Age Appropriate Language Quotes

Adults are interested if you don't play down to the little 2 or 3 year olds or talk down. I don't believe in talking down to children. I don't believe in talking down to any certain segment. I like to kind of just talk in a general way to the audience. Children are always reaching.

I have a friend called James who is in his 40s and he's still not allowed to swear in front of his mum. I find it strange that you can't be yourself and be open with the one person who brought you into this world.

Many adults play roles when they speak to young children. They use silly words and sounds. They talk down to the child. They don't treat the child as an equal. The fact that you temporarily know more, or you're bigger does not mean the child is not your equal.

I don't believe in condescending to children. I don't change any writing technique.

When doing family entertainment, you don't actually worry about kids. You know what you can't do. But in terms of sensibility and sophistication and wit and ambition, aim for your own taste level, and kids will - if they're interested in the subject matter - be glad that you did.

As an American roughly the same age as Barack Obama, I will not be ridiculed or reduced to a stereotype. I want to age appropriately.

Yes, OK, farty is a silly word. I wish I'd never used it. I'm 34. Perhaps it was a word for my 20s.

There are no taboos. Every topic is open, however shocking. It is the way that the topics are handled that's important, and that applies whether it is a 15-year-old who is reading your book or someone who is 55.

Never patronize a child.

If I can make one generalised statement, and generalised statements are never entirely true, nobody wants to be talked down to, kids included.

Writing for children, you do bear a responsibility to not include overt or graphic adult content that they are not ready for and don't need, or to address adult concepts or themes from an oblique angle or a child's limited viewpoint, with appropriate context, without being graphic or distressing.

If you talk to your friends the way your parents talk, they will think you are stiff and odd.

It seems to me that not only the writing in most children's books condescends to kids, but so does the art. I don't want to do that.

I abhor 'baby talk.' I speak to kids like I would any other person, and they seem to respond to it.

Children's authors don't talk down or patronise their younger readers.

You can call me an older woman - I don't mind that at all - just don't call me an old one, because I'm not.

There's a difference between children's literature and all-ages literature. One is written expressly for children. The other is written for everyone, including children. And the difference usually manifests in not talking down to kids.

My mother certainly never altered the topics of her conversation based on children being present.

I've seen a range of children's personalities, so it's easier to write about them without patronising them, I think.

Don't bother discussing sex with small children. They rarely have anything to add.

I don't like the idea of talking down to kids. I think I was talked down to, and you rebel against that.