Are You Smarter Than A Five-Year Old?

Paraphrase of a conversation with Wesley on the way home from school yesterday:

Me: "When we get home, I want you to make sure you get all of your things out of the car. You are in charge of that."

Wes: "Mommy, in charge means the same thing as responsible."

Me: "Yes, that's true."

Wes: "We can just use the word responsible because I know what that means. Today we learned about empathy at school."

Me: "Really, what is empathy?"

Wes: "Empathy means, 'I know how you feel.'"

At Wesley's school, students can earn tickets by exhibiting behaviors that display any of these 12 (see above) encouraged attitudes. They are also learning the meanings of all of these words. I was only a little surprised to notice that responsibility was not on the list.