Whaddya Mean…?

Most kids go through the “Why?” stage driving parents to the brink by challenging their every word and instruction. They’ll spin you in circles until you finally throw a “because I said so” their way or finally submit with an “I don’t know”. Aidan’s been doing a little something like that recently but it’s a product of what I’ve been encouraging him to do.

Even when we’re just lounging around I like to ask the boys a lot of questions. Some of our most stimulating conversations have been in odd places like the car shop waiting area. I’m constantly quizzing Aidan asking him a lot of questions and I’ve told him he should do the same. I’m confident that getting him in the habit of seeking out answers and new knowledge will serve him well when he hits school in the Fall and in his quest to be “smart like Dada" (and Mama too).

Lately he’s been hitting me pretty hard with the vocabulary questions. I never dumb down the words or phrases I use when I talk to him hoping he’ll ask for clarification if he hears something new or unfamiliar and he takes the bait every time. The kid’s doing well at everything we throw at him I figure I’ll make him my little walking, talking lexicon.

He’s got a memory like his father’s and correlates things in the same round about ways I do. Yesterday he heard the word “survive” and wanted to know what it meant. Problem was we didn’t hear the word when he did. After 30 minutes of him racking his brain for clues as to what he heard and how to get us to figure it out we recognized some reference to the show “Survivor” (which we rarely watch). He somehow deemed the show to be Mama’s game show…the one where people try to hit targets. Must have been a game they were playing on one of the few occasions it was actually on. Nothing beats a half hour lesson on one word when it takes that long just to get there!

He’ll press you into minute clarifications too and I always try my best not to simply throw my hands up in surrender. I do sometimes need to breathe deeply before continuing on after a string of five or six “whaddya mean’s?”. It sometimes forces me to go research better ways to explain things.

Let’s hope he remains forever curious about the many subjects he wishes to master at this early age and that his kindergarten teacher will survive his inquisitions and not boot him off the island.

Whaddya mean "the tribe has spoken"?