AIBU to feedback to school about teachers use of glottal stops

[TalomaPaith]

Children at Dcs school are split into different groups for phonics.

Parents are sometimes invited to watch lessons. I observed a lesson by a teacher using glottal stops I.e Let'er instead of letter.

Would IBU to mention this?

what about the fact that a lot of English accents don’t pronounce Rs? Why is that “correct” but some other English accents but not pronouncing “t” in letter is “incorrect”?

tbh that question is mainly rhetorical because it’s obvious you place a value judgement on other ways of speaking and have not properly interrogated the notion of prescriptivism - who prescribes, why, and how, and what does that say about power and class?

Unintelligible. She was talking about speech, not writing.

Why would you do if the teacher had a rhotic R as I do as a speaker of Hiberno English and pronounced words like drawer with two syllables? Would you object if the teacher had an intrusive R as many English speakers of English do (the idea r of ) or pronounced car to rhyme with caw?

The teacher’s glottal stop is regional accent. You would be very unreasonable to comment on it and you will be laughed at forever in the staff room.

It used to be (when I were a lass) where teachers spoke " properly" and "proper" or more formal speaking was encouraged in the classroom.

In the playground language was more colloquial and children hopped from one to another.

Because the glottal stops result in lack of clarity, @queenmeadhbh .
Some accents are rhotic and some not, but it generally doesn't affect clarity.

If you were unfamiliar with different accents, and you heard two people say 'water' and one said watt-urr and the other said waugh-wuh, one of them is far likelier to be understood.

I genuinely hope the bigoted clod of an OP does complain about it. They will be hard pressed not to laugh in her face, and it wil be useful for all the teachers to know who they are dealing with.

Precisely. I can't tell you how weird 'well spoken' South Eastern pronunciation still sounds to my Irish ears, but I don't complain that sixth and year are pronounced incorrectly.

Spoiler - every accent is regional and has its quirks.

Why is the use of the glottal stop, in an area where it is part of the local accent/dialect, failure, in your POV?

Classist?

Yep. And that's all there is to it :)

Precisely. I can't tell you how weird 'well spoken' South Eastern pronunciation still sounds to my Irish ears, but I don't complain that sixth and year are pronounced incorrectly.
How are they mispronouncing sixth and year if they're well-spoken?

@Slightyamusedandsilly It's not part of the dialect

No. It is a phonics lesson. How can the kids learn their phonics properly if the teacher doesn’t model the correct sound in their everyday speech? They won’t spell “letter” properly if they don’t hear “letter” properly.

Oh I fully agree! I have a mix of accents due to my mum being from Dover, my stepdad being from Essex and my dad being from Hull, and I've lived in Manchester before, but I'm originally from Hull myself 😂 most people can tell I'm from Yorkshire, but I also code-switch a lot depending on who I'm talking to, so some people struggle with guessing where I'm from. Generally I can understand what most people are saying regardless of their dialect. Just because people have a certain accent or dialect, it doesn't make them stupid, despite what OP thinks

Which area is this in? I understand you don't want to be specific to the town, but NE, SE, Scottish borders?

AND is the teacher native to the area?

The thing that amuses me about your annoyance, OP, is that unless your child stays in one town for their whole life, they will hear loads of different accents and dialects (and even that isn't guaranteed, because of tourists and people who have moved to the area from a different part of the country), so you can't avoid this anyway. You're going to criticise a teacher, while being (or having been) one yourself, for most likely using their regional dialect, but how do you know that people don't judge you for yours? How you speak might sound "wrong" to me if I ever heard you, but I wouldn't say anything because I know that you're likely from a different area of the country than I am and truthfully, it doesn't matter.

People are fallible. Teachers have different accents. My DC speaks in a way that isn't pleasing to my ear because the local accent is not the one I grew up with and that until now DC has spoken in. It sounds incorrect to me.

But I'm not going to the school to demand they use my preferred enunciation. Even if it would enhance his phonic ability.

If you have a specific preference about the voices your child is surrounded by and therefore what they inculcate, I think maybe you need a private school who place value on the use of RP.

Otherwise, I'd stick to just reinforcing the bits you disapprove of quietly at home.

This is so bad...

A lot of SE English people say sikth instead of sixth and yah instead of year.

Where I live we say Granda rather than Grandad. I wouldn't have welcomed a parent telling me I was pronouncing it incorrectly by missing out the final d.

@RaraRachael , but the pp said 'well spoken'.
They are not well-spoken if they say sikth and yah.

@GarlicBreadStan , @Slightyamusedandsilly , OP isn't saying the teacher should use RP. She's saying the teacher should enunciate clearly. There's a difference.

To my ear all SE 'posh' people say yah as they don't pronounce the r at the end of the word.
Hope that's makes sense.

Seriously as a teacher yourself, you must know how that 'complaint' to the school would be treated and viewed.
Pick your school battles. This isn't one!

Err, the OP is a parent, not a school child.

Differing pronunciation of vowels between accents is one thing, but dropping letters isn't on. How children choose to speak informally is up to them, but they shouldn't be taught to drop letter sounds as though this is standard English.

'Posh' and well-spoken aren't the same. @RaraRachael . I understand your point about the r in year, but it isn't sounded in RP.
Who would be an example of 'SE 'posh' people'?

If a teacher was conducting a spelling test, I'd expect them to say sixth and year as siksth and yee-ur.

What about the southern long vowel sound? Sounds like there is an extra letter (r) in many words.

Barth instead of the short bath.
Farther instead of father.

Should that be corrected too?

@Slightyamusedandsilly People using glottal stops are discriminated against and can effect career prospects. The extra r is not a problem