To correct my toddler's speech (nicely)

[glitterjellybean]

NC for this. I have a dd coming up for 2 years old. She's bright and happy and her vocabulary is coming on in leaps in bounds.

Her df and I see eye to eye on pretty much everything except one thing. Speech.

Bit of background, and as much as I hate labels, dh is very working class (as in he's a total grafter with a common accent) and I'm from an upper middle class family where I was corrected to say the full words and names not abbreviate. If my mum heard me say the word "telly" she'd come back from the dead to tell me off 🙊.

It started off when she was small with my utter refusal to the whole "say taaaaaa!" thing. She now says please and thank you anyway, so it seemed unnecessary for her to learn two ways of saying it.

Now this last week "yes" has turned into "yep" and I keep (gently) saying "no xxx we say yes".

Dh thinks I'm being stuffy but I've never been turned down for a job in my life because I speak (in his words) "posh" and I'd like to give our dc as much of a chance as possible in life.

Dh is constantly getting annoyed because people judge him on his accent and the way he speaks, and we even had an incident in a posh cafe the other week where a patron made a comment loudly about "letting anybody in now". So surely if he's had issues like this he wouldn't want his kids to go through the same.

Lol this is a bit more detailed than I was expecting but as long as I'm doing it kindly and constructively (and not in a way that's demeaning) it's not a bad thing to speak "correctly"?

I think the people who get on best in life are those who can adapt their accent. I know I do - I can do St Andrews / Miss Jean Brodie Scottish and I can do Edinburgh Scottish. My relaxed accent is between the two.
I honestly think any child who grows up hearing "proper" speech at home will be able to roll it out when required even if they spend most of their teenage years speaking like a rapper.

I don't think you are being unreasonable either OP, my speech was constantly corrected when I was growing up from day 1 and i'm glad my mother was persistent.

Don't correct, model.

Don't say " no that's wrong, this is right"- repeat what she says back to her but with the "correct" version. So if she says she wants a drink of "wa'er, say "oh yoi want a drink of water?

Kids learn by mimicing. Correcting and telling her she's wrong will not do her self esteem any good.

Modelling never worked for us. It wasn't direct enough. My DD would just continue saying the word her way. It depends how you correct and if you are gentle

I have a regional London/Essex accent. From a WC background but Oxbridge-educated and now MC.

No yarp, you can't be born into working class, and then suddenly jump into middle class just because you went to 'Oxbridge.'

You are born working class, you stay working class. Going to uni, (even one of the so-called posh ones,) having an expensive car, and living in a 6 bed detached house in Cheshire with an acre of land doesn't make you middle class if you were born working class.

There are many famous people with shitloads of money, fancy cars, million dollar homes etc, who are still working class. Becoming rich and buying fancy goods, and going to uni does not make you jump up the classes.

You are still working class yarp. And you always will be.

Wayne Rooney is still a gobby chav through and through, and he is loaded. Same for many more famous, rich people. Money does not buy class. Nor does the uni you attend.

Yes you can model correct language for your toddler. Without the snobbishness though. Is your only qualification for work really your accent? That would probably explain some of the attitude. Hopefully your toddler gets jobs because they are competently skilled, that has always worked for me.

Don't correct a toddler's speech, rather model how you'd like her to speak.

And I am similarly bemused by your mid-thread name change.

User, that's rubbish. Working class means you work. As in, you work because you have to. As in, if you stop working the money runs out. There are a lot of associations that go along with being working class but that's actually what it means. Wayne Rooney is about as working class as Kate Middleton.

wayne rooney is as middle class as kate middleton

PMSL. I assume you're joking.

I guess you're another one who thinks that even though you were born working class, if you have been to uni, you have a mortgage, and '16 registered audi, that you are now middle class.

You're still working class dear.

Suddenly coming into money and buying a big house, and/or going to uni, does NOT make you middle class if you were born working class. You're talking tosh.

I do wonder if you're doing the right thing when your own grammar is a tad off...

user

I am "Middle Class" because I went to University, and my parents aren't because they didn't. That gave me choices I would not have had otherwise. I earn more than average but I have to work.

What you are saying actually emphasises my point. You compare me to Wayne Rooney (who is, frankly an ignoramus), because of my origins. And one of the signifiers of those origins is my accent.

... To make it even clearer

Accent = thick/ chavvy in your eyes

Nice, dear

^^ That was to user1489etcetc

Is it a Hull accent?! As the words u hate sound very much those used in Hull. I'd have gone crazy at anyone judging my DH in a cafe, the cheek!

Me and DH are both from up north but live in the SW for the past 8yrs. DH has mostly lost his accent, mines still going strong but it's our 9yo who corrects us. ALL. THE. TIME. It gets right on my nerves lol.

DD has picked up a bit of an accent, I assume from nursery as DH and I and close family don't speak with any accent specifically. DH has corrected her on a couple of things ("waTer not "WArder") but I tend to ignore it on the basis that the more fuss I make the more of an issue it becomes and she'll probably try and do the opposite. But we never taught her to say ta and she's never used it as it isn't something we say.

Of course you can move to the MC. There are only the classes of upper and working class. Middle Class is simply and basically about money and acquisition. Completely a sop to give an illusion of aspiration having meaning. It also being completely about the material expression of money neatly ensures little true wealth is accumulated.

I think the people who get on best in life are those who can adapt their accent

I'm sure by this you don't mean what me and my mum both accidentally do. Picking up a bit of the accent of the person you are talking to completely unintentionally and then realising and trying not to sound offensive.

I don't think correction works tbh, according to linguistic research. I model good pronunciations and language but I don't correct.

Don't correct her -- it's pointless.

She will copy those around her and will come out fine... as long as she's not exposed to too many grammar howlers such as:

"the upbringing that me and dh had"

DH and I and close family don't speak with any accent specifically

Oh but you do have an accent. Even the Queen has an accent.

I totally agree with you on this one, your daughter should be taught to pronounce words properly.

I have what would be considered a "posh" accent for my area and often got teased about it at school however my mother was brought up to be well spoken and brought us up the same way.

I have no doubt that I have been successful in getting a number of jobs because I speak with a relatively neutral accent.

I will be correcting my daughter when she starts to speak as you have been!

There is nothing wrong with bringing your child up to speak well, however, as many pp have already pointed out, 'correcting' them is awful. Saying 'no, we say this' will actually have a negative impact on your child's speech and their confidence. If you must correct them, at least leave out the 'no'.

derxa I can see the SLT in your seething at the 'i don't have an accent because I speak RP' from here

Everyone has an accent.
You can speak well and still have a regional accent.
accent is not the only indicator of education.
I modify my speech depending on who I speak to, I don't use the samr language in the small welsh village I grew up, as when I speak to clients at work, which is different again to the speech I use when at job interviews, professional meetings.