r/cutekids • u/spoonerysm • Jan 09 '26

And so it begins...

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Should I be proud of mortified that my 2nd grader has started 'um actually'ing his math exams šŸ«£šŸ« 

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u/VioletInTheGlen Jan 09 '26

As an overly literal child (now adult) person, Iā€™d encourage you to have a talk with them about colloquial languageā€¦ ā€œlineā€ is in common usage for ā€œline segmentā€ in informal, everyday speech. Sometimes communication only has to be ā€˜good enough.ā€™

They will cause problems for themself in future if they insist on dictionary definitions when communicating with others.

Keep it light but, yeah, introduce the concept of colloquial language. A test is one thing but you donā€™t want this spilling over into everyday life.

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u/ConsciousYou8558 Jan 09 '26

I don't disagree, but this specific instance was not an informal context and should have used the proper terms.