Get 'em While They're Young

I don't want to seem cruel, even if I am. This is a little something I found at the local 4-H fair a few weeks back:

We have to get them while they're young, people! This isn't simply a spelling matter, either; it's a matter of pride in doing your work well. It's a matter of teaching children that they should try to do things the right way and not just be "good enough." Reach for perfection even though you know you'll never achieve it. And, by Jove, look your projects over one last time before you turn them in!

Of course, experience counts for something. We learn from our mistakes, and this is the type of mistake that some (not me!) would describe using the execrable phrase "teachable moment."

I hope someone in this child's family teases this boy just a little bit about '"Untied Methodist." It won't take much for it to sink in permanently, and this child will never make this mistake again.

(In the same way that I will never again misspell gardener, the word that landed me in second place in my fifth-grade spelling bee. Alas, Lloyd Suh, you will always hold a dark place in my memory!)