Living with all men can be challenging.
Communication is one of the most difficult challenges that men and women face and my "little men" that I am raising are no different. Communicating with them can sometimes drive me crazy! Normally, I try to speak with good grammar, season it with interesting vocabulary and even use complete sentences - but to no avail. I have listened to all the expert advice:
Never speak to you children in baby talk - ok, got it.
Use good grammar and add variety to your vocabulary - ok, got it.
Read lots of good literature so they can pick up on speaking well - ok, check.
Answer their questions with complete sentence answers, not just yes or no - ok, got it.
These experts should come live with me for a while! While all this is good advice, my boys just don't appreciate numerous words - no matter how good they sound.
In an effort to communicate in a way that gets their attention I often find myself resorting to what I call speaking "caveman".
Here's an example of how caveman speak works in my home:
Mom: "Could you please go pick up the mail from the mail box and bring it in the kitchen?"
Caveboy: "HUH?"
Mom: "Could you please go get the mail?"
Caveboy: "Where's the mail?? Is that what you said?"
Now, I don't know if their mind is just wandering when I am speaking or if they have the hearing of a rock band roadie but at this point I get so frustrated that my communication ends up being grunted one syllable words.
Mom: MAIL - GET - BRING - UG!
Suddenly the light comes on . . .
Caveboy: "Oh, OK!"
And they are off - happily completing the task. You can frequently hear me saying:
GO - ROOM - CLEAN
or
WIPE - FEET - UG!
Somehow, they perfectly understand these grunted commands!
I always pound my chest and shout UG! or grunt or snort - they love this !
Caveman has become our unique family language and we all crack up everytime one of us ends up speaking caveman.
And just like those experts - I have my own advice for speaking this male language.
Like any good language, there are rules to speaking caveman. To ensure this language is used properly (and in an effort to educate their future wives) I will share with you the 3 most important rules to speaking caveman:
1.) Never speak in full sentences - keep it short and to the point
2.) Only use 1 syllable words when possible
3.) Always grunt or snort and laugh after you speak
I truly do enjoy our differences and even when it appears these cave boys will never learn proper english, they always surprise me. In fact, as I am writing this, one of my caveboys just used the word "redundant" - in a complete sentence even! I am so proud of him!
Oh, I'll have to try that with my son! It seems that everything I say to him is met with the response, "What?" Usually if I say nothing for a second, he says, "Oh" or "OK," but sometimes he just doesn't get it.
Need Speak Cave Talk
:-)
Karen
I have 4 boys (and 1 girl) and when I read this post I immediately related. Thank you for the short lesson in cave--speak. I think you should write a curriculum manual for us moms to learn the proper ettiquette of this informal language so that we get it right and our little cave men will be able to understand what we have been trying to tell them all along!
-Brenda in FL
Thanks for visiting my blogdom. I can really relate to your post. Lately, I've been annoyed with repeating myself so I am experiencing parrot talk in my home. Clean your room! Clean your room! 10 min. later. Clean your room! Clean your room! Ugh! So annoying!
I have a much greater number of girls than boys so haven't quite needed to learn caveman yet...I'll start brushing up on it though just incase :-)
Thanks for stopping by my blog the other day. I haven't been over here for sometime and just browsed back a bit. You have a wealth of information here! Thanks. I've now added you to my RSS so I don't miss another post :-)
My son loves journals. My plan was to make drawing journals but I couldnt find small enough notebooks with blank pages.....I was in a crunch time so I didnt shop around either!!
I do not know about grunting or snorting... for me at least!
You do have an inkling of what dudes are all about!
:)
Just checking in.
I have not been to HSB much lately at all.
My family has been hit with a really bad thing- an attack from satan- and I have been out of the loop in just about every area of my life.
"Huh?" must be the single most uttered syllable to leave the mouths of my boys. Even if we are in a quiet room with no distractions and eye contact, it will still come out of them. Maybe it's because Mommy is wordy and I need to a little more to-the-point. Anyway, very funny!
I also noticed that you use Tapestry. We have just started looking into it for the reasons you stated in your post "It's all about God." Can you please give me a little insight into it. How has it been working, and does it keep the boys' attention? We've been using mostly ABeka texts so far, and my 7yo son is miserable most days.
LOL! My dh laughed at me the first time I gave commands like that (minus the grunt)...but it works! :-) I am glad I am not the only one who had to learn a new language to speak to my boys.
Thanks for stopping by my blog...have a blessed day,
Tammy
Thankfully you have a blog so you can communicate in complete and interesting sentences with other females of the species! Otherwise, you might get a little . . . well, wonky when you couldn't verbalize yourself in an appropriate venue. LOL!! Great post! :D
Glad to see I'm not the only one to resort to the caveman speak! My 8 yo son drives me batty sometimes with the "Huh, what did you say? What do you want me to do? Oh, you told me to ___? I didn't hear you!"
Thanks for stopping by my blog, by the way! You left my 100th comment - seemed like a milestone minute to me! My husband actually designed my template...I love what he did with it, but need to have him update the pictures he used - the boys have grown up quite a bit since those were taken a year ago! I love your template, too - very fun!
We are a homeschooling family raising 4 boys in Virginia. This blog is mostly about anything relevant to raising boys or homeschooling in general - but every once in a while I can't help but add some nonsense from our daily life.
! 
Posted by
Posted by
Anonymous 
Posted by
Posted by
Posted by
Posted by
Posted by
Posted by
Posted by
Apr. 9, 2008 - Untitled Comment
Need Speak Cave Talk
:-)
Karen