Words are easily misunderstood when you haven’t learned to read yet or you’ve never seen them in print. For example, in the area where I grew up, the piece of furniture more commonly known as a dresser was called a “chest of drawers.” I misunderstood what it was called and believed well into my teens that it was a “chester drawers.” (If you’re familiar with Southern drawls, you can understand how “chest of” could morph into “chester.”)
My mistake seems funny now, but confusion over words isn’t always funny. People not yet fluent in a new language are prone to misunderstanding slang or idioms in that language, which can be embarrassing or stigmatizing. Misunderstanding words can also be a problem for people with impaired hearing. Misunderstood words can even be dangerous when they happen in the medical field.
I think that children appreciate stories about misunderstood words because they so often misunderstand words themselves. The stories help them see that they’re not the only ones who get confused by words. The books below are sure to tickle their funny bones (which is itself a phrase that could easily be misunderstood!).
Amelia Bedelia
By Peggy Parish
Illustrated by Fritz Siebel
Amelia Bedelia is one the literary characters most often associated with misunderstood words and phrases. Amelia first appeared in 1963 in Amelia Bedelia, the first of a series of books by Peggy Parish. In that book, Amelia is hired as a servant by Mr. and Mrs. Rogers. Mrs. Rogers gives Amelia a list of things to do while the couple are away. Before she starts her chores, Amelia bakes her new employers a lemon meringue pie as a surprise.
Amelia is puzzled by the items on her to-do list, but she does what she thinks she’s supposed to do. The list tells her to change the towels in the bathroom. They look fine to her, but she changes them by snipping holes in them. The list says to draw the drapes, so she sits down and makes a sketch of them. When the list says to put the lights out, she takes all the light bulbs outside and hangs them on a clothesline. She completes everything on the list by the time her employers return.
When Mrs. Rogers sees what Amelia has done, she is furious and wants to fire her. Then Mr. Rogers tastes the lemon meringue pie and has his wife try it, too. They decide that Amelia’s pie-baking skills far outweigh the mistakes she’s made. Mrs. Rogers will take more care in explaining what she wants done in the future.
The Amelia Bedelia stories have been charming young readers for decades, but there are mixed opinions about them among adults of the present day, especially the later books in the series. Some people believe that Amelia is autistic and that Mrs. Rogers’ behavior toward her is abusive. A newer version of the Amelia series has been written by Peggy Parrish’s nephew. In those books, Amelia is a child, and the adults in her life are patient and accepting of her misunderstandings. You can’t please everybody, of course, and some people think that the new version of the story removes the charm of the original.
I haven’t read all of the series, but as someone who can be quite literal-minded when it comes to idioms, I think the original Amelia Bedelia is hilarious. I understand why thousands of children have begged to have the story read to them again and again.
You can learn more about Peggy Parish here. More information about Fritz Siebel can be found here.
The Old Man & His Door
By Gary Soto
Illustrated by Joe Cepeda
The Old Man & His Door tells the story of an old man who doesn’t always pay attention to what his wife is telling him, especially when he’s busy in his garden or household chores. One day his wife leaves home to go to a barbecue. He doesn’t listen carefully to what she is saying because he is trying to give his dog a bath. His wife tells him to bring el puerco (or pig) to the barbecue, but he thinks she told him to bring a puerta (or door).
The man doesn’t understand why his wife wants him to bring a door to the party, but he dutifully unscrews a door from its hinges and sets off for the party. Along the way, he puts the door to good use over and over again. He uses it to play peek-a-boo with a crying baby. He hides under it when attacked by a swarm of bees. He lets a weary goose rest on it. He uses it as a raft to rescue a drowning boy. He uses it as a ramp to help load a piano into a truck.
The old man is very late for the barbecue, and his wife is very angry when she sees that he brought a door instead of a pig. The good-natured old man just laughs and shows her that he also brought some honey from the angry bees, an egg from the weary goose, a fish from the boy in the lake, and a watermelon from the man with the piano. He also gives her the kiss that he received from the baby.
The Old Man & His Door has all the elements of a perfect folktale, and Joe Cepeda’s illustrations, done in bold colors and strong shapes, are a perfect match for it.
You can learn more about Gary Soto here. More information about Joe Cepeda can be found here.
Pie
By Sarah Weeks
Pie, by Sarah Weeks, features fourteen (14!) pie recipes plus a cat named Lardo. How could it not be fun?
Alice Anderson’s Aunt Polly was a natural-born pie maker, and her pie-making skills put her hometown of Ipswitch, Pennsylvania, on the map. Her pies had won the coveted Blueberry medal for thirteen years in a row, and the resulting publicity brought a steady stream of tourists — and tourist dollars — to the town. Almost everyone appreciated the pie-induced prosperity her pies brought, but they appreciated her kindness and generosity even more. Polly Portman had put aside part of an inheritance for her living expenses and started her pie shop with the rest. She churned out a almost infinite variety of pies that she gave free of charge to anyone who wanted or needed one.
Everyone was shocked when Polly died, but Alice was truly heartbroken. Aunt Polly had been her favorite person in the world and the center of her life. Everyone was also shocked to learn that Polly had willed the pie shop to the minister of a local church, the recipe for her famous pie crust to her cat Lardo, and the cat to Alice.
Alice was actually scared of Lardo, a grouchy old cat prone to scratching and biting anyone except Aunt Polly, but she becomes his caretaker out of love for Polly. Meanwhile, almost everyone in town begins frantically baking pies in the hope of winning the next Blueberry, while a mystery person is bent on obtaining Aunt Polly’s recipe for pie crust, even if it means catnapping Lardo.
The quest to find Lardo and the pie crust recipe results in a series of madcap adventures for Alice and her new friend Charlie. The resolution involves a big misunderstanding of a word, the nature of which I can’t reveal, but I will say that it is hilarious and entirely satisfying.
You can learn more about Sarah Weeks here.
Miss Alaineus: A Vocabulary Disaster
By Debra Frasier
Sage’s misadventure with words begins when she misses school because of a cold. A friend calls her to tell her the 15 vocabulary words for the week. The friend doesn’t have time to spell the last word, which sounds like Miss Alaineus to Sage. Being sick in bed, Sage doesn’t take the time to look up the definition of Miss Alaineus in the dictionary.
Sage has a vague notion that Miss Alaineus must be the name of the woman on a box of spaghetti that her mother bought after saying she was needed to buy miscellaneous things for dinner.
The result is predictable: When asked to spell “miscellaneous” in class, Sage spells it the way she heard it over the phone and describes the woman on the box of spaghetti. Her classmates and the teacher burst into laughter. Sage is mortified, but she recovers quickly and decides to dress as Miss Alaineus in the school’s Vocabulary Parade, for which she wins a prize.
Debra Frasier uses many clever techniques to enliven the story, which is told in the first person. As Sage tells her story, she defines the words she uses. For example, she says, “I was devastated: wasted, ravaged. Ruined: destroyed. Finished: brought to an end.”
On the credits page, there is what looks like a reproduction of an actual handout with an assignment for extra credit. It asks students to go through the alphabet and write one sentence for each letter, using three words that begin with that letter in the sentence. The sentences that Sage writes are shown in a border around the page.
The illustrations look as though they were drawn by an elementary student with Magic Markers on lined notebook paper, which will make young readers feel right at home. The list of vocabulary words is printed in the handwriting of a young person.
Teachers love this book because it uses multiple clever techniques to teach vocabulary words. Students love it because it’s hilarious and because they can empathize with Sage’s embarrassment. The fact that she survives her vocabulary disaster and uses it in a positive way makes her a great role model for children and adults.
You can learn more about Debra Frasier here.
Word misunderstandings can be funny, but making fun of someone who misunderstands a word is never appropriate — especially not on social media sites, which can magnify the embarrassment a thousand times. I have a theory that they are funniest when we learn about them from a safe distance, such as when they happen in movies or books. Feel free to tell people about the woman who kept her clothes in a chester drawers. My embarrassment about that has long since faded.