This week has been spent culling the collection of books in our school’s library. It is a challenging job, especially for people who love books. Each book has its merits – one harder to part with than the next. You can tell so much about our library by the books in the collection. Some draw us in more than others. One of the sections I loved looking at was the books that have word play as the theme. Among the dictionaries, thesauruses and other reference materials, one can also find idioms and books about alternate uses of language or words.
From children’s books about the character Amelia Bedelia who makes a sponge cake with a kitchen sponge or pitches a tent by throwing (or pitching) it in the woods, to the book for older children Eats, Shoots and Leaves about misplaced punctuation changing the meaning of a phrase, these books are a delight for those who love words.
As children grow, they learn to speak, to read and to make meaning of language; as it become increasingly complex, mistakes are made. They repeat what they think they heard and what makes sense to them, only to have adults chuckle at their misunderstanding. Language takes a lifetime to develop. At WMS, we focus on language development from the earliest ages when toddlers are mimicking sounds, to rhyming words with primary and elementary students and laughing along with children as they begin to “get” words’ double meanings and play with words and their usage.
They’re all ears!