NATIONAL — Talking to teenagers is hard enough, and then add in trying to understand their slang words.
One Massachusetts teacher took it upon himself to better understand his students by creating a Gen Z dictionary of all the slang words his students use.
"Teenagers sort of have their own language, and I want to be able to understand that and try to reach them at their level," James Callahan, a 43-year-old sociology teacher at Lowell High School in Massachusetts, told CNN.
Callahan created a spreadsheet of the terms along with their definitions. It went viral after one of his students shared it on Twitter.
His goal is to help adults understand their teenage children better.
"It's always kind of fun if I can use their words in my instruction, in my lectures, and the kids get a kick out of it, too, so I feel like it makes me a more effective and better teacher," Callahan said.
Here are some of the terms Callahan includes in the Gen Z dictionary:
Bread: Future money
Bang 30s: To fight someone, as in a physical altercation
Clap back: Respond to an insult with an equal or greater insult
Facts: I agree with what you just said; a confirming question; may be used as a question or statement of fact
Finesse: To steal
Finna: I or we are planning something
Flexed on: A verbal gesture of dominance
The game: Life
Gotta blast: I have to leave
Hop off: Mind your own business
Jawn: Thing, object, person, place
On blast: Expose/call out someone
Rashing: To make fun of someone
Slay: Do really well
Slaps: Of high quality
Tight: Extremely mad
Tweakin: Overreacting; ecstatic
Yurrr/yerrr: Affirmative; call for attention
Information from CNN used in this report.