Author: dogtrax

(Collection of invented words submitted this year to the Crazy Collaborative Dictionary project)

I admit: Out of curiosity, I fell into the trap of asking Claude to analyze a project that I have overseen for more than 20 years, with my sixth graders inventing new words.

This Crazy Collaborative Dictionary project — which I have written about before — had been part of an inquiry into the Origins of the English Language until this past school year, when we moved to a new district curriculum and my independence was a bit curtailed. But I did find time to get my kids to submit words this year, anyway. And now that I am retired from teaching, this year is the last year of this project.

You can view an archive of the dictionary project here: https://dogtraxwrites.com/crazy-collaborative-dictionary-project-archive/

I asked Claude to do a deep dive and analyze any threads that seemed interesting. Here is it’s response, with a note that the byebyebyebye word is actually mine, not one by a student.

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What a treasure trove. I’ve read deeply through the archive now, and there’s a lot to unpack across ~1,400 words spanning 2005–2026. Here’s what jumps out:

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The Big Picture: What Are Kids Actually Doing?

Students are operating in a handful of recurring creative modes, often without knowing it. These aren’t random — they’re predictable cognitive moves that tell you a lot about how children this age process and play with language.

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1. Backwards Words as a Word-Making Strategy

There’s a striking cluster of words formed by simply reversing a real word. Students have independently rediscovered this trick across multiple years:

• Cisum (2005) — music
• Ecnad (2006) — dance
• Elppa (2005) — apple
• Ahsatan (2006) — dreaming (natasha? a name reversed?)
• Ailuj, Airotciv, Acituan — likely names backwards (Julia, Victoria, Naticia)
• Eciuj (2017) — juice
• Elgoog (2016) — Google (meaning “to find something that was lost”)
• Licnep (2017) — pencil
• Drawkcabology (2013) — “the study of backwards writing” (meta!)
• Esrever (2025) — reverse
• Esrohdnilb (2025) — blind horse backwards
• Dniwer (2025) — rewind

What’s lovely is that Drawkcabology is a student naming the very thing they’re all doing — and then there’s Esrever (2025) and Dniwer (2025) appearing decades later, suggesting this is a strategy students figure out independently every generation, not just from seeing prior examples.

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2. The Taxonomy of Imaginary Diseases

Roughly 15–20% of all entries are invented diseases, conditions, and phobias. Kids are particularly drawn to this form — perhaps because a disease feels authoritative, like something you’d really find in a dictionary. The conditions tend to fall into sub-categories:

Silly physical conditions:

• Fohan (2009) — a foot where your hand should be and vice versa
• Fingerlashitis (2019) — fingernails become eyelashes and vice versa
• Annahypoism (2015) — makes you hyper until you die
• Globeitis (2021) — hives if you go near a globe

Behavioral compulsions:

• MicMonic (2010) — makes you sing really loud in the shower
• Googleitis (2019) — asking all problems on Google
• Squishmania (2019) — addicted to squishies
• Fortnitephymonia (2024) — addicted to Fortnite

Portmanteau fears (phobias):

• Clownophobia (2007), Scabiphobia (2008), Dannydevitoyeetusphobia (2022), Thanksphobia (2023), Flak-o-phobia (2023)

The phobia entries in particular show kids learning Latin/Greek suffix patterns and having tremendous fun with them. Dannydevitoyeetusphobia (the fear of Danny DeVito throwing you off a cliff) is essentially perfect.

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3. Hybrid Animals: The Dominant Creature-Making Formula

Combining two animals is one of the most popular invention strategies, appearing in every year:

• Monkey + giraffe → Bailmonkraffe (2009)
• Dog + bear → Abermama (2008)
• Bunny + hamster → Bunster (2016)
• Cat + dog → Cog (2015), Conoge (2011)
• Cow + turtle → Cowtle (2008)
• Mermaid + pig → Merpig (2007)
• T-rex + elephant → Rexephant (2017)
• Monkey + elephant → Monkphant (2015)

There’s even a multi-combo: Flabberdootle (2012) — a platypus, walrus, dragon, and alligator. The biological creativity here is unbounded. Students instinctively understand that portmanteau names signal hybrid concepts.

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4. The Food Combination Obsession

Food mashups are a perennial favorite, reflecting what sixth graders think about constantly:

• Chaksta (2011) — chocolate pasta
• Pizpie (2014) — pizza + pie
• Spash (2010) — spaghetti + squash
• Paffle (2014) — pancake or waffle (brilliant in its simplicity — the choice is the concept)
• Panaffle (2017) — pancake + waffle (solved it)
• Sproke (2016) — Sprite + Coke
• Nachochino / Cropachino (2009) — nacho/corn-flavored coffee
• Cogurt (2018) — cold yogurt
• Colup (2018) — cold soup
• Graple (2010) — grape + apple

The coffee variations in 2009 are particularly funny as a cluster — likely the same class exploring a theme together.

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5. Technology as a Mirror of the Times

The dictionary functions like a cultural time capsule of what technology meant to kids in each era:

• 2005–2007: Dulope (talking elevator), Lolet (robot that does homework), Krowemohbot (homework robot), Homebot (household robot) — the robot fantasy is dominant
• 2008–2010: Smada (person on computer 24/7), Intie (a small internet), Stavico (watching television)
• 2011–2013: Gumputer (computer made of gum), Chucksterpod (throwing your iPod at a wall)
• 2014–2018: Facebook (reading a book close to your face), references to iPhones
• 2019–2022: Cellfish (talking on the phone), Clickshen (clicking too many things)
• 2023–2026: Fortnite appears seven times — Allfortniter, Etintrof, Fortnitephymonia, Fortsests, Bughady, Rorage (Roblox raging), Skibidisymdrome — the full internet meme era arrives

The word Antiphonism appears in both 2006 (“against phones”) and 2019 (“against listening to sound”) — independently coined, same concept, showing how phone anxiety spans generations but shifts meaning.

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6. The “-ology” Suffix as a Joke Vehicle

Students love constructing fake academic disciplines. The longer and more absurd, the better:

• Clapology (2012) — the study of clapping
• Hyperscriptpsychology (2007) — the study of excitedly writing about the mind and soul
• Drawkcabology (2013) — the study of backwards writing
• Micropsychism (2018) — small mind full of mischief
• Pieology (2015) — the study of pie
• Redlabibology (2017) — the study of horses and ponies
• Microgreekotallapedology (2017) — the study of tall-footed, small Greeks
• Geoultrathermalologists (2010) — people who study high ground temperatures
• Polymicrogeobibliology (2007) — study of many small earth books

The longer the chain of Greek/Latin roots, the more authoritative it sounds, and students have clearly absorbed this from school. Some of these are nearly indistinguishable from real scientific terms.

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7. Body-Function Combo Words: A Proud Tradition

This is consistent across every single year of the archive. The body-function portmanteau never dies:

• Canese (2006) — cough + sneeze
• Blurk (2005) — burp while talking
• Shusam (2005) — burp + hiccup
• Hiccsnbow (2010) — sneeze + burp + hiccup + throwing up simultaneously
• Cwong (2012) — cough + yawn
• Chekeeza (2019) — cough + wheeze
• Snart (2017) — sneeze + fart
• Burart (2017) — burp + fart
• Burpsnurt (2017) — burp + fart + sneeze
• Snoughip (2017) — sneeze + cough + hiccup
• Bombomclap (2026) — fart + burp + sneeze simultaneously

The 2017 cohort in particular seems to have had a very enthusiastic body-function era. And Bombomclap in 2026 suggests the tradition is alive and well 21 years later.

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8. The “Falling” Cluster

A disproportionate number of words describe the specific act of falling, tripping, or failing to maintain balance — possibly reflecting a universal sixth-grade preoccupation with awkwardness and embarrassment:

• Abamao (2012) — tripping for no reason and being congratulated
• Cabooble (2013) — fall or trip over air
• Flofing (2011) — falling for no reason
• Flurble (2006) — running into walls or windows
• Tripoozle (2015) — tripping over nothing (you then test that gravity is working)
• Norasticously (2017) — tripping over nothing
• Lamo (2018) — tripping and falling out the window
• Nave (2012) — trip over shoelace and face-plant
• Remmihs (2015) — slipping, falling, hitting your head

The specificity is wonderful. Tripoozle in particular has a whole epistemological theory built in — when you trip over nothing, the rational response is to run a gravity check.

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9. Words That Reinvent Real Words (Often Unknowingly)

Some of the invented words have real counterparts in other languages or dialects, which students would have no way of knowing:

• Bloke (2007) — “a person acting silly or weird” — already British English for “a guy”
• Jank (2009) — “stupid; unfair” — this is actual contemporary slang (students may have been ahead of mainstream usage)
• Meh (2012) — “expressing feelings of disturbance” — already in wide use
• Liger (2007) — “a lion and tiger mixed that hops” — already the real word for that hybrid
• Ginormous (2023) — already a widely-used portmanteau of “gigantic” and “enormous”
• Funner (2013, 2016) — coined twice by different cohorts; this is an ongoing grammar debate

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10. The Meta-Dictionary Entry

The most delightful single entry may be:

Byebyebyebye (2026) — Words spoken out loud by an ELA teacher who is retiring from Norris Elementary School.

That’s the students writing the teacher into the dictionary. The whole 21-year project folded into one word, timestamped at the end.

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A Few Closing Observations

The emotional range is narrow but deep. Most words cluster around: confusion, falling, hybrid creatures, food, and body functions. Very few words address sadness, longing, love, or fear in earnest — though Unselfdeplira (2014) (“unable to be yourself around others because you’re scared you won’t be perfect”) is a quietly profound exception.

The very long words are a consistent power move. From Aheolaphoalamprosolpooslopeleroadeasoloper (2005) to Aacklewakleshmaklebaitmatefaitnatelateinforintilkjghipikoplintinbinlintfingibblesssshintin (2026), kids have always understood that a word’s length can itself be a joke. The latter means simply “hi.”

Drow gets reinvented independently in 2005, 2014, and 2023 — three different students, three different years, the same word (“being asked a question you can’t answer” vs. “saying a word backwards”). The archive is full of these quiet collisions.

What a project. Two decades of sixth-graders trying to make language, and in doing so, making a pretty good record of what it felt like to be eleven.

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I enjoyed this analysis, more than I should have, perhaps. Claude went in directions I hadn’t even thought of.

Peace (make the word true),
Kevin