Jonathan's special
vocabulary
at almost
four year
of age,
Jonathan is
inventing new
forms and
you words,
as is
typical of
children his
age. Working
with two
languages is
proving a challenge
and his
tendency to
swallow words
is not
helping, the
result, however,
can be
interesting. I tried
to document
the best.
pippopotam (instead of
hippopotam) = hippopotamus
jrefy = tom
and jerry
asati (instead of
asiti) = I made/
I did
shatati (instead of
shatiti) = I
drank
[caused by the
basic form of first
past tense in Hebrew]
tiftoach (instead of
tiftach/tiftechi)= (you) open
(something) - [caused
by the infinitive
form of Liftoach]
ventich (instead of
sandwitch)
Legamer (insteadof
ligmor)=
finish
Ani Mizaher (instead
of ani nizhar) =
I am being careful
Ani micanes (instead of ani nichnas)=I am coming in/entering
hasfaka (instaed of
hafsaka)=pause/break, masfik instead of maspik (enough) or mafsik (stop)
lehasfik m(instead
of lahfsik)
=to stop
feifeifiya – instrad
of yefeifiya (beautiful
female)
podcorn – instead of popcorn
clay mobile – instead of Playmobile (Kelim means tools in
Hebrew, I wonder if this is just a phonetic mistake or a logic mistake)
I have a sensible idea…”Yesh Li Raayon Hegyoni” – his
opening sentence for special requests or a starting point for negotiating his
wishes
Aval Ima! But mommy – his opening statement when
explaining or negotiating (usually after I said no to somthing)
in German all
gets the addition of
“ein” - even though
verbs are not supposed
to get
it this prefix at
all:
Ein-tanzen=to dance
Ein-trinken = to
drink
Ein-knoepfen= to press
(a button) – this one
is an entirely new
creation based on
the noun Knopf (button
in German) and refers
to using a vending
machine to buy
a drink or a
snack.
Ein kitzel = to tickle
kikminchen = kikaninchen (kika +kaninchen)
ich hab dich lieb- gam du – interesting sentence structure
and mixing a bit of Hebrew in too (gam=also)
fe-fau-de: instead of de-fau-de – DVD in german
birthsteg – a mix between the English birthday and the
german geburtstag…
When Jonathan is
not able to use
words, he still knows
how to help himself
to communication. In
our recent summer holiday
in Germany, visiting family
and friends, when facing
the need to request
a pair of scissors
in German and not
knowing the word,
after he expressed
the wish in Hebrew
once and saw no
reaction from a
German speaking friend, he
pulled on the friend's
sleeve and with his
hand showed her the
action of cutting (using
two fingers in a
V shape and opening
and closing them, like
scissors).
He likes to do pantomime on a daily basis even at home.
Making sucking sounds and demonstrating drinking in order to ask that I assist
him in making a drink (June 2012).
