To want my children to speak beautifully

[MiniMonty]

I'm a Londoner, we use "nice round vowels" so bath is "baarth" and grass is "graars" but I live in Birmingham with a partner from Sheffield and my kids use flat vowels which, I confess, are simply ugly on my ears.
Am I being unreasonable to want (and to encourage) my kids to use "round vowels" and to have a Southern (BBC or RP) accent ?

If you want them to get the piss ripped out of them at school, YANBU.

Harsh, but it happened to me.

YANBU - but it's really all a matter of opinion what's 'nice' and what's not. So what might sound horrible to you sounds loooverlay to others. Everyone has accents that they like and don't like.

(This thread will probably degrade into class war if it gets going though. )

I don't know if YABU as my DS1 turned to his father this evening and said "it's waTer, daddy, it has a T in it". He's 3!

My niece speaks in a really posh 'BBC presenter' accent.

Fuck knows why, her parents have flat Cumbrian accents ( think Wallace and Gromit ) and she grew up in a village near Preston.

Strange, I don't really think you can force it tho.

Your DCs need to speak like the rest of the class at school. If they don't they will be picked on and have the piss taken for the way they speak.

You may not realise it, but to a northerner extra 'r's' in words that don't have them like bath sound silly and wrong.

However, if I were to bring up my children in the south I would have to accept them speaking this way if I didn't want them to be picked on at school. As you live somewhere where they use flat vowels, you should accept your children doing so.

In any case flat vowels aren't 'wrong' like poor grammar or using 'f' for 'th'. Get over yourself!

'Barth and grarss' actually sound very common to most people. Over egging a vowel is worse than a flat vowel as with a flat vowel nothing unneccessary is added.

You need to move to Sutton Coldfield if you still want to stay in the Birmingham area. An ex of mine came from there and his accent was RP. The only slip up he made was pronouncing 'none' as 'non' rather than 'nun'! If it hadn't been for that I'd have thought he was a southerner.

Yanbu - Ds is starting to pick up local accent (he's 2.8) and it makes me cringe when he doesn't pronounce the 't' eg in water, I always correct him - not sure what to do about it though other than elocution lessons which seems rather extreme! (and no doubt I'll get flamed by some for that thought!)

When I was at school, my best friends snobby aunt paid for her to have elocution lessons.. she definately had the piss ripped out of her for her posh accent when the rest of us all spoke with broad bolton accents..

My parents used to joke that they never spoke to me and so I learned how to speak from the BBC (in the 70s). I was treated differently by my peers which was a disadvantage. It worked to my advantage in adulthood.

Thing is it's a benefit to have others understand you, but fitting in brings other advantages. Pronounciation is important, but it is not the most important thing in life it can be taught, switched on and off. The most important thing is to let them be themselves.

Bring them to Belfast.

Bath - Baff
Window - Windy
Old - Owl
May I have that? - Giz
Bread roll - Bap
Your mother - Yer Ma!
A person who wears alternative clothing - GOFIC!!!

I'm a southerner living in the north with a northerner. Our DS (age 4) is bilingual; he speaks northern and southern. For example "Mummy, walk on the paarth, daddy, walk on the path."

I know he'll pick up the local accent because that's what he'll hear most of, and that will be part of who he is. I don't want to change it. Tbh, I think it's not fair on him for me to want him to change.

Your DCs need to speak like the rest of the class at school. If they don't they will be picked on and have the piss taken for the way they speak.

Why? What if a child moved up from London or worse from another country and did not speak like the rest of the class.

Also since when did what the other children in your DC's class will think or do dictate to how you want you children to behave or speak? Madness.

Why not leave them to develop their own accent ? As long as they accentuate their words correctly does it matter ?
I left my DD to develop her own accent , she is very funny and speaks Queens English ( we are in Nottinghamshire !).
I would try not to steer them too much , as you run the risk of them becoming self conscious about the way they do or do not talk . And this would be very unsettling for their school life and socialising .

Imo the most useful way is to be bilingual: to be able to do an educated accent and the local accent depending on the occasion. So I insist that ds should be able to pronounce the middle t but at the same time accept that he won't necessarily always want to do it.

Agree with Village and A1

My mother had a strong Jersey accent.

My Grandmother hated it, and made her have elocution lessons.

Thus proving a target for bullies,my Mum wished she hadn't had to go.

It is only fair if you plant your kids somewhere, to let them speak as locals.

Two of my kids have American accents ...and one sounds Mid-Atlantic (according to my family in UK )

We are heading for Dorset...I wonder what will happen?

my DDs have 2 accents

the horrible local accents which they use when talking to their friends which I think sounds put on and exagerated by them and the normal accent they use when they are talking to adults

strokes throat

Geordie is the best
Aye

Nannyplum me too! I have that posh northern accent now. The one that all the girls round Southwell way have- kind of a happy medium.

Barth and grarss are just wrong