So trivial, yet it really ticks you off.

[Hercule]

The following, FAR from trivial in my opinion, did MUCH more than tick me off.

Because we are working parents, our 10yr old son attends a day camp for several weeks during the summer when he isn't enrolled in a more topic/activity oriented camp - chess camp, Natural History museum, chamber music camp etc. This day camp is run by the same organization that ran the daycare/preschool we had him in before he entered kindergarten, so we have a relatively long history with them. At any rate, after I picked my son up yesterday, and when we were in the car on the way home, he tells me that he was scolded for reading! Apparently, they had gotten back from the playground and had an hour to kill before lunch, so they played "around the world", what ever that game is. My son, rather than participating in the game took out his book and began reading, at which point the counselor told him that if he wasn't going to play the game he should put the book away and sit there quietly and do nothing. I went through the roof when I heard this! So this morning when I dropped him off I confronted the counselor about it (being careful to ask another counselor to witness the interaction). Her story wasn't much different from my son's though she denied scolding him for reading. Long story short, I cautioned her that, not only was it my son's prerogative to not participate but that given the universally recognized fundamental place of reading in education, intellectual development and enrichment, and literacy, discouraging children from reading, let alone associating it with punishment by denying or even adding reading time as a punitive measure, is not a good direction to go in. She reluctantly acknowledged she was wrong but easily apologized and I asked that she direct her acknowledgement and apology to my son not me. Which she did. Fortunately he only has today and tomorrow then he's done with them for this summer. Next summer, we are considering that he may be able to stay home by himself at least part of the time.

 

[2jakes]

^^^^

I recall a friend at work telling me about a time when he was taking his son to school.
It was his son’s elementary 1st grade.

The father was carrying the book sack or whatever kids use to carry books today.
It was not a regular thing, most of the time, the kid carried his own books.
But he was happy that dad was with him today.

Anyhow as they were nearing the entrance, a teacher kidded the boy.
“What’s the matter, you can’t carry your on books , you need daddy to hold your
hand, ha-ha-ha-!”

The father didn’t say a word.
After he said farewell to his son, he approached the teacher.

In so many words he told him something like this:

“There will come a time, when I won’t be able to carry his books or hold his hand
when he goes to school.
Let this be the first & last time you ever say this to my son again,
do you understand?"

 

[LizzieMaine]

The best, most enriching summers of my life were spent loitering in a drug store reading magazines. Once, when I was about eight, my mother was convinced I'd been abducted and called the police, and they laughed at her and told her they'd just seen me with my nose stuck in a comic book.

 

[2jakes]

The worse moment of my life in grade school when I was 7:

Having a grand time playing during recess. I ignored going to the bathtroom.

Back in class, the afternoon session consisted of a group of five kids standing in front
of the class facing the teacher & reading a paragraph from our home-work.

I was too shy or embarrassed to ask the teacher for permission to go pee,
especially in front of the girls.

Not able to hold off any longer, I thought I could just release
just a tinkle.

Well...that tinkle turned into a full shower.

“What’s the matter, jake?” asked the teacher.

I buried my head in the book as the entire class in back of me roared
with laughter.

“Teacher...jake wet his pants!” echoed from my classmates.

About the only consolation that day was that it did feel good having
released
all that anxiety.

 

[wgnovak]

The two word colloquialism used in the United States “ you guys”. You is both a singular and plural pronoun and does not need the word guys.

 

[LizzieMaine]

In the Northeast, it's "*youse* guys."

 

[2jakes]

Down south, it’s “y’all."

 

[swanson_eyes]

Jake, I peed my pants in 1st grade because I was too scared to ask. That haunted me for years but eventually I totally forgot about it until just now. Good times.

 

[BlueTrain]

"You all" is singular. "All of you all" is the plural. "Y'all" is merely a written contraction and does not necessarily represent a different pronunciation. But then, I can't understand half of those speaking English anyway and none of them in England.

 

[KILO NOVEMBER]

Down south, it’s “y’all."

I was in a Latin class at the local community college some years back. The topic was the number and person of pronouns. One of my classmates was of Southern birth. He explained that the second person singular was "y'all" while the plural was "all y'all".

Where I grew up in southwestern Pennsylvania, it was "youns" or "yins" (alternate pronunciations). I lost my native dialect and accent decades ago, but I remember a time when I was working with a very young man who had only recently migrated from the Pittsburgh region. Another coworker asked him to spell "yins". I explained that you don't spell it, you only say it.

 

[BlueTrain]

What with regional accents and variations of rules, one would think that English would be one of the most difficult languages to learn, yet it is probably the one language spoken in more places than any other language. Spanish is probably second, but that is not to say there are not more speakers of some other language like Mandarin. But other languages can also have widely different variations of speech and accent, too.

 

[Hercule]

The two word colloquialism used in the United States “ you guys”. You is both a singular and plural pronoun and does not need the word guys.

That doesn't bother me so much. It's the possessive that makes me cringe: "your guyses"

 

[2jakes]

Jake, I peed my pants in 1st grade because I was too scared to ask. That haunted me for years but eventually I totally forgot about it until just now. Good times.

Swanson, good times indeed!

What “haunts” me now is having to go to jury duty.


Imagine a cold courtroom with lawyers arguing and all sorts of
drama going on & on & on.

Suddenly, yours truly stands up.

“Your honor, I regret to interrupt the proceedings but I need to go wee wee.”

 

[wgnovak]

That doesn't bother me so much. It's the possessive that makes me cringe: "your guyses"

Similar to "ain’t youzez” .

 

[tropicalbob]

The following, FAR from trivial in my opinion, did MUCH more than tick me off.

Because we are working parents, our 10yr old son attends a day camp for several weeks during the summer when he isn't enrolled in a more topic/activity oriented camp - chess camp, Natural History museum, chamber music camp etc. This day camp is run by the same organization that ran the daycare/preschool we had him in before he entered kindergarten, so we have a relatively long history with them. At any rate, after I picked my son up yesterday, and when we were in the car on the way home, he tells me that he was scolded for reading! Apparently, they had gotten back from the playground and had an hour to kill before lunch, so they played "around the world", what ever that game is. My son, rather than participating in the game took out his book and began reading, at which point the counselor told him that if he wasn't going to play the game he should put the book away and sit there quietly and do nothing. I went through the roof when I heard this! So this morning when I dropped him off I confronted the counselor about it (being careful to ask another counselor to witness the interaction). Her story wasn't much different from my son's though she denied scolding him for reading. Long story short, I cautioned her that, not only was it my son's prerogative to not participate but that given the universally recognized fundamental place of reading in education, intellectual development and enrichment, and literacy, discouraging children from reading, let alone associating it with punishment by denying or even adding reading time as a punitive measure, is not a good direction to go in. She reluctantly acknowledged she was wrong but easily apologized and I asked that she direct her acknowledgement and apology to my son not me. Which she did. Fortunately he only has today and tomorrow then he's done with them for this summer. Next summer, we are considering that he may be able to stay home by himself at least part of the time.

I home-schooled my son from the middle of his junior year after speaking with a few of his teachers and a school official. Deeply stupid people.

 

[Zombie_61]

I was in a Latin class at the local community college some years back. The topic was the number and person of pronouns. One of my classmates was of Southern birth. He explained that the second person singular was "y'all" while the plural was "all y'all"...

Interesting. I was told by a "Southerner" several years ago that "y'all" is only used when addressing two or more people, and never when addressing only one person.

 

[2jakes]

Interesting. I was told by a "Southerner" several years ago that “y’all" is only used when addressing two or more people, and never when addressing only one person.

Also used by folks who are familiar with one another and not much towards strangers.

And I read that in Pittsburgh, it’s “y’uns”.

 

[Trenchfriend]

I tell you, I'm definitely NOT the (banned) person with the nickname trenchfriend on the bodybuilding.com-community!

 

[KILO NOVEMBER]

And I read that in Pittsburgh, it’s “y’uns”.

Like I wrote, we don't write it, we say it. What you've got there is the apostrophe representing the missing "o" in one of my alternate, you should pardon the expression, spellings of it.

As a native whose family lived there since the mid 19th Century, by the mid-20th Century both "yins" and "youns" were semantically and socially equivalent pronunciations. It doesn't take much imagination or insight to see that both are contractions of "you ones".

In the days of Shakespeare, English had distinct singular and plural second personal pronoun forms (e.g., thee vs. you [objective case], thy vs. your, thou vs. you [nominative]). In the later 17th century, the singular forms disappeared and the plural forms stepped in for both.

Ever since we've been trying to reconstitute the distinctions with varying degrees of success with "y'all" vs. "all y'all" or "youze" vs. "youzes", for example.

 

[2jakes]

Like I wrote, we don't write it, we say it. What you've got there is the apostrophe representing the missing "o" in one of my alternate, you should pardon the expression, spellings of it.

As a native whose family lived there since the mid 19th Century, by the mid-20th Century both "yins" and "youns" were semantically and socially equivalent pronunciations. It doesn't take much imagination or insight to see that both are contractions of "you ones".

In the days of Shakespeare, English had distinct singular and plural second personal pronoun forms (e.g., thee vs. you [objective case], thy vs. your, thou vs. you [nominative]). In the later 17th century, the singular forms disappeared and the plural forms stepped in for both.

Ever since we've been trying to reconstitute the distinctions with varying degrees of success with "y'all" vs. "all y'all" or "youze" vs. "youzes", for example.

Great information.
Thanks for sharing.