Posts Tagged ‘kids say…’
I had an interesting language and cultural experience with my 6th graders yesterday. What’s sad is that it dovetails right into the whole weight-loss issue and how we, as a culture, are obsessed with skinniness. Not healthy slimming but skinniness.
We’re refreshing our memories about the use and meaning of specific prefixes. One of the prefix groups we’re studying is the MIS-group. You know, misguided, mistake, misunderstand, misbehavior. All words my 6th graders are more than familiar with. I challenged them with a word they didn’t know–misrepresent–to see if they could intellectually apply their knowledge of MIS (wrong or error) to the new word to figure out the definition.
What I first discovered is that they also don’t comprehend root words because they wanted to say “wrong again present”, which lead them to believe this had something to do with Christmas (for my Mexicans) or Eid (for my Somalis). When I confirmed the root was “represent”, they got thinking but never quite mastered the meaning, so I helped them out.
Me: “Thinking about the word, “represent”, what’s one way we can define it?
Various kids who forget, even in the sixth grade, to raise their hands: “To show something about yourself”
Me: (hiding my shock that they remember anything I taught them): “Excellent. So if I come to class and tell you I’m a rich heiress to a bubblegum throne and I have six cars and servants, do you think I’d be misrepresenting myself?”
Various kids: (laughter) “Yes!”
Maico: “You have seeex cars? And you are reeech?”
Me: “So what do you think misrepresent might mean?” (“No, Maico, it was an example. I have one car. And no money. Cuz if I did, I’d be in your home country sipping margaritas by a pool instead of dealing with this crappy Ohio weather, OK?”)
Various kids: “to represent yourself wrong!” (the energy of their replies really does earn an exclamation point.)
Maico: “What ees margarita?”
Me: “Great! Now, can you give me an example of someone misrepresenting something or someone? A time you misrepresented yourself?” (“Maico, I hearby revoke your Mexican heritage based on the content of that question. No Mexican should ever ask what a margarita is. Even if you are in the sixth grade.)
Various kids:
“When someone lies about doing homework.”
“When my mom says she’ll give me allowance but doesn’t.”
“When the guy on TV tells you Oxyclean gets your whites whiter but it doesn’t work.”
Maico: “When my dad went to the Hummer man to buy a Hummer in the paper because of low price and the Hummer man try to sell him more expensive Hummer.” (“Maico, your parents are shopping for Hummers and you haven’t had a margarita yet? What’s wrong with your family?”)
Me: “Perfect! Now, playing off the idea of the Oxyclean commercial, what are some other commercials that misrepresent their products?”
Various kids: “You don’t get a leprechaun with Lucky Charms!”
“Certain clothes don’t make you popular.”
“Shoes with lights in the soles are the coolest things you can wear!!”
Maico: “Bood Light does not make girls like you. And Snoogies make people laugh at you.” (Ahh, Maico. Welcome to American culture.)
One girl: “Diet pills don’t make you skinny.”
While the cacophony of little voices discussed amongst themselves examples of misrepresented advertisements going bad, I sought out the girl who’d mentioned diet pills. I asked her what she’d meant, wondering how she’d come to her conclusion and wisdom at such a young age–and jealous that I’d spent thousands of dollars over the years believing.
“So, Madina. I have a question about your comment on diet pills. What makes you so sure they don’t work?”
She shrugged, her cute pink polkadot hijab sliding around her face. “My mom told me. One of my friends told me I was fat and I wanted to try them to get skinny. I liked how the girl was skinnier in the second picture, but my mom said skinny is ugly.”
Madina is about as fat as I am thin. Just to clarify, Wii Fit Plus considers me obese. I’m guessing that a BMI measurement in the 30s is not a good place to be, even with a fabricated cartoon character. She’s a beautiful little sixth grade girl whose wrists are about the size of three of my fingers put together.
“You’ve got a smart mom.” I wish Patti had told me that growing up. Where would I be if I’d have not grown up believing all the things commercials led me to believe on Saturday mornings between cartoons–when cartoon were good? Maybe I wouldn’t have had a fascination with stuffing myself with sugary cereals, spent my babysitting money on a Chia Pet or have believed I was less than popular if my jeans didn’t say Jordache and my shoes didn’t say Nike.
What a radical departure from my current state of thinking that would have produced. With a little shot of reality, a little rebuking of the commercial message, would I be a different person today? How much of who I am and what I think is a result of those early advertising sessions? Subliminally, of course. I’m too smart logically to believe anything I see on TV anymore, hence the reason I rarely watch (except soaps, of course. And QVC.)
How much of my life and time on Earth has been spent believing and buying the next perfect gadget to get me thin? (Don’t answer that, really. It’s beyond embarrassing.)
By the time I was told that there is no such thing as a quick fix (“If it’s too good to be true, it is. And you’re a fool to have believed it,” so said my senior Consumer Ec teacher Mrs. Bell), it was too late. I had already spent allowance and lawnmowing money on Dexatrim and those little chewy chocolate square diet pills that promised rapid weight loss. I’d already snuck diuretics from my mom’s stash to see if it would help me lose the bulge. I’d already bought a cassette that promised me strong abs and a body every teen boy would envy because the manufacturer had misrepresented the product and American society had determined it was OK to promote the lie with very colorful commercials.
Where would I be today without all that?
Poolside in the Mexican jungle with a personal waiter, double-salted rims and the perfect margarita on ice, all paid for by my bubblegum inheritance, that’s where. Without a Maico in sight…