This Preschooler's Phonetic Spelling Was Called "Dumb," but It's Actually Pretty Damn Smart

Bro I had to be the dumbest preschooler out there😐 pic.twitter.com/0AGIk1tBa9

— Sal Perez (@Sal_Perez4) May 19, 2018

While going through some old schoolwork, Sal Perez discovered a sheet of paper from his preschool years in which he drew out shapes and attempted to spell their names underneath. He shared a photo of the work to Twitter, claiming that he "had to be the dumbest preschooler out there," but as many Twitter users have pointed out, toddler Sal was actually pretty damn smart.

"Are you serious? This is amazing for a preschooler," one user wrote. "Even the handwriting is pretty good. Now if that were a second grader I'd be concerned, but holy heck, 'chriego' is an awesome spelling for 'triangle.'" A teacher replied, agreeing completely that for a preschooler, his handwriting was "killer," and a school psychologist weighed in on his spellings, saying she was impressed by his "very clear usage of phonetic spelling" at that age.

Because phonetic spelling is a written representation of how a word is pronounced, the fact that many of his letters aren't actually correct is irrelevant. If you sound out each of his spellings, it's clear that he was on the right track with each shape's name.

According to GreatSchools.org, "many students are in the phonetic stage by the end of kindergarten or the beginning of first grade." So as it turns out, toddler Sal was pretty ahead of the curve at this point in his educational career, earning gold sdrs and shining bright like a dimn.