Correcting People When They Talk – You Knew What I Meant!

We had someone over the house recently who was correcting one of my children. Correcting them in a way that we just don’t correct people around here. If someone is telling a story and they misspeak, I almost never bring it to their attention. The only time I do is when I need clarification. If a mistake happens to come to the speaker’s attention, I quickly respond with, “No worries, I know what you meant, go on…” For example, multiple ‘funner(s)’ are used by the kids before we respond with a quick, “Oh yeah, you mean ‘more fun—that sounds like you had a real blast, honey.” And we leave it at that.

Since I was a little girl, nothing fires me up more than someone being made to feel bad. My passion around this topic must stem from struggling with reading aloud in class as a child. All the little comments I could hear around the room from my classmates made me feel so small—it was horrible. 

I understand that one of my jobs as a mother is to be a teacher, I’m just choosing to teach my children that mistakes almost never matter. What matters is that I don’t let my ego get in the way of an exchange with another human being. My being right is never more important than someone else being heard.