AIBU to worry my daughter is picking up too much slang?

[DeBore]

DS16 has gone to the local grammar for sixth form rather than staying private and we’ve noticed she’s picked up rather a lot of slang. Whenever she’s on the phone to her friends her whole way of speaking changes - the wide vocabulary we’ve given her just disappears and it’s all “like”, “literally” and “innit” 🙄
We don’t want to control who she’s friends with of course, but would it be nice if she at least spends some time with girls who speak well. Speaking properly opens so many more opportunities,more hireable in good jobs, higher positions later in life. You know what teenagers sound like nowadays… it’s rather grating.

Welcome to Mumsnet @DeBore - where, generally speaking, goady threads like yours are not well tolerated.

... as you will have seen from the replies you have received so far.

Jive turkey, muthaphucca!

Put her back in the private school so she stops mixing with the common povvos innit

Imagine if you'd sent her to the local comp. She'd have learned all sorts from Bob and his crew.

She is a teenager trying to fit in. That what they do.

😀😀

Does it matter. Teenagers do all sorts of shit pick your battles

Clearly this is a joke post. You can actually be serious and think that a) private school kids don’t speak like that an b) she would speak like that when she’s in a professional environment

And even policing who she is friends with.

joke thread

😂oh dear

I’m amazed it has taken her until age 16 to start code switching.

The boys of Dulwich College sound like they are auditioning for Attack the Block on their way home (my train goes through the local station). I am sure they sound like Boris Johnson in class and in front of their parents.

I’m sure she’s been doing it all along. The OP just started listening more critically when her DD moved to a state school in case she was contaminated by plebeian speech patterns, and has decided her DD’s ghastly new classmates are at fault.

My mother (brought up in Manchester) would try to correct my speech when she thought i sounded "coarse"
If Hyacinth Bucket had been around then Im sure she would get on well with my mum 🤣

I voted YABU because she's 16.

She knows how to speak properly but is choosing not to when chatting with friends.

I thought you were going to say she was a toddler or something.

This is one of the funniest threads I’ve seen. Of course she wants to fit in with her friends. Her ability to shift around her environment will serve her well.

I agree and that’s a useful social skill x

@DeBore How does she sound when she speaks to you, or her granny or in a shop? I'm sure you don't want to think of all those thousands of pounds going down the drain but soon, luckily for her, she'll be outwith your control.

@DeBore literally worried about your own slang, innit?

I'm all foe code switching so long as people actually do it. How do we know she won't grow up and get a job in marketing where she will be unable to code switch and will start selling to us with annoying faux chummy crap like the side of an Innocent bottle.

Why did she change from a private school to a local grammar? Have you lately come down in the world and are worried that your new family status might be revealed by your daughter’s way of speaking?

You sound like an insufferable snob.

I'm sure your dd is more than capable of moderating her language for different audiences.

A someone that lived through thr South London fam and bro years, I feel your pain. But I voted YABU as its what teenagers do, it is normal, they grow out of it and its the same at private sixth form.

And DS became a she.

Your daughter is smart.
Language is adaptive and young people deliberately have a lexicon designed to exclude their parents from knowing everything they're doing and talking about.
It's a normal and pretty healthy thing.

Is this a joke post?? 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣

You adapt your language to those around you, so unless she is talking to you/grandparents etc in the same way, it shows she is smart enough to adjust her commuinication, it's a positive.

She is now surrounded by a group of smart girls from a variety of backgrounds who have earned their school place through hard work and intelligence, rather than the small section of society where parents buy their school place. In many way gramnar pupils are a 'cut above' private, if you want to be snobbish about it.

Mixing with a wider variety of people, where the ethos is based on hard work and achievement can only be a positive for her.