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Literal thinking

NAS90001

Hi All, 

I am new here and looking for some advice as I am going crazy. My son is a sensitive wee soul and I think that he takes a lot of things to heart ( or personally). However the teachers at school see it as him taking things literally but I think these are completely different things - am I wrong ?

A few examples of them describing him as literal was 

He was helping the teacher and he made a mistake so she "jokingly" told him he was sacked and he got upset 

He once got upset before lunch the teacher asked him to wait in Class while she took the rest of class to lunch - she forgot about him and he sat there for the whole lunch . They said he just took it literally as no other kid would do this. 

Am I being stupid thinking these are not examples of literal thinking? 

He understands metaphors, the other day when we were in car there was a road sign which said roadworks ahead and he said "I sure hope it does" I panicked and asked him what meant "he said mum it's a joke - a play on the words" I feel like I am over analysing every small thing . 

Parents

  • I agree with you that the first thing about being 'sacked' may well just be an example of him being sensitive not literally believing he was sacked. You are probably the better judge of that as you know his personality better than his teachers. The second thing could be him taking the teacher too literally, but also, he was just doing what the teacher had told him and school usually encourages kids to take instructions literally so it makes sense why he would do that. (It's also hard for us judge without knowing exactly how it was phrased.)

    The roadworks joke sounds like the type of joke I used to make... My theory is that those of us who do quite literal thinking, enjoy this type of joke and wordplay in general because we have a more detailed focus on how letters, words and phrases are put together while other people usually ignore the components and only perceive the word/phrase as a whole. Focusing on individual parts of language doesn't mean that we don't understand metaphors, or compound words, it's just that it jumps out at us (not literally... ;) ) when a word/phrase has a literal interpretation as well as the conventional one. I have been told that I take things too literally sometimes. (For example, the phrase `it fell off the back of a lorry' confused me when I first heard it... now I find that very funny.) I think that this alternative perspective sometimes adds to the depth of appreciation we have for things like etymology, linguistics, and wordplay.

    I know that some poeple do have real difficulty with understanding non-literal language. I'm not trying to belittle that, I'm just saying that slightly literal thinking isn't such a bad thing.

Reply

  • I agree with you that the first thing about being 'sacked' may well just be an example of him being sensitive not literally believing he was sacked. You are probably the better judge of that as you know his personality better than his teachers. The second thing could be him taking the teacher too literally, but also, he was just doing what the teacher had told him and school usually encourages kids to take instructions literally so it makes sense why he would do that. (It's also hard for us judge without knowing exactly how it was phrased.)

    The roadworks joke sounds like the type of joke I used to make... My theory is that those of us who do quite literal thinking, enjoy this type of joke and wordplay in general because we have a more detailed focus on how letters, words and phrases are put together while other people usually ignore the components and only perceive the word/phrase as a whole. Focusing on individual parts of language doesn't mean that we don't understand metaphors, or compound words, it's just that it jumps out at us (not literally... ;) ) when a word/phrase has a literal interpretation as well as the conventional one. I have been told that I take things too literally sometimes. (For example, the phrase `it fell off the back of a lorry' confused me when I first heard it... now I find that very funny.) I think that this alternative perspective sometimes adds to the depth of appreciation we have for things like etymology, linguistics, and wordplay.

    I know that some poeple do have real difficulty with understanding non-literal language. I'm not trying to belittle that, I'm just saying that slightly literal thinking isn't such a bad thing.

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