Should schools 'correct' local accents?

[darcymum]

DD is due to start school in September and I went to visit two local primary schools recently. We live in the west country although neither DH or myself are from here. DD has picked up some of the local accent in some of the words she uses. I explained this to both schools and asked if they would correct her pronunciation. The first school said they would and "she wouldn't get away with talking like that here". They saw it as part of the job of teaching her. The second school made a bit of a joke about it and said "nothing wrong with the local accent".

Am I just being a snob because I don't want her to talk like Pam Ayres?

This is a joke, right ? ...

Actually, I think Pam Ayres comes from Oxfordshire - not sure that counts as South West.

I would expect schools to teach children the ability to moderate their speech according to the audience. So you can talk as much slang as you like with your mates, but in a job interview you'd use a more formal language, making it easier for an interviewer who doesn't share your dialect to understand.

While dialects may be wonderful and all part of life's rich tapestry etc. etc. etc. children will come up against people who make snap judgments based on accents. They need to know how to handle that. In an ideal world you might think 'stuff you' is an appropriate response to a snob, in the real world a child who is able to moderate their speech has an advantage over one who cannot.

(Personally I love Yorkshire accents but if you speak broad Barnsley and can't alter it for your listener, people from Birmingham - actually anywhere outside a 10 mile radius ? might struggle to understand you.)

I don't think the prejudice about so-called local accents is really about clarity. Obviously it's good to be able to understand eachother. I have a feeling though no matter how intelligible the accent was it would still be wrong if not from the "right" part of the UK England.

darcymum, you fancy-pants types aint welcome 'round yer.

I'd like t'meet yer dorter an' I'd whisper baaaaad words like zider n dimpsy n aaaample in 'er yerawls.

Thee's a snob alright, but we's used to it.

@ Cadelaide

petty small minded bullshit op.

Their accents will vary depending on where they live and the accents with which they converse...and that will be so ALL of their lives! Accents change if these variables change.

Anybody with a regional accent who has moved away will modify their accent and pound to a penny, when they get back "home" to their own folk, they will morph back into the accents (broad or otherwise)and phrasing and vocabulary from which they hailed.

I have a north eastern accent and DH has a true Yorkshire accent and we live somewhere completely different - DS's accents are hybrids of all three .

Doesnt make them freaks or thick - but it does give them social heritage and belonging.

OP,..just interested to know, why does it bother you so much?

when i went to coventry for uni (it might be called 'warwick', darling, but coventry is where it's at) i got bullied for being posh by local girls. (still lol-ing at pam ayres, i was brought/ dragged up in oxfordshire, maybe that's why the pam ayres impressions - hadn't occurred to me at the time tbh... but she was pretty much everywhere wasn't she?) posh! i ask you!

pam ayres. not heard of her for years, and then she pitches up on mn. oh, i wish i'd looked after me teeth.

accents are fine, whichever they are, wherever they're from.

Grammar is another matter - as long as she doesn't grow up to say eg "I were well mad about that!" (which would make me want to punch her, sorry) then her accent doesn't matter at all

What a bizarre OP.

Where I live all the children and most of the teachers talk with the local accent. They say "booz" for bus and "foon" for fun (etc etc).

It's totally fine with me (I don't have the local accent btw - I have one but it's local to somewhere else! ).

OP yes you are being a snob. I imagine as soupy says you yourself have an accent - or are you one of those people who thinks they speak without any kind of accent?

I assume you'll go with the first school (sounds a bit grim).

@ cadelaide, lurrrvin that ol west country!

Was Darth Vader really from the West Country pmsl ?

TP

Not exactly. His body was from the West Country, his voice was from Mississippi.

Actually, I think it is more complex than simply teaching 'propa Inglish'!

Children are being taught to expect to have to write in different ways for different purposes. Likewise they should also learn to speak in different ways.

I tell my pupils that it really is completely right to say 'free' for three and 'ai'' for eight when you are counting ready for a game on the playground or counting dinner plates under your breath and chatting with your Granny who speaks in this way too is actually really a nice thing to do. Equally using 'ain't' for the negative is fine when you are shopping with a friend and feeling cool so too is the double negative as it is correct in certain dialect rules... BUT in a formal situation generally it is inappropriate and could confuse a good message if dialect and a strong accent is used.

I would never nod and smile at an essay handed in when the task was to write a poem nodding and smiling at dialect in particular situations in the classroom is basically in the same ball park.

Understanding right language for the right place is empowering! As a learned adult you can choose to break the rules but breaking the rules because you don't know them could sometimes make life difficult.

A school classroom is a formal setting which should be a forum for getting standard English right as well as through drama, poetry and fiction gaining a comprehension of your own dialect and accent and other peoples too.

A good example of people with good standard English are modern day BBC news readers. They often have regional accents - We can certainly tell where they are from but they speak in clear standard English. Well... they do when they are on the telly or radio - I am sure (and hope) ts are dropped and 'ain'ts' are uttered at afterwork drinks!

I don't see what the big deal is! My dc1 used to come home from school saying greeyun and bloowuh and skoowul (green, blue, school). I correct her every time. Now that's ironed out and she knows how to say it correctly no matter how local children are saying it. My parents did it for me and I'm grateful. My Dad says his parents did it to him. It's normal to guide your children towards a more moderated accent I think.

ps, i wouldn't expect the school to correct the children's accents though.

I agree with Edam about the ability to moderate your accent being an advantage. I think there's a window for that though. The fact that my dc1 CAN do it correctly and she's only 7 hopefully means that in the future, no matter how she talks in the playground, when she's older and with adults she will easily be able to lose the dodgy vowel sounds. I think some people get to an age where it's too late. It'd be as hard as speaking French with an authentic French accent.

I love the west country accent. Lots of our local accents are dying out, and the BBC has done lots of work recording people's speech so future generations will be able to hear accents and dialects which no longer exist.

I live in London, and I think that it is important to correct the poor grammar which often goes with our accent, but not necessarily the pronunciation. The accent that was previously associated with Kent and Essex has now virtually disappeared to be replaced with a more generic accent often described as estuary. I suppose language has to evolve but much colour has been lost in the process.

I think that if it interferes with learning to spell (i.e they use a phonic process), then correction is necessary, but otherwise not at all.

I often wonder about the sounds DS is learning tho... We are southerners, say "barth" and so on (tho I have a tendency to a Dorset drawl at times. They have taught them the long and short "oo" sound. So, "food" versus "look"... and it got me thinking... DH comes from Yorkshire, and has ben known to say "book" etc with a long "oo". Since it must be widespread accent wise, and doesn't affect spelling if they use either, do they just not teach the short 'oo' oop Narth.

Again, I was dong some voluntary work once, and was partnered with someone with a very broad Brummie accent. I could not make head nor tail of what he said. It took ages to tune my ear! I mainly smiled sweetly and tried to answer correctly!

Ahem.

OP - you are a snob. Nowt wrong with west country accent. My dd has got a broad west country accent, she sounds like Alice Tinker. Of course there is nothing wrong with it.

Pam Ayres is from Norfolk, isn't she?

Darth Vader was fron Bristol, he was the green cross code man (but voiced by James Eral Jones).

I like regional accents. Better than the generic elglish accent with slight estuary twang as populated by Tony Blair when he was trying to be 'matey'.

She doesn't really sound like Alice Tinker. Sorry dd

They teach the short oo for words like foot but here in Stoke book, look, cook took etc are the long oo as in food.

(Pam Ayres was born in Berkshire - says so on her own website.
Later lived in Oxfordshire.
Maybe her accent on tv is part of her screen/stage persona.)

I wish my DDs school would correct her accent. She's Lancashire born and bred, as was my mother - but thanks to me being raised in Essex and DD having picked up mostly my accent, she sounds like she comes from dahn sarf a bit. I'd much rather she had nice short vowels like her schoolmates. (its a private school and they do elocution but def not RP!)

Thanks islandofsodor! I thought they must have to do something a bit different!

This is a serious point that people should take into consideration, though, when making that 'Move out of London' decision because you don't like the traffic, the crime, the schools, the pollution, the fact that your child might be in a school with people who have English as a second language, the house prices, and we LOVE Dorset, the people are so friendly......oooh, no hang on, our children might start to talk like those people who have kived there all their lives