I have just been thinking about how my son speaks and what he says. He is 13 now and here is what I have discovered:
1. He does know some curse words, although he does not use them (at least in my hearing). I know this because he knows to switch the YouTube video he is watching when he hears one.
2. His language is tempered by having a younger sibling around (and he knows he will be in big trouble if he forgets that).
3. He gets more animated when he is around his friends and especially when he is gaming with them, and he uses a different vocabulary than regular speech (see #5).
4. I should not be annoyed if I am speaking to him and he shouts back "What?!!" The decibel level gets really, really high when he has his headset on AND he is gaming.
5. I am grateful that he uses expressions like, "What the fudge?", "Crap" and "YOLO". Usually these are followed by the terms "Die!" or "Hackers!" or "Destroy" , because he is usually gaming when using these words. It could be worse.
6. I can still give him food for thought/pause. He recently used the expression "Shut your piehole" and
my immediate reaction was 'Yuck!' When he asked why he couldn't say that, after all, he was not cursing. I told him that I think much more of him than those words convey - they make him less than he is, and he could find a better way to say what he wants to. There was no snarky comeback, in fact, he was so silent, it appears he was actually turning it around in his head.
7. 'Grrr' is becoming a way of communicating with him, in that, he sees me and says "grrr" as a pre-emptive response to whatever I may be about to say. Maybe it works this way with all teens? Teen boys?
8. My boy is still not in high school and as such, is not "up" on all the teen slang making the rounds on BuzzFeed. For which I am grateful. I already have trouble talking to him as it is.
9. You should still read to your older kids and have them read to you. Aside from the obvious bonding for you and your child, there may be words that they understand perfectly but because they don't hear them in adult conversation, they cannot pronounce. Case in point - vineyard. Lucas kept insisting it was vine-yard.
10. Spelling may be overrated in some people's eyes, but not in mine. Lucas is a poor speller and I've been trying to convince him that despite having very intelligent points and the ability to speak well, he should still be able to write well and spell correctly. It is a losing battle so far, not helped by teachers apparently, evidenced by the Language Arts teacher's comments below.
1. He does know some curse words, although he does not use them (at least in my hearing). I know this because he knows to switch the YouTube video he is watching when he hears one.
2. His language is tempered by having a younger sibling around (and he knows he will be in big trouble if he forgets that).
3. He gets more animated when he is around his friends and especially when he is gaming with them, and he uses a different vocabulary than regular speech (see #5).
4. I should not be annoyed if I am speaking to him and he shouts back "What?!!" The decibel level gets really, really high when he has his headset on AND he is gaming.
5. I am grateful that he uses expressions like, "What the fudge?", "Crap" and "YOLO". Usually these are followed by the terms "Die!" or "Hackers!" or "Destroy" , because he is usually gaming when using these words. It could be worse.
6. I can still give him food for thought/pause. He recently used the expression "Shut your piehole" and
my immediate reaction was 'Yuck!' When he asked why he couldn't say that, after all, he was not cursing. I told him that I think much more of him than those words convey - they make him less than he is, and he could find a better way to say what he wants to. There was no snarky comeback, in fact, he was so silent, it appears he was actually turning it around in his head.
7. 'Grrr' is becoming a way of communicating with him, in that, he sees me and says "grrr" as a pre-emptive response to whatever I may be about to say. Maybe it works this way with all teens? Teen boys?
8. My boy is still not in high school and as such, is not "up" on all the teen slang making the rounds on BuzzFeed. For which I am grateful. I already have trouble talking to him as it is.
9. You should still read to your older kids and have them read to you. Aside from the obvious bonding for you and your child, there may be words that they understand perfectly but because they don't hear them in adult conversation, they cannot pronounce. Case in point - vineyard. Lucas kept insisting it was vine-yard.
10. Spelling may be overrated in some people's eyes, but not in mine. Lucas is a poor speller and I've been trying to convince him that despite having very intelligent points and the ability to speak well, he should still be able to write well and spell correctly. It is a losing battle so far, not helped by teachers apparently, evidenced by the Language Arts teacher's comments below.
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