Onomatopoeia?

[dbummee]

Here's a word that I've never heard of in all my 69 years. My grandson, who is 10 years old,
has to memorize this word as part of his upcoming Common Core testing.
Not sure myself, but I think it describes putting words and phrases together to make a sentence or as close
as I can get.

Tom DuRose

[Steve]

At lunch today, one of us talked into his smartphone and asked for the definition of a word we were arguing about. Seconds later, we were all enlightened. It was so easy, I wondered why we bother learning any words at all, beyond what we need to ask our phones.

Tom, Common Core has lots of problems, but asking kids to learn the occasional word that we might not have heard before isn't one of them. BTW, here's the buzz.

[dbummee]

Well, Steve, far be it from me to argue with you as to the problems with Common Core. It does seem that
our little ones are getting beat up with this stuff though.
I will take this one step further and add another word for you. Consubstantial.
Without going into it too much, one of the prayers we use in our church service has this word in it. How in Hell can a 6 year old be expected to say it, say nothing about know what it means?
I've always thought of myself as fairly literate, but now I don't know.

Tom DuRose

[Steve]

Tom, the good news is that both onomatopoeia and consubstantial are jargon. Folks rarely encounter these words unless they're studying literature or comparative religion. The bad news is that if a kid is studying either, sooner or later he'll have to learn the word, so the only real question is at what age should a kid have to learn it. That's a judgment call. My feeling is that it's more important to teach a kid that when he comes across an unfamiliar word, he should look it up instead of ignoring it. He can just ask his smartphone.
P.S. Was it better when the prayers were in Latin?

[dbummee]

I can see that I'm not going to win this argument, if that's what it is. Fact is, I would much rather
listen to the service than participate in it. Our church has morphed in to a combination
evangelistic, fundamentalist type of faith. Not that that is a bad thing, really, but not to my taste.
Touching and shaking hands and making peace with a perfect stranger who doesn't give a damn
about me or mine after Sunday leaves me a little cold, I'm afraid.
I agree that the kids should look things up. By the way, my 40 year old daughter told me she knew what
the word her little boy was trying to figure out. That was after I wracked my brain trying to explain it to him.

Tom DuRose

[Midway Tommy D]

At lunch today, one of us talked into his smartphone and asked for the definition of a word

Say what? I thought you were a member of the OLA (Old Luddites Association) What the heck happened to the smoke signals?

Learned the meaning of onomatopoeia 50 years ago. Never used it or saw it again until now, and never gave a darn either.

Tom

[Steve]

...this argument, if that's what it is

I hope it's not. Some CC assignments seem to be full of insane math questions, but it's fine when it challenges kids to learn some new words and use them.

Old Luddites Association

After the fellow luncheoneer talked to his smartphone, we telegraphed the Association president and had his membership revoked.
I'm hurt that no one mentioned the onomatopoeiacized link.

[Robyn Summerlin]

Interesting thread. In a high school English class in Port Arthur almost 60 years ago, Mrs. Greer kept a poster on the bulletin board titled "Figures of Speech" that included definitions and examples for each of several non-literal expressions. The example for Onomatopoeia was "The bee buzzed and hummed angrily." This and several thousand other factoids rattling around in my head have somehow enriched my life, although I admit they've never put a penny in my pocket. Same with reel collecting.

[dbummee]

Well, now that I've caused some old minds to think about old times, let's go fishing.

Tom DuRose

[Robyn Summerlin]

[nomdeplume57]

My Dear Old Mom use to tell kids that we onomatopoeia
before we got in the car to go to Grandma's cuz Dad would not stop till we got there.

[Ron Mc]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-EEyQIAemn0

[bvandeuson]

I can see that I'm not going to win this argument, if that's what it is. Fact is, I would much rather
listen to the service than participate in it. Our church has morphed in to a combination
evangelistic, fundamentalist type of faith. Not that that is a bad thing, really, but not to my taste.
Touching and shaking hands and making peace with a perfect stranger who doesn't give a damn
about me or mine after Sunday leaves me a little cold, I'm afraid.
I agree that the kids should look things up. By the way, my 40 year old daughter told me she knew what
the word her little boy was trying to figure out. That was after I wracked my brain trying to explain it to him.

Tom DuRose

"making peace with a perfect stranger"? By definition, one doesn't know a perfect stranger, so why the need to make peace? Is there more to this story which will clarify the concept?

Bruce

[dbummee]

There isn't really much of a story here. Just an old fart trying to deal with the modern world and 11 year old
grandchildren asking him questions he can't answer. In my eyes the word perfect can mean many things.
Perfect flyreels, perfect baseball games, perfect this, perfect that. In answer to your question, a perfect stranger is one who I don't know, so is perfectly strange to me. Case closed.

Tom DuRose