Active discussions

Please or to access all these features

Talk
AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

Dropping her T’s

439 replies

Stick0rTwist · 04/09/2025 10:51

My daughter has just gone into Yr1 and is an articulate child, relatively smart with a love for reading.

We moved her to a new school in the new year and have noticed since then she has started dropping her t’s when saying many of her words, like water, better, bottle, little etc.

This gets corrected consistently at home as although we don’t speak the queens English (and are not snobbish by any stretch of the imagination) we would prefer her to speak properly and not get into bad habits speech wise.

Over the summer holidays she was fine, but I’ve noticed in the two days she’s been back her speech has reverted back.

So here’s the AIBU - would I be unreasonable to mention this to her teacher? Or would I sound like a massive snob 🙈

Sounds dramatic but it’s even making me want to move her school again as this was not a problem at her old school at all. Its been a direct result of moving school as it started the week we moved.

OP posts:
limegreenheart · 04/09/2025 11:07

What do you hope the teacher will do? Small children aren't putting on an accent or dialect, they're hearing it at home and it's how they speak. And if some of the teachers speak that way, it's doubtful that the school will either fire them or require them to change their speech patterns (unless, I suppose, it's an elocution teacher). You could try what my mother (serial expat parent of 5) did: there's nothing wrong with the way your friends pronounce water, darling, but we say it differently at home. Of course, the downside of that was we then knew exactly what to say and do more of when we wanted to annoy her.

Justploddingonandon · 04/09/2025 11:07

Where do you live? I still drop my t's as that was the regional accent where I grew up.

Spidey66 · 04/09/2025 11:06

I admit I have a London accent and drop my Ts. It drove my mum insane and she sent me to elocution lessons, didn’t work! I was generally a well behaved child but the accent was my bit of rebellion. The more my mum focussed on it, the more I kept it up to annoy her.

Original poster
Stick0rTwist · 04/09/2025 11:05

applesblowinginthewind · 04/09/2025 10:59

Was the change of school linked to a move to a different part of the country? Could she be copying a regional accent of other children in the school? It is noticeable in some parts of the west country that the t's are dropped from words such as water and butter.

We’ve only moved about 6 miles away 🤷🏽‍♀️

OP posts:
InterestedDad37 · 04/09/2025 11:04

She's just fitting in with her peers. It doesn't necessarily lead to degeneracy 👍

jettisoned · 04/09/2025 11:02

You can't speak to her teacher. At least she's not th-fronting 😉

Silverbirchleaf · 04/09/2025 11:02

Where do you live? In some areas, it’s fairly common.

Do you want the teacher to correct her? Firstly, I don’t think the teacher will do this, and secondary, it will dent her (your daughter’s) confidence.

TheOtherAgentJohnson · 04/09/2025 11:02

Get a grip, you sound like my dad.

Or my friend's racist husband who complains about Amol Rajan presenting University Challenge, because apparently he doesn't talk proper.

applesblowinginthewind · 04/09/2025 10:59

Was the change of school linked to a move to a different part of the country? Could she be copying a regional accent of other children in the school? It is noticeable in some parts of the west country that the t's are dropped from words such as water and butter.

Ablondiebutagoody · 04/09/2025 10:59

You want her teacher to enforce a different dialect? Are you serious?

tumblingdowntherabbithole · 04/09/2025 10:59

In the nicest way, you’re being ridiculous.

Dogaredabomb · 04/09/2025 10:56

I modelled how I wanted my children to speak and would very occasionally correct glottal stops etc. They played around with sounding cool for a while but dropped it organically.

Lingfield01 · 04/09/2025 10:56

YABU. You need to get out more.

HoLeeFuk · 04/09/2025 10:53

Sounds dramatic but it’s even making me want to move her school again as this was not a problem at her old school at all. Its been a direct result of moving school as it started the week we moved.

I think that's crazy.

FWIW this happened to me in secondary school. My mum "consistently corrected" it and it made me feel small and hurt, but didn't stop me speaking in a way that came naturally at the time. When I went to college in a different area with a different accent, I started speaking differently. That lasted into adulthood and I don't drop Ts now.