robin marcoccia

I feel the need to weigh in on this from a few different fronts. This hits
close to home, for my husband thinks that this is acceptable. He grew up
idolizing the dictionary and somehow feels that by being made to look up
words, my kids will share his love of the book.
I, on the otherhand, liken the situation to how we would treat our spouses
or friends if they asked what something meant. Would we tell them "look it
up!'? What if we were travelling in a foreign land and needed assistance
with a sign or menu, and the person who we asked , noticing or phrasebook,
said "look it up!". Aside from the obvious rudeness of it, aren't we trying
to help our kids understand the world, enjoy their reading, etc.? I know
that if I'm reading and I come across a word I'm unfamiliar with I'll guess
at it's meaning and continue on. If I'm REALLY interested I'll look it up
later.
Ultimately we're here to help our kids out, not put roadblocks in their
path. It's easy enough to show them the dictionary and how it's used,
trusting that if they wanted to look up a word ( or were able) they would.
But in my humble opininion asking for a definition is no different than
asking for a glass of milk, I'd rather furnish it lovingly than telling them
to get it themselves.

Robin
Ma to ds Luca ,5.5, and dd Lillian, 3.5----- Original Message -----

Daniel MacIntyre

The way I see it, telling a child "Look it up" is equivalent to saying
"that information isn't important enough for me to waste my time on it
- go waste your own time finding it out."

However, "I'm not sure - let's look it up!" has an entirely different meaning.

On 9/20/05, robin marcoccia <randrs01@...> wrote:
> I feel the need to weigh in on this from a few different fronts. This hits
> close to home, for my husband thinks that this is acceptable. He grew up
> idolizing the dictionary and somehow feels that by being made to look up
> words, my kids will share his love of the book.
> I, on the otherhand, liken the situation to how we would treat our spouses
> or friends if they asked what something meant. Would we tell them "look it
> up!'? What if we were travelling in a foreign land and needed assistance
> with a sign or menu, and the person who we asked , noticing or phrasebook,
> said "look it up!". Aside from the obvious rudeness of it, aren't we trying
> to help our kids understand the world, enjoy their reading, etc.? I know
> that if I'm reading and I come across a word I'm unfamiliar with I'll guess
> at it's meaning and continue on. If I'm REALLY interested I'll look it up
> later.
> Ultimately we're here to help our kids out, not put roadblocks in their
> path. It's easy enough to show them the dictionary and how it's used,
> trusting that if they wanted to look up a word ( or were able) they would.
> But in my humble opininion asking for a definition is no different than
> asking for a glass of milk, I'd rather furnish it lovingly than telling them
> to get it themselves.
>
> Robin
> Ma to ds Luca ,5.5, and dd Lillian, 3.5----- Original Message -----
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> Yahoo! Groups Links
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>


--
Daniel
(Amy is doing a half marathon for Team in Training
Anyone who wants to help can do so by going to:
http://www.active.com/donate/fundraise/tntgmoAMacint )

Donald and Sandra Winn

Remember me the what if they go to the "k" section for
Cat. LOL Today my children and I played scrabble and
we played it the way that my mom and I did and still
do. We don't play "challenge", we look up in the
Scrabble dictionary to see if we can find words. This
drives my hubby insane and he will not play with me
because I know words that start with "Q" and have not
the "u". Anyway, too funny. My 7yo dd said, "Mom,
can I spell "k-a-t", I said "I don't know. Let me look
it up here in the Scrabble dictionary." Sure enough
there is "k-a-t" meaning an evergreen shrub! Who'd
have known? My 11yo ds said, "Yeah, now when someone
says 'Hey, whats up Cat' you can say, you mean the
animal or the shrub?"

Okay, well not hysterical but it put a smile on my
face and we had a ball doing "spelling/vocabulary"
today. :-)

~Sandy Winn





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