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Primary education

Join our Primary Education forum to discuss starting school and helping your child get the most out of it.

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Original poster

Year 2 teacher had to be corrected on pronunciation of Pepys

192 replies

CheshireSplat · 04/10/2018 14:22

Interested to hear opinions on this.

DD's class are doing the great fire of London and their teacher was talking about the diary of Samuel "Peppis". DD's friend told him it was Peeps in the inimitable style of a 6 year old.

Should I be worried. New teacher to the school. I don't tend to interfere but I would've thought that was pretty general knowledge.

Then when he gave them times tables he did 2 x 1, 2 x 2, 2 x 3 etc which is the wrong way round.....

Happy to be told to wind my neck in!

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rebelworld · 04/10/2018 15:45

@RoboJesus incorrect!

RoboJesus · 04/10/2018 15:47

What is?

Showergel1 · 04/10/2018 15:54

Teacher training teaches you how to teach not the content.
Not everyone has done GCSE History.
The last time I learnt about Samuel Pepys I was also in year 2 and I watched the same magic grandad video that I went on to show my class. We all make pronunciation mistakes especially when we are so used to reading phonetically.

As for the times tables the maths training differs all the time but It's helpful to teach it the way arrays are shown.

You've done all you need to do in regards to these matters op.

user1499173618 · 04/10/2018 16:02

How can you be taught to teach content you do not master?

SoupDragon · 04/10/2018 16:02

How do people know how Samuel Pepys pronounced his name?

mybumpismostlypudding · 04/10/2018 16:14

@user1499173618 I think pronouncing a word wrongly (or differently!) is slightly different to being 'unable to master' a subject.
Some doctors pronounce paracetamol with a short 'e,' others pronounce it paraceetamol. Would you really think a doctor was inadequate if they pronounced it differently to you?

OldBean2 · 04/10/2018 16:18

If you asked any London cabbie to pronounce Pepys Court (off Fenchurch St), they would pronounce it as Peppy's. It can be pronounced either way and neither is incorrect.

TragicallyUnbeyachted · 04/10/2018 16:21

SoupDragon, I don't think we do. Most discussion comes back to a nineteenth-century opinion by Walter Pepys that Samuel "undoubtedly" pronounced it "Peeps", but he offers no evidence for that.

Contemporary misspellings of his name suggest, taken as a whole, that he probably pronounced it as a single syllable, but that's about as far as we can go and is suggestive rather than definite.

There's an interesting discussion (if you find this kind of thing interesting) at journals.psu.edu/wph/article/download/2471/2304

applesauce1 · 04/10/2018 16:23

I'm a Year 2 teacher. Both orders of times tables are generally accepted, but personally (and as directed by my school's maths policy), I prefer to explain tables as "groups of". As in, 2x3 means two groups of 3. It makes it easier to bring real meaning to the maths, and in turn, instil a transferable skill. Eg. 2x3 is two nests with 3 eggs in each nest, or two vases with 3 daisies in each etc.

Check on the school's website and find their mathematics policy to see if it is the whole school policy.

As for Pepys, I agree with a PP who said not to judge someone who says a word as written as it often indicates someone who is self taught.
If I didn't have relatives living on a Pepys road, and hadn't been raised on a diet of museums, I probably wouldn't know how to pronounce it either as he wasn't taught when I was at school.

user789653241 · 04/10/2018 16:26

I'm from the country that do the times table other way round. Nothing wrong with learning the concept or mathematical ability.

ShatnersBassoon · 04/10/2018 16:29

The Pepys thing wouldn't bother me so much, and I don't think it's necessarily due to ignorance or stupidity. I went through school hearing several pronunciations of Boudicca and Tutankhamen, and still do. It's not that important.

The times tables error is obviously going to cause problems. You can't ignore that.

dementedpixie · 04/10/2018 16:34

How will it cause problems!! Its how I was taught and my kids are being taught and they can do maths very well

user1499173618 · 04/10/2018 16:35

I think that the order of times tables varies hugely.

dementedpixie · 04/10/2018 16:35

And its not an error

user1499173618 · 04/10/2018 16:36

My DD was taught tables tables by doing long multiplication in Y4. It worked really well.

TheNumberfaker · 04/10/2018 16:40

Pepys would annoy me too.

2x3 = 3x2 = 6

Multiplication is commutative so order does not matter as a general concept.
If you are talking about actual things, then it does matter, e.g. 100 (small) boxes of 3 chocolates is different to 3 (big) boxes of 100 chocolates, even though the overall total is, of course, the same.

Luckyme2 · 04/10/2018 16:40

We lived overseas for a bit when I was little and I proudly came home from school one day announcing that my teacher had taught us that capital of England was Manchester!
I wouldn't worry too much about whether the teacher can pronounce Pepys properly but it probably would make be wonder what else would be wrong (hopefully not on a Manchester scale though!

catkind · 04/10/2018 16:44

There's no correct way round for times tables. I tend to do 1x2, 2x2, 3x2 etc and phrase it "one lot of two, two lots of two...". DC's school initially taught 2x1, 2x2, 2x3 and read it as "two one time, two two times, two three times...". Not my preferred interpretation but multiplication is commutative, there are any number of ways of phrasing it in words, and it's not incorrect.
If the teacher took the correct pronunciation of Pepys on board with good grace then the children have learned a great lesson and hats off to him.

mybumpismostlypudding · 04/10/2018 16:44

@Luckyme2 but why would that make you question their abilities as a teacher? If you made a simple mistake (and indeed, a mistake of pronunciation, not content) at work, would your ability to do your job be called into question?

Rainbowtrain · 04/10/2018 16:45

Really? I am from abroad and teach in the UK, I have only leant the Great Fire of London from visiting exhibits and reading about it, so I would be devastated if a parent thought less of me because of that. Year2... I usually get praised for my interaction with the kids, knowledge and experience. This has actually made me very sad as I learnt English abroad and I wonder if parents are mocking and talking about me

BikeRunSki · 04/10/2018 16:45

DS’s Y4 teacher taught them the times tables both way round, to help their understanding of multiplication, and to grasp that 3 x 2 = 2 x 3.

Pepys - I have heard pronounced as “Peepis” on Radio 4. I suspect many pronounciations have evolved since the 1600s.

Luckyme2 · 04/10/2018 16:53

mybump as I said it wouldn't worry me that there was a mis-pronunciation but it would just make me more aware. And yes in my job if I mis-pronounced something in the context of trying to explain it to someone else I would expect a raised eyebrow. It would suggest that perhaps I wasn't completely familiar with the subject matter. In this case though Pepys is not something I would be worried about, as it's a name that is often pronounced in different ways. (If it was an answer on University Challenge though I bet you Paxman would have something to say if was pronounced Peppis!)

OvO · 04/10/2018 16:54

I had to google Samuel Pepys as I had no idea who he was and definitely didn’t know how to say his name. I’m sure I know stuff you clever lot don’t so I’m not too worried that I’m an uneducated fool.

Luckyme2 · 04/10/2018 16:57

Although having read through PPs and in particular the comment about the doctor pronouncing paracetemol differently I can definitely see that it doesn't really matter. So ignore me OP!

Prettysureitsnotok · 04/10/2018 17:01

Is it not pronounced Pepsi?

Honestly I can't see how it's a big deal.

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