Would you correct your 16/17 for.....

[bookworm8500]

CONSTANTLY saying 'freakin'? Freakin' this, freakin' that. It's genuinely nearly every sentence and we have much younger children in the house too.

She's also recently started to stop saying the 'th' sound, so instead of saying 'think', she says 'fink' and instead of 'thought' she says 'fort'. I ignore this.

It just sounds awful and I hate it. I thought this stage of talking badly to sound cool was over by about 14 years old, but it's stayed since sixth form

YABU freakin' unreasonable to correct her
YANBU and I would freakin' correct her too

If that's the worst she ever says (bet it isn't) then you're lucky.

Nor would it bother me around 8 or 9 year olds, who almost certainly hear much worse in the school playground.

Fink and fort would bother me more because it just sounds lazy.

16 or 17 is still quite young. Freaking is obviously better than what's really meant. Whatever word was used, it is the repetition that grinds I should think, like init or knowwhatImean every two seconds. You might suggest she makes herself sound silly when she could be sounding clever. Then again, she'll grow out of it anyway. Wait till she's knocking around with the local biker gang, then you really will have something to worry about.

The glottal stop is the bane of my life and I pick it up every time with my daughter. Drives me mad.

Accents are one thing, incorrect pronunciation another.

Send her to a finishing school immediately 😁

Freakin’ is a US term isn’t it? It’s annoying but she will grow out of it/move on to the next annoying fad.

Fink & fought are painful though… we previously lived in an area where that pronunciation was very common, and I corrected each and each time. I think it’s regional but it’s sounds terrible.

As a PP pointed out ask her to practice 'code switching' so that she can use language to her advantage whenever she needs to as she becomes an adult.

Explain the advantages of knowing the right way to pronounce things for the right situations and why it's sometimes crucial - job interviews, police interviews(!), getting something she needs from someone in authority etc.

So she practices better speech habits in front of younger siblings and with you, and she can speak however she likes with peers.

Warn her that it's hard to lose an ingrained habit and she won't want to lose out on opportunities because of it.

I have a ds that age....no I wouldn't. Pick your battles and all that.

It’s not a glottal stop.

It’s th-fronting.

I correct both glottal stops and th-fronting in my children’s speech.

My parents corrected my pronunciation as a teen. I thank them for it now. I'm quite articulate and well spoken. People think I'm proper posh.

Oh I know, it was just a similar theme.

Dropped t's and g's go through me.

I hate the 'f' instead of 'th'. But you listen to newsreaders and tv show presenters it is very common. I think it sounds very lazy.

Ah sorry - yeah same.

the f/th thing is awful too though - it’s bad when it’s at the end of words too - Earf instead of Earth, truf instead of truth, etc 😡😡😡😡😡

My youngest daughter is 5 and I'm trying to teach her to say the word three properly. She saw a picture on my pyjamas that said "free hugs" and I had to correct her when I told her the phrase - she thought i meant the number three 😆 But she has obviously picked up the loss of the letter from somewhere , so i unfortunately have to try and correct it now while she's younger.

I guess it doesn't really matter but I don't speak Estuary English in a Cockney accent, and it would sound a bit odd in a Home Counties accent IMHO.

I also remember when an ex used to call a friend "Smiffy" when his name was Smith - and I only realised this when I asked him. 😳 I just thought he had a very odd sounding name from his mispronunciation 😆😂😖

Using [f] rather [th] is a local language variant and no different to bath v barth. It does not make you sound thick as mince. It might make you sound more working class. Not the same thing, whatever people on Mumsnet might like to think.

I dunno, it does make you sound a little lazy in speech pronunciation I guess, depending upon your regional accent 😳

I don’t think there’s much point in ‘correcting’ a 17-year-old for saying ‘fink’. They’re not five. I don’t think you can really expect to engineer the way someone speaks to meet your accent requirements when they’re far off adulthood. They’re probably doing it to annoy you anyway, just ignore it.

Lots of children haven't fully developed the ability to discriminate [f] from [th] by the age of 5. It's developmental. In acoustic terms they are incredibly similar. You don't have to correct it; if your local language environment discriminates them, she'll pick that up the same way that she learned that [s] and [th] are different

It's not lazy.

Pronouncing one is no easier/harder than another.

Oh definitely, I agree about the sound similarity. I guess I find it harder to differentiate between similar sounds too, as I have high frequency hearing loss which meant I never knew that the letter s existed as I couldn't hear it.

Try using it back - you using it my put her off. Here's your tea - it's freaking lovely - at least I fink it is.
My son used to use 'literally' literally all the time - that drove me mad.

Annoying, but at least shes older and not in the skibidi toilet and italian brain rot age group.
At least it is an actual word in the dictionary.
The Cambridge Dictionary defines "freaking" as an informal, mainly US English word used to emphasize what is being said or to express anger. It can be used as an adjective or an adverb, similar to words like "fricking". For example, one might say "I didn't realize how freaking good he is" or "Are you freaking kidding me?"

I grew up in a place where t and h didn't seem to be part of the language. My parents, who weren't locals, regularly corrected me as a teen on that. I'm glad they did. I've left the area now so my speech and accent is a bit better but I'd like to be even better spoken. I'd definitely recommend correcting her as it could impact her job prospects in future. I wouldn't employ someone with lazy speech.

I would let the "freakin" go as this is just a phase and will inevitably become a very uncool thing to say. Every generation has a buzz word - remember groovy! I would however correct her on the fink and fort and remind her that it makes her sound thick as shit.

Fink needs to be corrected and say why.

Freaking is teen talk and completely fine

My brother has a slight lisp/speech impediment which means he can't say THink or THought, always says it with an F. My mother gave up trying to get him to work it out. He's hardly illiterate or stupid! Some of this is bordering on ableism.

And she'll grow out of saying Freaking. I used to, then the people I was around changed and the words I used changed. It didn't make me unemployable or any other bollocks. Also, just because she doesn't stop around family (where she is presumably comfortable and doesn't care about being "professional") doesn't mean she can't code switch in different occasions