a student to write what he/she did this weekend. Well, I sol a deer, it was running across the field. OR I sol my brother play ball. What a wonderful word that SOL is!
How about hafta? Ever use that word? To be a police officer, you hafta go to a special school. My mom said before I could go play, you hafta clean your room.
We never realize how our dialect and how we speak is perceived until we read 19 1st grade writing journals a day.
Today I had them write about one thing they don't know how to do, but would like to learn. Most kids wrote about cooking to help mom, riding some contraption, or doing something coveted like a flip on the trampoline. Not one girl...nope...she's going to skip all that malarkey and learn how to make a forchun (fortune). Yep, she's got a bright fuchure (future)!
Moral to this story?
If you need a good laugh or even just a strong giggle....have your 6 year old write something:!!

6 comments:

Corin said...

A post after my own heart. I love little things like this. I bet reading those papers is fascinating. The phonetic spelling alone would be awesome to behold.
This is kind of how Levi sings the ABC song. He gets through about G and then things get a little interesting as he tries to run the letters into words.
P.S. I would love to know which girl wanted to make a forchun.

Shonya said...

I smiled all through this post--aren't kids something else! :) Yet it IS a reminder to us parents to speak clearly and correctly, isn't it?!

Bree Shaw said...

love it! i love your letter you got yesterday too. you better hang on to that forever!

Anonymous said...

I love all those spellings, even though I'm sure it becomes annoying when you have to correct it every.single.day. The one word that drives me crazy is "ain't" and I know there are a few kids who are tired of seeing my look when they use it, lol. ~Laci

Finding Joy in the Journey said...

Natalee's just going to write about things being "gut, yah?"
LOL

Anonymous said...

Oh, this cracked me up, Andrea!! My pet peeve is "SOL"!! I don't know how often I've hounded on that subject since I became a teacher! Our dialect really does become more apparent as they become more proficient writers. I like "yousta", personally..."I yousta go to the babysitters.." And I always have at least one or two that tell me about riding on a "chrane" or water running down a "jrane"...Cracks me up! --Lindsay