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Dec. 6th, 2011 09:36 pmI have mad street cred with 11-year-old boys on account of Knowing Things. Sample conversations:
Me: What's different between comic strips and short stories?
Boy: Comic strips have colour!
Me: Usually, yep! But not all the time. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle comics are black and white.
Boy (in hushed, awed tone): That's true!
Other conversation:
Me: I really like computer games. Right now I'm into Plants Vs. Zombies.
Boy 1: Do you play Black Ops?
Boy 2: Don't be silly, she wouldn't play that.
(At this point, I'm ready to gently correct the theory that girls don't play military-themed computer games, because boy, do they ever.)
Boy 2 (continuing): Black Ops sucks. Miss Emily* plays cool games.
*snicker*
We also talked about root words - they knew about cardio exercise, so I gave them a bunch of words with "cardio" in them and showed that they all talked about the heart. Minds were blown, I tells ya. BLOWN.
*A lot of people at that school use their surnames, but my mother is a regular substitute teacher there, and I figured it would be confusing if there were TWO Ms. F------s. Besides, I've never been called "Ms. Surname" to my face. I'd get really confused.
Me: What's different between comic strips and short stories?
Boy: Comic strips have colour!
Me: Usually, yep! But not all the time. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle comics are black and white.
Boy (in hushed, awed tone): That's true!
Other conversation:
Me: I really like computer games. Right now I'm into Plants Vs. Zombies.
Boy 1: Do you play Black Ops?
Boy 2: Don't be silly, she wouldn't play that.
(At this point, I'm ready to gently correct the theory that girls don't play military-themed computer games, because boy, do they ever.)
Boy 2 (continuing): Black Ops sucks. Miss Emily* plays cool games.
*snicker*
We also talked about root words - they knew about cardio exercise, so I gave them a bunch of words with "cardio" in them and showed that they all talked about the heart. Minds were blown, I tells ya. BLOWN.
*A lot of people at that school use their surnames, but my mother is a regular substitute teacher there, and I figured it would be confusing if there were TWO Ms. F------s. Besides, I've never been called "Ms. Surname" to my face. I'd get really confused.
