fillers and fumbles

[Molly]

Is there really anyone who still believes that items such as you know, I mean, and oh are just fillers and fumbles?

[prezbucky]

At times they are fillers... fancier ways to say "um".

hehe

...there's a person here at work who constantly uses "you know".

"So, you know, we're, you know, going to have to, you know, think about this."

(not an exaggeration)

[Molly]

[prezbucky]

At other times they are functioning parts of a sentence:

-- You know that I love you.

-- See what I mean?

-- Where, oh where, are you tonight?

...they aren't always fillers.

Did someone way that this was their sole use?

[NinaZara]

I was taught that people say them because people don't close their mouth while they are thinking before saying something. Bad habit in public speaking.

[prezbucky]

yeah.

They are the sounds of cogitation. hehe

[NinaZara]

What a positive way to see it!

[prezbucky]

hehe

...just a neat way to say "think":

I cogitate
You cogitate
He/she cogitates
They cogitate
We cogitate

hehe

[NinaZara]

Oh, my. When I first replied, I was thinking of the word cognition, and it reminds me of "cognitive" the word I usually come across in scientific magazines. (To be fair it was 1 o'clock in the morning).

But really, do people really use the word like that?

I cogitate people don't use the word, I think.

[prezbucky]

Yeah, it's (cogitate) pretty rare.

My 6th-grade English teacher used it all the time. He was always using weird words -- I think he just wanted to help expand our vocabs.

He drilled us on the parts of speech using one root word: "boing".

As in "The boing boinged his boing in the boingdom."

lol

[NinaZara]

ROFL!

Can you tell me how old are kids in the 6th grade? I am only familiar with Standard 6 and 6th form, with the first indicating a 12 year old in his primary/elementary school and for the latter, an 18 year old in secondary school.

BTW, what do they mean? They sound funny though.

[prezbucky]

This is basically how it is in the States -- kids' ages at different grade levels. Since the school year is so long, I give the age most are when they start that school year and the year most are when the school year ends:

Kindergarten: Age 5-6
1st grade: 6-7
2nd grade: 7-8
3rd grade: 8-9
4th grade: 9-10
5th grade: 10-11
6th grade: 11-12
7th grade: 12-13
8th grade: 13-14

Then high school:
9th grade (freshman): 14-15
10th grade (sophomore): 15-16
11th grade (junior): 16-17
12th grade (senior): 17-18

And then it's on to college at the age of 18.

So I was 11 or 12 in 6th grade. My birthday is March 19, during the school year, so my age changed during the school year.

[NinaZara]

I see, so they are not that different, I think I can use 6th grade as the middle C to count, next time I come across this numbers. Thanks!

Maybe you didn't see my question before, (I edited my previous post), what does the boing expression mean?

[prezbucky]

I think he taught us using "boing" so that we'd learn the parts of speech based on their role in the sentence, not on our familiarity with the words themselves.

(hopefully that made some sort of sense. The truth is, I have no idea why he used boingish words)

[NinaZara]

When I first read it, I did this: The boring boringed his boring in the boringdom.

Tom, maybe he was trying to tell you he's bored.