Accent wars plus Phonics

[Carouselfish]

I'm a Londoner who says barth not bath, farst not fast, onvelope not envelope etc whilst DP is a midlander who says the opposite (he's also a haitch not aitch person although I think that might be deliberate!).

Our DD (5) is learning phonics at school. Phonics seems to only cater to the more northern pronunciation of words. Locally it's a mixed bag but DD is leaning towards northern much more now she's back at school.

I wonder how children learning phonics in the London area speak and read aloud? Are they all going more northern? And how do couples with totally different accents and therefore pronunciations, feel about the way their children pronounce things? Do they teach them both and let the chips fall where they may? Or follow the local way, which isn't really helpful in our case.

I know very little about this, but might the accent of the teacher have an influence? Was just chatting the other night with a young (24) Scots-born friend of mine who moved to Kent aged 3, who had been reminded of his teacher being unable (or perhaps unwilling) to understand his (very mild, Edinburgh) accent and correcting his pronunciation to hers. He now has a SE English accent, though his family returned to Scotland when he was 8.

I'm really surprised by this if you live in London (unless her teacher is a northerner). My dc are long past phonics now, but we lived in the SE when they were little, and the pronunciation in phonics was definitely southern 'a' sounds etc. Now we live in the NW. I work in some primary schools, though I don't teach phonics myself, and have definitely heard the northern 'a' in lessons.

As for what teach your dc, tbh I'd just stick to you pronouncing things your way and your dh saying it his way. It's normal for children to have two parents with different accents.

DS2 learned to read in north east England. I’m Scottish; his dad’s from the south coast. His teachers have local accents and taught phonics that way. I did all the home reading and phonics, with my own pronunciation.

Mostly DS laughed at my pronunciation of things (especially when he had those stupid oor/ore/aw books that do not work in scottish accents).

He has never had a geordie accent, despite the phonics at school. His accent is kind of generically Northern with hints of scottish and Sussex.

I’d say just do it in your own accents and see what comes out at the end.

My daughter had a Northern teacher they all sang when santa got stuck up the chimney EEE BEGAN TO SHOUT we loved it ❤ it was very sweet but my daughter pronounces her "h" just fine now

DH is kiwi and it's not a problem. He just say to DC, this is how I say this phonics sound, and this how you say it. We just have different accents. The key is that it's consistent within the accent. Also, we found some words that are homophones to DC are not to DH (and also in reverse).

It's a good lesson on how we are all different, and there's no one accent that's correct.

I'm a teacher with an RP accent, living in an area with a very strong accent.

I teach the children b-a-th (short a), but would then say, 'but some of you might say this word as b-ar-th'.

My daughter went to school in the area where we lived and picked up the local accent. However, she moved to a different school in year 4 which had children with a few different accents, and her accent began to fade.

You sound like you think the northern accent is “ wrong “ and you’re concerned about correcting it or winning the battle of the accents. I’m from the East Midlands and have a fairly neutral accent apart from my A sounds on bath & grass. My DH introduces the imaginary R in those words. We also disagree on “ scone” with me rhyming it with gone and him with cone. We are raising our DD in Surrey so if you think any of that is going to be a stronger influence than her buddies / people in the locality then I’m afraid you’re mistaken. The way she speaks is the way she speaks... the main issue I have currently is the Haitch thing which she claims she was taught at school 🙄

DS2 is doing phonics in Ireland - and TBH I really haven't noticed any problems! I can't imagine his teachers are adapting their accents, and I'm not adapting mine (SE UK) - I think it's just that these days kids are exposed to so many accents they don't even think about it!

I do love the little bits of local accent that creep in - like DS says pray-errr rather than prair - gives his speech colour.

I don't so much think it's wrong as wrong for me and quite alien for me to hear my child do it. I'm relaxed about it in front of her apart from the haitch thing which has become a running joke. My DM on the other hand corrects her to the southern all the time! No, we don't live in London, we live near Wales! There's a total mix of accents in her school.

But I didn't think phonics was set up to allow for accents. B A TH, they just teach the A phoneme as the short sound by default.

One of my DD's speaks like me (Londoner/home counties) the other sounds like her northern dad, go figure. We lived in the middle!

Tbh I think it's pretty unreasonable to expect a London/ RP pronunciation in Wales! As for her accent sounding alien to you, why on earth should she have your accent rather than your dh's? Presumably on that basis if she spoke with a London accent, she'd sound alien to him? Besides, she might well pick up a bit of a Welsh accent!

@Carouselfish

But I didn't think phonics was set up to allow for accents. B A TH, they just teach the A phoneme as the short sound by default.

I think that’s what surprised me too when reading your post and the one by @Littlefish. There’s no “r” in “bath” so why teach it? I understand it’s around accents but still.

Can you explain to your dd why you say barth for b-a-th?

My dh and I have totally different accents and grew up somewhere with a third accent so have a real mish mash now. They say some words from all three accents. I stood up for the ones that mattered to me, like you are doing by banishing haitch.

I explain the 'ar' sound in bath because as soon as I say the word 'bath' with a short 'a', at least one of them will tell me that that's not how they say it.

So I explain that it sounds like 'a' when they sound it out, but some of them might pronounce the word differently.

I think that’s what surprised me too when reading your post and the one by @Littlefish. There’s no “r” in “bath” so why teach it? I understand it’s around accents but still.

This is a common misunderstanding on MN. When southern posters say they pronounce it 'barth', they don't mean that they put an 'r' sound in it! They write it like that because in most southern English accents AR and AH soynd identical. So they are saying
"Baah th". But Scottish (and other rhotic English speakers) assume that they mean they are pronouncing it with an actual 'r' sound - barrrrrth! In any case, you must have heard southerners say words with a long A in them. We don't add 'r'.

My accent is like yours op. Ds is very Cornish. We had great fun with phonics laughing at each other’s pronunciation. He’s got a really sweet little accent and I wouldn’t try to change it.

I'm a SAHM and home educate my British children with my NZ accent. DH has an RP accent. Despite me being home 95% of the time with our children, and DH working out of the house, they have his accent.

When I was teaching them to read - and when we do spelling, for example - they "correct" my pronunciation. There are some sound differences I can't hear (like beer/bear/bare/bier - I don't know which are supposed to sound the same in DH's accent) so it can be tricky in those situations.

I would expect teachers to cover all the sounds a vowel can make. There's not just one way to pronounce A.

I mean like this

I'm a southerner married to an East Mids/South Yorks hybrid (conjures up an image, doesn't it?) We live in East Mids, our kids have an accent but not quite the true local accent.

They rib me for my accent which is no longer truely southern, but a local "bath" feels awkward to me so I say "barth" (or even "barf").

They just missed out on phonics but I would've taught them to read/make sounds however they do it at school, so as not to confuse them.

Kids pick up what they hear at school & modify their accents to fit in anyway.

Most of the UK, outside the south east, pronounce short vowels in the decent, patriotic British manner we always have (even with such a range of accents).

YABU to expect midlanders to pronounce vowels in your newfangled Germanic fashion. After all, it was only introduced by our conquerors in 1688.

You should be pleased for your DD.