[jxjnskkzxxhx]

It makes my blood boil that my kid comes from the nursery saying things like "I did an ouchie". Kids don't naturally speak like this, they are taught like this. He's 3. At home he speaks his parents languages and he sounds like a 5 year old because we don't dumb it down for him. In English he sounds like every other English 3 year old in the nursery.

[dismalaf]

As someone who has a 2.5 year old learning multiple languages, I think a problem with English is that it's very verbose; we use full sentences to express things that can be expressed in other languages with only 1-2 words. And of course shorter sentences are easier for children as there's less grammar to be learned.

And specifically for expressing you hurt yourself, we teach children to express that they're hurt far earlier than they learn actual speech. So from ~1 we teach them to say "Ow" (or some variation), but then the words change from that to "hurt", and into a full sentence "I hurt myself", which is also redundant (myself and I imply the same thing, so why do we use both in that sentence in English?).

Anyhow just a thought as I'm feeding my son breakfast. "Would you like some breakfast" in English turns into 2 words in his second language.

[elgenie]

Your understanding of how formality levels in English function is perhaps not entirely complete: native speakers of English convey usually convey the sentiment with as little as "Breakfast?" or "Hungry?" when talking with family. In the child's second language, would the maitre'd at the restaurant of a fine hotel ask a two word question, or rather bury those in respectful filler?

"Ow" and friends, by the way, are interjections to express sudden pain, functioning analogously to an adult's swearing. They're not full sentences about the pain and its source.

[dismalaf]

> Your understanding of how formality levels in English function is perhaps not entirely complete: native speakers of English convey usually convey

It's kind of hilarious that you assume I'm not a native English speaker because I speak more languages... I'm a native English speaker who just happens to have grown up with 2 other languages and have a wife that speaks 4+ languages. On top of that I've taken a bunch of university level English courses.

Yes, I'm aware that people shorten sentences into statements when speaking to those they're familiar with. I do it as well.

Here's a thought experiment:

- If a toddler speaks in short statements it's "baby talk"

- If an immigrant speaks in short statements it's "broken English"

- If a native speaker speaks in short statements it's vernacular or slang

Or:

- If a toddler makes up words it's "baby talk"

- If an immigrant makes up words they're uneducated

- If a native speaker makes up words it's a dialect

[elgenie]

Most of those incorrectly use the linguistic terminology (in particular, "dialect", "baby talk", "slang") but, yes, congratulations on discovering that context plays a role in communication.

[dismalaf]

Ah so you want to be snarky to try assert intellectual superiority but actually have nothing to say. Gotcha.

[deadbabe]

I don’t get it, you can’t just ask “want breakfast?”

[dismalaf]

You can and you do but it sounds "babyish". That's my point. Whereas in some other languages it's idiomatic.

[dgfitz]

I think you’re overthinking it. I’ve been talking to my kids like they’re just normal people since they were born.

“Oh how old are they, 5? Nope, just turned 3. They speak so well!” shrug

The second language must be biasing you somehow, it’s not hard to talk to your kids.

[dismalaf]

It's not about how I talk to my kid; he's picking up 2 languages just fine (trying a third but I'll admit I'm slacking a little on that one).

It's about the perception of how children speak in English.

[dgfitz]

> The second language must be biasing you somehow

[thfuran]

"Would you like some breakfast" isn't quite so overly wordy that I'd say it sounds unnatural, but it absolutely is not the bare minimum for idiomatic English.

"Do you want breakfast?" is perfectly grammatical, and "Want breakfast?" would be a totally normal phrasing, even if some might argue that eliding the subject isn't technically correct.

[Izkata]

There's even the in-between "You want breakfast?" that relies on the tonal shift at the end of the sentence used for questions.

[bongodongobob]

No it doesn't. I don't ask my colleague "Would you care to go to the bar and drink a beer after work?" I say "Grab a beer later?" As does every other normal person I know. "Get lunch?" Etc.

[deadbabe]

Even “Lunch?” is enough with someone you know well.

[ikanreed]

And preschool teachers talk this way because they're desperately afraid of hurting parents' feelings

[andrepd]

I really think baby talk is a phenomenon that pre-dates helicopter parenting

[bombcar]

Baby Todd is a real phenomenon caused by kids not being able to say complex words. You want to say those complex words to them and they will repeat them back and they may make a baby version of it which is fine but it’s good to for you to keep using the complex words and the correct pronunciation so they learn.

Every one of my kids has a name that is hard for a baby to pronounce so they have a baby nickname, but we let them grow out of it.

[phatfish]

I blame Ms Rachel.

[uoaei]

Please don't inflame these otherwise reasonable comment sections with low effort culture war rhetoric.

[DiggyJohnson]

How does this have anything to do with the culture war? This is just a discussion of culture and how its changing unrelated to what you are referring to.

[uoaei]

Do you even understand the argument being made by the person I was replying to?

[bongodongobob]

It's true though. Talk to any teacher or childcare provider.

[uoaei]

I'm not denying the phenomenon exists. But to try to say that adults would be upset if teachers spoke to their children like they weren't developmentally challenged is completely ridiculous.

[watwut]

It is just a different sound for the same thing. There is nothing dumber about "I did an ouchie" then "I got hurt". Ouchie is more infantile, but not stupider.

[sorcerer-mar]

"I did [a noun]" is 'stupider', i.e. not grammatically correct English, i.e. a formulation that people will look down on you for using as you age. Sometimes you have to teach children things they'll eventually have to unlearn, but this is not one of those occasions.

[dragonwriter]

“I did [a noun]” is grammatically correct English object-verb-direct-object sentence structure.

Depending on the noun, it may not the most idiomatic way of expressing the sentiment it intends to communicate, but that is a different issue. (On the other hand, idiom is context dependent, and the objection here seems to be that it is idiomatic in at least one context, but that people prefer that children exclusively learn some other preferred idiom. But if you don't have this diversity, children don't get to learn and practice context switching as early, and that's an important skill, too.)

[sorcerer-mar]

Please provide examples

[losvedir]

Off the top of my head:

* I did a puzzle.

* I did a bad thing.

* I did a backflip.

Or, since this is just normal English, it's exactly the kind of thing that ChatGPT is good at, so here's a dozen more examples if you want: https://chatgpt.com/share/67e6d457-5ff4-8002-a5c7-15040f3d22... .

[sorcerer-mar]

Ah yes, "I did a [thing that a person performs or does]" is valid.

Is "an ouchie" a thing that someone performs or does?

[carom]

>“I did [a noun]” is grammatically correct English object-verb-direct-object sentence structure.

I'm going to need some examples here because I'm filling in nouns to that structure and it does not sound correct. "I did [a] water." Huh?

[stonemetal12]

"I did a runner" British idiom means I ran away without paying. The only problem with "I did a water" is I don't know what "a water" is without context. If person A said "I did a shot" and person B said "I did a water", it would make perfect sense.

[thfuran]

I can't offhand think of a case where that construction is appropriate for a noun that isn't a nominalized verb.

[RandallBrown]

I did a dance.

I did a presentation.

[sorcerer-mar]

So things that people do, of which "ouchies" is not

[quesera]

I did art. I did postgrad. I did work(n). I did dishes. I did Paris. I did the walls, but hired someone who did the roof.

Not idiomatic for all nouns, esp those for which there's a more applicable verb.

[thanatropism]

"1;

[zdragnar]

Well, it is grammatically wrong.