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By Jack Beresford
Senior Reporter
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A six-year-old's witty response to a confusing English homework assignment left his mom and dad in hysterics.
David, a father of two from Sunderland in the U.K., took to Reddit to share his youngest son Thomas's response to the baffling question.
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In a post under the handle u/Jambo1317, David shared the assignment, which asked kids to "Write your own extended sentence about this picture using the conjunction 'but.'"
That all seemed straightforward enough but what made the homework all but impossible was the picture itself: a pair of dark blobs stacked on top of one another.
Quite what it depicted was anyone's guess and does not serve as a great example of the benefits of homework.
Homework is a much-debated topic among parents. In one survey of 782 U.S. moms and dads conducted by Narbis, a technology company focused on products designed to enhance concentration, over 80 percent said that in the past their child had struggled to complete a homework assignment.
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Thankfully, in this instance, Thomas had no such problems. Instead, he saw an opportunity to incorporate the word "but" into a very clever, outside-the-box, answer.
Writing alongside the question, his answer read: "I tried to see what this was but I don't know what it is."
Evidently impressed, David shared a picture of his son's response to Reddit's r/TechnicallyTheTruth sub, home of "information that is technically true, but far from the expected answer."
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David wasn't surprised to see his young son answer in this way. "Both mine and my wife's families have a funny sense of humor," he told Newsweek. "So the wit, sarcasm, and jokey nature has only but been passed down."
David also said that Thomas has made a habit of trying to "find loopholes in things" when they ask him to do something.
"Say we are asking him to get ready for school or he'll be late, he would say something like 'well, I'll just not get ready and not go to school, so I'll not be late' with a cheeky grin."
David does freely admit, however, that the family's sense of humor can be "both a blessing and curse" to him as a parent.
He recalled: "When his eldest brother Thomas was four years old, he ran into our room at 5:30am, asked me if I could spell "sleep", then ran out of the room giggling."
When it came to Thomas's homework, however, the whole family was laughing and in agreement that, in the circumstances, it was the best thing he could have written.
"When he wrote the answer down, all of us were giggling and can see why he wrote that down as the print out was awful quality," he said. "We think it's meat cut up, perhaps? Or a lizard lying on a rock, or two stones?"
Reddit was similarly baffled. "Looks like carbonized meat," one user wrote with another commenting: "clearly it's a cell in biology exams the pictures were the same."
A third said: "I see some sort of fat rodent scampering over some rocks" with a fourth writing: "Sir, I'd like to conclude that your son is a genius" in response to Thomas's answer.
David said they are still no clearer on what the image is and would welcome any suggestions. "We haven't heard a response from the school," he said.
For now though, Thomas is happy enjoying his newfound internet fame. "He told me: 'I'm practically a YouTuber, like and subscribe!'" David joked.
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