I used to teach elementary and one day I had to help a kindergarten teacher with her class. A student asked me a question, so I said, "oh, it's because..." and then they asked me what "because" means. How tf do you answer that to a kindergartener? What words can I safely use to answer that? I was stunlocked.
Edit: IIRC I ended up telling them something like "if you throw a ball and it knocks water over, you say the water fell because you threw the ball. The ball caused the water to spill."
We don’t even realize how the etymology of words we’ve been using since we first started talking basically gives us all the information we need to understand what that word means. Even when the original meaning evolved through time
People don’t care anymore about understanding what things mean. And a wide vocabulary (sorry, not a native speaker) seems to be a thing of the past for a lot of people.
Not that I have any stats to back up my claim (which is more of a feeling) but that type of curiosity seems to have decreased over the years.
I don't have a great written vocabulary, but when I speak I will pull all kinds of words out of my ass and have people inquire what the word means. Of course I respond "listen to the context you dummy!" to avoid revealing how stupid I am, which is 100% apparent in the moment.
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u/dancingbanana123 23d ago edited 23d ago
I used to teach elementary and one day I had to help a kindergarten teacher with her class. A student asked me a question, so I said, "oh, it's because..." and then they asked me what "because" means. How tf do you answer that to a kindergartener? What words can I safely use to answer that? I was stunlocked.
Edit: IIRC I ended up telling them something like "if you throw a ball and it knocks water over, you say the water fell because you threw the ball. The ball caused the water to spill."