There was that big stink just before school started about whether kids could listen to their president speak to them. Apparently he was going to indoctrinate the impressionable little children with a socialist agenda.

After people read the text of the speech and found out he was just telling kids to study hard, they calmed down a little. We parents duly received our opt-out forms, and the kids got to hear his speech the second week of school.

Here are my kids’ reviews of their president.

Kid 1 (new third-grader, the advanced reader and very verbal girl, in an it’s-cool-to-be-bored-in-third-grade voice): I didn’t really understand it. It was 19 minutes long!

Kid 2 (new first-grader, in a squeaky, earnest first-grader voice): I liked it! 

Me: What did you like about it?

Kid 2: I liked his voice.

Me: OK (muffling laughter) ... did you like anything else about it? What did he say?

Kid 2: I actually understood it! Some of the kids didn’t understand it, but I did. He talked about good stuff like if you study hard and you work so hard, and everyone in this country does, it will be a good country.

That was indeed the message. This is the child who received an extra ear exam this summer because I questioned his hearing—instead the problem was just his attention span. Whatever else you think of Obama, he passed the Kid 2 test—he’s a mighty good communicator.