82 replies to this topic

[The Matt]

There is neither a B nor an L in the word chimney.

Dan, if that winds you up, you would HATE to live in this area. That's one of the many words that gets slaughtered by the locals!

Chimbley = chimney
Wire? = How are you?
Dunna = Don't
Canna = Can't
Shunna = Shouldn't
Wunna = Won't, not to be confused with want to!
Munna = Mustn't
Inna = Isn't
Seen = Saw, I don't know why, but an example would be "Guess who I just seen?"

It's a terrible state of affairs. We don't appear to suffer with this new version of 'ask' around here though, I think that must be a Southern thing? Also, nobody appears to remember to use the 'g' at the end of most words anymore.

People never seem to use the correct tenses either. Often talking about something that's already happened in the present tense.

One more thing, the use of the word 'like' at the end of every other sentence. It's annoying to say the least like

An example:

Wire mon? I seen Mike last night and he says that I shunna go drivin today. He says me brakes inna workin, but I dunna think there's nuffin wrong with em like. He tries em and says that he hears a grindin, but I tries em and they feels alright like. I canna see what's wrong, but when I seen him, he said I munna use it like.

[Southy]

I am also amazed at just how the youth of today cannot speak proper English anymore. I lost the hearing in one of my ears, due to an imploded ear drum, at the age of 3 and I struggled learning words whilst I was younger. I used to regularly visit a speech therapist to help try and improve my language skills after a referral by my Doctor, only for my mother to be told It wasn't necessary from the nurse, due to the lengths my mother went to before I started going to school to help improve my communication skills. These included, as has been said before, being read to and learning to write from an early age.

It wasn't till I actually started ATTENDING school when my problems began to surface, due to talking with the other children, I began to copy some of their traits and how they spoke. One of these traits was with words beginning with 'th' which until this time I pronounced perfectly, but I began to say these words like 'dere' and not pronouncing the 'th's correctly at the start.

It was only when I entered into year's 4 and 5 that a teacher actually noticed these mistakes which I had picked up and unlike the rest of the children, due to being partially deaf, I hadn't grew out of it. She then took it upon herself, to my embarrassment at the time, to make me stand up and make me keep repeating the words in class till I managed to get them correct. I look back at this now and I thank her for what she made me go through as I now, although far from perfect in some situations, I can speak good English. All this I was due, in my oppinion, because of the small class local school which I attended.

I persoanlly believe it's this level of lack of one-on-one teaching which is causing the deterioration in the modern language, mainly because of so many backgrounds being mixed together causing a clash of the language skills to intertwine together and the fact that modern schools are just becoming so crowded that it just isn't possible for this one-on-one to occur anymore.

[Jimmy Hat]

Well, it is a big problem round where we live... Not so much at school because its private, but we do get the odd one there who can't talk properly (who strangely seem to all have been expelled now) but round where we live its shocking... Not so much the grammar used, although thats shocking as well, its the fact that 99% of the kids round here cant string a sentence together without using some offensive word every 5 seconds (literally) and we have other unrelated problems like some chavs in knackered fiats racing down the high street (fortunately nowhere near where we live, but still sickening. Thats for another thread though)

[Mini_Rob]

I'm by no means perfect with spelling and grammar, but there are certain people who just take the *yellow human water* with not using any. Take my housemate for example, who seems to think that words can still be spelt without any vowels being used, or that the letter 'z' can replace 'said' in texts

[mister bridger]

At last I've managed to read through an entire thread and not only understand it all but agree with it! My personal hates are "ect" for "etc", and the use of the word "like" all the time - my 13 year old does this and I often count the number of times she does it in a sentence and run out of fingers. I lay the blame for this one squarely on US tv and films. I think she thinks she lives in California not Sussex.

[HollyBaby]

I dont just mean getting shot of SATS to make school fun - they need to change the way they teach full stop!

Thank god my daughter's school have never done them.

I loved Junior school - it was fun. We were allowed to get dirty, have fun and played games which actually educated us.

Secondary school was a whole different kettle of fish mind you - Im the dim one of the family!

*Caution. Slight rantage*
This is really interesting to me as a trainee teacher, unfortunately the whole curriculum and generally the teaching we do in schools is far too government controlled. Myself and most people in the teaching area all get upset and annoyed when we are blamed for things, as we are controlled by the government, sometimes local councils have voices, and
Some schools are lucky and successful in using a creative curriculum that doesn't focus too much on fun but keeps it balanced with an actual learning outcome. We are forced to follow the set objectives we must teach throughout the key stages, and as someone else mentioned there is far too much worry about childrens health and safety - which is one of the reasons I love the emails about being a kid in the 70's etc that say about all the stuff they did when they were younger and how they are perfectly fine now. Also as to why children are more likely to become ill as they are so sheltered from everything.

From most of my experience, I've found alot of schools having pupils who come from travelling families, and some cases where 80% of a class are children who don't speak english as a first language. Because of the backgrounds they are from, they rarely speak english or proper spoken english at home, and also never read to their parents or practice the spellings they are specifically given by their teachers/teachign assistants. However for the basic english children, alot of families and parents don't give them the support they need regardless of speaking english as a first language or having the time to work with them. So I've been impressed from time to time as some children from non-english backgrounds and their parents do sometimes put alot more effort in than english families.

Personally I'm a fan of creative teaching, the more interested the children are, the more fun they have without too much of a focus on the learning intention - the more they actually learn. Also cuts down on the amount of children really misbehaving just because they can't actually understand the task set in a lesson because they are told they must achieve that.

And as this has now become more or less a rant about teaching and such... I shall leave the thread to head back to funny words =)

Edited by HollyBaby, 19 April 2009 - 12:23 PM.

[The Matt]

*Caution. Slight rantage*
This is really interesting to me as a trainee teacher, unfortunately the whole curriculum and generally the teaching we do in schools is far too government controlled......

And that's hit the nail on the head right there!

Anyway, I think you (and all other teachers or trainee teachers for that matter) have a right to respond to this as you have done. In fact I'm glad you have. I have major problems with the education system of today. I am amazed by the way that children are educated. In the school I used to go to, they are no longer marked down for using text talk in their exams! That's a whole new level of ignorance right there, being allowed to sit an English exam and write 'U' instead of 'you'. We're allowing the 'system' to mutilate our language whilst we just sit back and complain about it.

We all know that the English language is a hybrid one anyway, drawing influence from all over the world, but it's in danger of disappearing without trace!

I'm afraid my feet are now firmly planted on top of my soap box. No, I'm not coming down! It's nice up here!

PS: Why doesn't the forum allow me to use a double space after a full stop? It frustrates me!

[shorty]

In the school I used to go to, they are no longer marked down for using text talk in their exams! That's a whole new level of ignorance right there, being allowed to sit an English exam and write 'U' instead of 'you'. We're allowing the 'system' to mutilate our language whilst we just sit back and complain about it.

there was a case last year (possibly, maybe the year before) where an English student wrote their entire exam in text talk (not sure what happened to the student) but it is outrageous that students would even think to write their essays in un-proper English.

[MD-IN-UK]

I have taken the time to read this thread completely before responding. Up to this point I have not noticed any American complaints, so let me be the first to throw in my opinion.

U.S. television is by far the worst example of the English language I know.
U.S. rules and regulations governing how students should be tought English are simply put, pathetic.

The general attitude of todays youth is far beyond the radical behavour of my early days. If you simply question a young person today as to what they mean when they say the things they do, your lucky if you get a nasty look in return. An actual answer is no longer expected. I believe it's because they don't know themselves what the answer is.

Simply put, we are raising a generation of idiots and no one is doing anything about it. Sadly, these "kids" will be the "grown ups" and future leaders of what we leave them. Something needs to be done and soon. Parents need to take a more agressive and active role in there childrens lives. When both are off to work eight hours or more a day, that has a tendency to leave a kid with a lot of spare time to knock around doing foolish things.

Somebody stay home with your child if you feel the need to have them so badly. I still don't understand how society has become so open to having children and letting strangers raise them for you. The results are clear, no one has a better interest in your childrens well being then you. If you don't wish to stay home and raise them as needed, then reconsider having any at all. If your career is so important, money is your true happiness, and success means so much to you, then forget about children, you don't need them, they'll only get in yourway.

Wow, that's sounds pretty harsh after reading it back, but I'll stand by it all the same. Decisions must be made, we can not keep going on like this anymore. The results are shocking, and it's time some serious changes in the way we think are made.

I'm no Einstien by any means, but I was raised with good old fashioned common sense. I make spelling and grammatical errors. But I try and that's what is important. When we can get todays youth to try to spell correctly, complete a sentence,use a little gammar. It never killed anybody to my knowledge.

It all starts at home, and while wer'e at it, lets take some time to re-educate some of these idiots that call themselves parents.

Rant over!

[yorkshirechris]

Lol Matt! I was going to say I use some of those words.. but I NEVER do in text unless it's someone who I know will understand them. And that's only because of my accent, I.e. "Can I" = "Canna", "Will not" = "Wont", etc. I don't think that's laziness, it's my inherited accent

As I've probably already said I completely agree with the people who say that parents should spend more time with their kids. I was always read to as a kid, bedtime stories etc, not coming from a well-off family my parents couldn't always afford a new games console or brand new TV - or in many cases simply wouldn't get me one because didn't feel it necessary. When I was younger they'd always buy me books or things that I could actually learn from. Whilst I hated it at the time as everyone else in school had one, I now realise that it probably did me a whole load of good.

There's a few types of poor parents, ranging from those where both parents work stupid hours instead of spending time with their kids; those that are well-off but ignorant to their childs educational needs; and the poorer parents, usually single parents, many of whom have an ingrained attitude that they don't have to actually go out there and work for a living so neither will their kids - no aspiration in life at all.

In fact, the ex lived on a really poor, not even working class (underclass?) council estate, and I remember her telling me of a conversation she had with a child on the street, I can't remember whether he was 5 or 8, I'm sure he was 5...

"What you going to do when you get older"
"Nothing"
"Why's that? You need to get a job don't you?"
"No I can get benefits like my mummy"



I didn't know whether to laugh, cry, or go around and slap the parent around her face.

[Down&Out]

I'm so glad you raised this Chris. I'm fed up of having to spend twice as long on here reading a reply by certain members who really cant be arsed to type properly. I mean let me give you an example: "real nice mate goin well look forward to seeing it done". That was a made up example, but to be honest, its pretty irritating to read. Because there's no punctuation involved in there at all. What it should have been was: "Really nice work there mate. It's going well, and i look forward to seeing it done. I mean, i know that im not sentence perfect on my typing on here. Meaning i dont put a capital on everything and all that... But i at least put the right punctuation in to make everyone else's life easier when reading it.

[ashby_steve]

i rekon diz srt of stuf is pretti stupid 2 cnt c y people av 2 do it, it ent evn ne easier lol

(i reckon this sort of stuff it pretty stupid too, i cant see why people have to do it, its not even any easier)

point made mucho? lol

[ZED]

good topic.

I believe that at the heart of all failings in today's society, not just spelling and speaking but the whole attitude to life that kids seem to have today is down to diseplin. Basic concequences.

the teachers used to give us a clip round the ear or send us to the headmaster for the slipper if we misbehaved or disrupted the lesson. My old geography teacher used to throw the board rubber ( with some accuracy ) at any kid who didn't shut up when told.

I wasn't the sharpest knife in the draw but I got 6 'o'levels when I left school in 1982, didn't help me get a job it has to be said but still, when my niece and her friends got their results last year it turned out that they didn't seem to do too well, one of them had 3 E's and an unclassified and they thought she had done well!

conclusion; if all kids got a smack round the face more often, it might make them pay more attention

Z

[ashby_steve]

sometimes people even extent words when typing em, lol

my personal most hated of the slang terms are -

love - luv - lv!

babe - bb - (the worst) - bbz????

and my biggest hate hate hate hate hate!!

when people cant be bothered to say thankyou n just say thnx or thx or even worse! ty grr lol

[yorkshirechris]

"Ty" annoys me too, as does "bk" in substitution for "back", and "itlaaradtcimmwc" in substitution for "I talk like an absolute retard and demonstrate this clearly in my written communication"