#sol23 March 14 "Pipe" Cleaners

"These are the pipe cleaner crafts my students made," she shared proudly on social media.  The creations were indeed beautiful and I can imagine the 5th graders having as much fun as my much younger grandchildren who craft pipe cleaners into bridges and string pipe cleaners with beads.

I smiled remembering a conversation with a grandchild about pipe cleaners not long ago. "How can these clean pipes," he asked clearly thinking of his own schema. It took me a moment to understand his very fair question!  

Well, I responded taking note of the name on the package, they are actually called chenille sticks, but long ago.....

"I get it," that is too hard to say, "so we call them a shorter name."

I was going to tell him about people smoking and cleaning pipes, in days long ago. I was going to tell him about how "old words" hang on even when they do not make sense.  I was going to tell him about about how words change over time. Then, I changed my mind as his explanation was just as good as mine. Someday, however, I may try to find that picture of my dad smoking a pipe.

Thanks to the Two Writing Teachers' SOL Writing Challenge for sponsoring this writing challenge and to MIF for a picture I grabbed from her site.