Out of the Mouths of Babes

As a language educator, I was fascinated with young
children and their efforts to use the English language.
Certain letters were initially problematic such as the letter L.
When asked her name, our daughter would tell others

her name was EM-MAH-WEE. We thought our son’s name
would be less difficult. He told people his name was THOMA.
He couldn’t get that final S to his name for some time. The
Requests for MUK or MOK from either child elicited a smile.

I then poured milk into their cups. One days as I was
cleaning, our son declared that the BACK-Y CLEANER
was too loud! I finished cleaning and stored the
vacuum cleaner so he could play his imaginary games

with cars and trucks uninterrupted. Both children
requested certain foods for dinner too. Our daughter
requested PIS GETTI since she craved this pasta. My attempts
to get the SP sound at the beginning of spaghetti were

for naught. She mirrored the word SPINACH just fine but
quickly said she wanted PIS GETTI for dinner. After polishing
off his favorite food, hamburgers, our son declared that
he just loved HANG GUR BURS. Another smile from me.

With our daughter’s birthday fast approaching, my
husband and I recalled with fond memories their
early attempts at language acquisition. I still smile at all the
hugs and I WUV YOUs uttered to us. We are lucky parents!